A great technique in bird and wildlife photography is shooting at eye level. Eye-level shots are often more intimate – they give better subject isolation and are typically more engaging. Libor and Massimo have recently written about how much they love this approach to wildlife photography, and I don’t disagree. But are eye level shots always better? Not necessarily.
Let me start with the positives. When you’ve got the right conditions, shooting wildlife photos right at eye level can produce dreamy and beautiful shots free from distraction. At eye level, the background is far away, and the ground or water melts gracefully in and out of the frame. It can also be possible to include more of the background landscape when shooting at eye level, which is often very cool.
But sometimes there is a danger of applying the eye-level technique too often and too stringently. The dreamy look it offers can be quite beautiful and addictive, but that doesn’t mean other sorts of photos are necessarily worse.
One exception I often find is shooting on the water. If you photograph from a higher vantage point rather than eye level, you are more likely to capture ripples and patterns, or the traces of an animal’s movement. These can be quite beautiful elements, and they add a dynamic sense of environment to the photo.
Of course, even when dealing with water, eye level shots are often beautiful. But constantly gravitating towards their unique boldness risks forgoing the beauty of a slightly higher shot that showcases the movements of water.
Sometimes, eye-level shots might simplify a little too much! If the depth of field is narrow, you may end up removing all context from the image. In such cases, shooting a little above eye-level can provide just enough of the little world inhabited by your subject, resulting in a better sense of place.
Both approaches to wildlife photography are imbued with a different sort of feeling. Certainly, the contrast of an animal against a background of flowing colors is striking. It feels different compared to the juxtaposition of natural patterns and rich texture that is more characteristic of higher-angle shots. But whatever emotions one ascribes to these different styles, they are indeed different, and they are both worth exploring without thinking one is better than the other.
I also think it’s best to think of “eye-level or not” as a continuum. The question is not whether you should get down to eye-level, but how far should you get? Each centimer means a different shot, tells a different story, and brings a different feeling.
There is nothing wrong with eye-level shots. Often, the resulting dreamy outcome agrees with the serenity of being immersed in the animal world. And yes, sometimes higher-levels shots that show more ground just have no sense since they rudely push elements into the viewer’s attention that would otherwise be distant. But, at other times, there is abounding beauty in those higher angles ripe for exploration.