During our recent visit to Daroji Sloth Bear Sanctuary in India, as I mentioned in the previous blog below I was challenged to make natural looking images of bears. Second day I stayed off the usual place which photographers use to make images of bears from a vehicle hide. I thought of setting up a remote trigger at some place to try something different. So I set up a remote trigger at a place where there are good chances of seeing bears. Set up everything and at around 1pm I sat in my camouflage cloth covered car far away just waiting to see bears. Around 1:30pm it started getting very cloudy and there were very heavy thunder storms. I had setup my Nikon D200 with 50mm f1.8mm lens mounted and buried in ground and just covered the whole setup with a cotton camouflage cloth. I was sure my camera will get totally soaked in water with cotton camouflage cloth nicely adding to collect more water - yet I decided leave it there and take a chance. I was ready to foot repair bills for just one memorable image.
Sure, it continuously rained for next few hours. My whole setup took nice multiple showers for about next 4-5 hours. I just sat in my car thinking about my camera and lens. No bears showed up may be due to heavy rain. At around 5:30pm a few bears started coming down. I was just hoping to see them on the path where I set up the trigger. No, they did not show up there but went some where else. It is nature and luck. Can I expect to be successful with one day of experiment ? I realized I was dreaming.
At around 6pm it is time to return. I slowly drove down near my set up. Just out of curiosity pressed release button on my remote trigger. I could hear D200’s shutter releases !! Everything was working just fine even after getting soaked in water for 4-5 hours on the ground. I had all appreciations for the Nikon’s construction quality of both the camera and the lens. Though I came empty handed, my camera and lens were in the same state as it was before - may be better since it took a nice bath -:)
If successful I was hoping to get a view something like below (image credit - Shivakumar L. Thanks Shiv!). Instead of seeing yours truly there you would have seen a bear !!
I really cherish those moments of waiting in rain now even if I could not make any image. Sure I got some very valuable learnings from this experiment. It is not only the images which count but the experiences of making them are invaluable too - more so when we are doing something out of just passion.
