The #1 Cause For Blurry Wildlife And Bird Photos - Don't Be A Victim (Heat Refraction, Heat Haze) 

Man the getting straight to point is so respectful of everyone’s time. Packed videos as usual - super informative!

I live on the East side of Washington State, and it's VERY flat here, and it gets very hot throughout the summer months. For years, I've been battling with soft, out-of-focus pictures, and I just couldn't figure out what I was doing wrong. This video explains SO MUCH about why my photos might not be coming out as sharp as they should be. Thank you.

Anyway... congratulations, you've just won my 'Most Depressing Video of the Month Award with Oak Leaves and Diamante Pins'. You also got Five Bonus Points toward any possible future Award by smiling and being so chirpy throughout the delivery. I get this bad 'round my parts for some shooting... and until i worked it out it was a nightmare. Now it's merely another source of disappointment. Well done presentation - i'd like to thank you but i'll save it for when you bring Good News! Kind regards from New Zealand.

Thank you for all your hard work and advice. I shoot mostly landscapes, and atmosphere/distance has always been an issue. Your additional focus on temperatures related to location and equipment makes me wonder how anyone ever gets a sharp image regardless of the subject. So much thought-provoking, excellent advice. Thank you!

You sure know how to dig deep! And you are right on the money!! Some of them I did not think of. Thanks! Always great videos!

The best wildlife photography channel by miles. Thank you very much for the tips!

I was aware of the obvious heat refraction, but never considered all your other examples. I am new to long-lens photography and I am realizing just how much of a new skill this really is.

The best video I've seen thus far that really explains this! Great job Steve!

Always sensible tips, Steve. I've been a fan for years, and appreciate your attention to detail!

It's absolutely worse in cold weather! (If, like many of us, you're sticking your long lens out of your car window). I had a particularly bad experience photographing short-eared owls in winter in Alberta, Canada with a new 150-600. The temperature difference between the inside and outside of my car was probably ~45degC (almost 90F).

The best scientific explanation which substantiates the theory of applied physics in photography.

Spot on, Steve, and ironic that you showed “shimmering cheetahs”. I had exactly that experience in Botswana last year with my first group of cheetah shots. I was excited like the proverbial kid in the candy shop when we finally laid eyes on a mother with her five cubs. However, the initial shots (distance, the open plain, time of day) were uniformly unusable. Fortunately, the evening and following morning brought lots of success. Same experience too for others in my group. Great tutorial, professor Perry. Thanks.

That lens hood example really hit me. I would have never expected this. Wow, thanks!

I always learn from your videos Steve! Thank you! :)

Been there, seen that! This is a great explanation of one of the most challenging problems to deal with. It's very well timed as well - it's the middle of spring here in the UK and I'm having major heat haze problems when the sun is up (which is rare, to be fair!). I've been on three consecutive shoots where I've come home and had to bin around three quarters of my images because of unexplained softness. I keep forgetting about heat haze, so I spent quite a long time blaming my equipment until I realised what was going on. Thanks for posting.

Wondering how many private investigators are taking notes on these car / house / window tips 😆

Very informative as usual! Well done again. 🙏

thats funny, yesterday i was saying to my wife that the thing i mostly keep in my head when shooting is not exposure neither composition and such (these pretty much come naturally at this point), but on how to minimize this damn blurr. I knew there was something up with the lens hood! thanks for this video, this is a very unspoken thing

This is subject matter for an academic paper! Thank you for sharing your expertise, not just opinion!

nicely done. I experienced much of these issues of several safari outings in South Africa last week.

Agree with you entirely. In fact i commented on it on a Topaz Gigapixel youtube about 2 months ago. An image can at first glance look OK but upscaling it will show heat distortion by magnifying it to be clearly observable and can make for some increadable shapes in distant buildings. As I am in Australia this is a constant problem. Often visible widely across the frame on an inland image, but on the coast it can be here and there in small samples in an image, particularly when there are buildings that attract heat interspersed with trees and greenery and an intermittent breeze coming off the sea. Noting the breeze drop where you take the photo from is no indication that it has dropped in the places chosen for the image, it is no guarantee it will be safe and clear. Temperature and breeze work in a mysterious way.

Experienced this at Yellowstone national park, very frustrating. Thank you for explaining.

Great information Steve! This situation is not high on the things I worry about when out shooting, bit it certainly should be. Thanks very much.

As always great video! Thanks Steve

Very nice topic i'm aware of it but you touched on others that i would of overlooked i am happy i subscribed to your site i am a photographer for more than thirty years and it only goes to show that we never stop learning thanks Mr Perry keep up the good work

Excellent! The dirty window analogy is on target. I had not considered the lens hood. I would have figured that since the heat diffraction occurs so close to the lens and not at all near where the focal point, as wells occurring in so thin a plane, it might not be that big of a deal. The dirty window analogy proves me wrong. Thanks, something to keep in mind. One "sort of" solution is to change your composition to a shot where sharpness isn't as critical. Zooming in on a lions eye at 300 yards may not be a good idea but a landscape shot showing the lion and some interesting landscape feature in the foreground or background may be the ticket. My pet peeve are lens reviews or user comments where they show an example of an "unsharp" lens where you can see the heat rising from the open ground.

Thanks! Very helpful to understand heat fraction!

I was shooting an airshow this past weekend on a hot day. The heat refraction/atmospheric distortion was awful. Your point about the animals in the trees is an important one. The further from the ground the less the problem. My jets that were closer to the ground had lots of sharpness issues but as I shot at higher altitudes my sharpness increased.

Great advice. Thank you!

I had just learned about heat refraction and this video was very informative. I feel better that it may not be me or the lens that make my photos blurry but heat refraction and wind also! Thank you for the video.

finally explains my soft images of wildlife in the arctic several years ago! looked exactly like camera motion, but ruled that out by high shutter speed! thanks!

Thanks for a great overview!!

Great advice I've put into practice. Thanks. 👍👍

Great info! Thanks!

Thanks Steve wonderful insight...I can relate to it.Have experienced it myself.

Brilliant video Steve! Tips for another video I would love to see! Dust on lenses, on the front/back/sensor dust! How it affects us and how to deal with it! I was reading an interesting article that dust on the back of the lens is will show up in images more than on the front element. Would love to see a video on this topic from you.

This is so relatable...suffered this last month...open field, middle of day, gray wagtail on a log...not a single image came out sharp due to the heat waves

Totally Agree about how frustrating it is.. I have to shoot so many more photos just to get a few in focus in good air.. also my tell-tale on heat refraction is.. if nothing is in focus then it's absolutely heat refraction.. if something is in focus but not the subject then it's just a miss.. Great Video!

Excellent vid, Steve!!!

Thanks this explains a lot!

Great as always! 👏👏👏👏

Great thorough explanations that have been affecting me alot.. Always happens to me out on our local islands with waterfowl landing in various ponds mid day and land, such as floooding corn fields. Shooting out my back door or always shooting from my truck. I am aware of alot of what you shared, but some times there can be multiple problems that when you think you solved one the other gets me. I have often wanted to send my gear back to Canon, but I was thinking this problem you shared has to be it since I can get sharp images some times. But more soft than sharp normally. Thanks for giving me hope.

Many thanks Steve for these really useful tips. Off to South Africa shortly so this will be very useful!

Your photographs are incredible!

Another great, informative video, Steve. Thanks! Here's another tip to avoid heat refraction. If possible, shoot from an elevated position. This isn't always desirable, especially if you'd be shooting down on your subject. But when being above ground level won't compromise your artistic vision for a photo, shooting from an elevated deck or other elevated position can place you and your camera above the most disturbed air. This is why research telescopes are installed at least one floor above ground level in their enclosures. It places the optics above the most disturbed air and allows them to form better quality images.

Great info thanks.

Cheers Steve great video 👍

Great vid. Thanks.

As a aviation photographer you're always confronted with heat haze, very difficult to avoid as airporst/runways are always open areas and every little sunbean can cause heat haze even at minus degrees.

Excellent advice. Thanks!

Thanks great info 👍

Thank you for this video. I was photographing a large ship from about a mile down a long river on a 30 deg. F day, and those were some of the softest shots I ever got with my 600mm lens. I thought my lens was acting up. Didn't think this was a problem in the cold, but it sure was...

Yup! Had a lot of this shooting over water on cold mornings just after sunrise recently!!

Never gave heat a thought. Thanks for tip

Great as always

I take a lot of water shots because I love the ocean. I have been struggling with my 150-600 and this may be part of the issue. Thank you so much for this video.

1:49, in 2016 when we got -26°C (-14.8°F) and seen the mirage on the Chainbridge pillar next to the Frozen Danube! It was really strange to see it, will never forget!

I live in Arizona, I have seen it. Thank you Steve.

Top notch video. I thought that I was doing something wrong. ❤❤❤ Thanks

Wow, how timely. My wife and I were in Yellowstone yesterday, we live close, (eat your heart out), and experienced this. Shooting from a turnout in the Lamar river canyon across the river to an Osprey nest. Pix soft - moved away from the car, not much better - moved off the asphalt, some better. Didn't think to remove the lens hood, but it was about 11 am with bright sun, cold river water, slight breeze and the nest was in the dead top of a lush green pine. We bailed and got some great pix of Pronghorn and a ratty red fox. Thanks for your tips, I learn much.

I run into this issue of heat refraction here in Phoenix, Arizona and so I will go early in the morning during summer time before the open areas are ovens. To your point, there is no correction for this in post processing, and the auto focus system has a real hard time with heat refraction as well. When that start to happens here, it is a sign to head home and enjoy the A/C.

I first noticed the heat refraction problem while photographing a football game with my 500 f4 on a turf field. At first, I couldn't understand why my pictures weren't sharp. I thought it might have something to do with the autofocus system, so I tried manually focusing on a stationary subject with the same unacceptable results. It then dawned on me that I was dealing with heat refraction. The problem was that I wanted to deliver a good gallery of pictures from the game...but that wasn't really going to be possible. The best I could do was capture some decent images when the action got much closer to my position.

Great video an it has shown me the problem is worse than I expected. I don't do any photography where the heat from the car could interfere except recently tried taking a photo of a sign without getting out of the car. It was not important or I would have been away from the car. Simply rolled down the window and focused on the sign at 70mm maybe 30 feet away. Using autofocus and it didn't look to be extremely sharp. I use single point. The shutter speed was certainly high enough and I thought maybe the eye adjustment was off. Took several photos. All were not sharp and obviously it was from heat. I was stunned and did not expect that!

I've had this problem many times in the Kalahari. Thanks for letting me know that I'm not alone! 😂 Particularly difficult when I'm not allowed to leave the vehicle. Opening windows on both sides to accelerate the creation of an air temperature equilibrium may help, plus removing the lens hood. Certain times of the day may also be more prone to atmospheric aberrations.

Yeah, this got me yesterday, 600 mm canon on a mud flat with temps in the 80 f range as soon as I took the first round of photos and previewed them, I knew I was in trouble. My issue is I keep clicking away, hoping I’ll get that One great shot. Back on Lightroom, I find 99% of the “nailed it “ photos are unusable. But still, I’m addicted and happily keep on clicking looking for the one!

I had quite a bit of heat refraction in my shots during the last soccer game I shot, and it was cold, like 4 C (39 F) but sunny. One additional tip is that you can also recognize that refraction is there by checking your bokeh pattern, it looks quite a bit different. I've also experienced the car case - shooting from a car into cold weather also pretty much guarantees the refraction softness.

Great. THank you very much.

Thanks Steve

Hey Steve, great video, it's the most frustrating thing! Especially when you have slaved and saved for top end gear, come back with a CF card full blurry shots! 🤣 Have you ever done any testing with a polarized filter? I brought the Nikon drop in filter for the 800mm F6.3, obviously the stop of light loss isn't great but it seems to have quite a positive impact on heat haze if you get the angle set right. Sadly we have a never ending winter in UK at the moment so my testing time has been quite limited but hopefully (maybe) at some point we'll get some decent weather and I'll get out to test more.

I really noticed that for the first time on my trip to Arizona last November especially trying to take pictures of Roadrunner or Burrowing Owl and i could see it in my 400mm lenses.

Thank you for this. I knew about it, have been victim to it, but forgot it on my last trip...could not get that focus on the black bear's eye at the end of the meadow!

Great explanation and complete, too, in terms of heat refraction. If you want tack sharp images, then test your camera both handheld and on tripod, and see where your own limitation becomes visible. With my old 24MP Nikon D camera I suffered from motion blur a lot, more so than in the film days. I figured this out in about 2012 and US photographer Joel Grimes shared this in his YT video, long time ago, with his viewers telling that art directors asked him why his photos were a lot sharper than those of his competitors that used exactly the same cameras and lenses. Moving to the Z system, to me the Z 7 seemed less sensitive to that. Then the Z 7ii seemed the same. Now the Z 8 is at another level. While people often talk about "sensor readout" we have to understand that the time the sensor, stacked first line processor, and main processor take to read the sensor and produce the raw image, is not the same as "exposure time". With an electronic shutter that must be very clear. I would also add the opposite of a hot environment. In icy cold circumstances, Steve, you explained about heat refraction in the lens hood and it may be a heat source too. But shooting in the icy cold when this becomes an issue, we have to take care in bringing the camera out of the cold into a warm environment - because of condensation. I would do those things instinctively, but when I saw Morten Hilmer shoot must oxen in Norway with his Z system, and it was about -20C (-4F) it took me some time to relate this back again to the rule book. He placed his camera with lens on the icy cold snow and returning to his tent left it outside. Here my only question was, your camera and the memory cards you use are guaranteed to 0C (32F) and this still works? Wow. Imagine products that do what is promised ...

Done it a few times trying to capture ships here in the sound between Sweden and Denmark. Guess I need to know water and air temperature, or just go out in grey days. Excellent video!

Once again, a wildlife photography subject that directly affects sports photographers. For us, the most common instances of heat refraction is on artificial turf fields. It gets so bad that anything above a 200mm is useless. For sports, we generally try to shoot from a low position, but with heat haze, we have to move a higher position. I agree, fixing in post is extremely difficult or nearly impossible. Topaz Photo AI will fix faces, but it can't satisfactorily fix the rest of the image.

Thanks Steve , Heat Refraction is also more commonly known as “Mirage “…! 🧐 cheers

I find most of the time with no wind it's wise. A wind of 10mph or more usually eliminates the heat shimmer. I see this almost always in places known for bad shimmer like Bombay Hook NWR where there are 3 large open area pools

8:06 This is good stuff!

Such a great educational video. Heat haze has been on my mind lately because I'll be spending copious amounts of time photographing out of a photographic blind on a farm. I have turnable air vents up top to release the hot air. We sat in a buddy's similar blind and I used a FLIR thermal monocular to see where the heat was going. None was coming out of the areas where the lenses stick out. My Mom is an amazing seamstress so she engineered camouflage covers stapled on the inside of the blind. They wrap around the lens and cinch tightly The heat was going off those vents. Of course, I won't use heat unless absolutely necessary. I also shut it down as soon as I see heat haze. Done deal. My shooting for the day is over. Of course, should I go to Africa someday, I won't have that choice necessarily! lol

You can easily check for heat diffractions if they're present by looking through the mirrorless viewfinder (or LCD) and then magnifying the image. If they're present, then the entire image will "dance" and "move around". If they're not too severe, there will be brief moments with "holes" in those heat waves, as they move through sort of like fog. You will see the photo get sharp all of a sudden, then go back to "dancing" again. In those moments it's possible to get a good, sharp photo. So the trick is to just take lots of photos and hope you get some at the right moment.

Excellent lesson. May I add something? The closer to the ground, the worse the effect.

Two other (perhaps more unusual for most) examples where this is a problem: 1. Photographing volcanic eruptions. If there's a flow of lava in the foreground, the resultant heat haze will make the entire photo way too fuzzy/soft. Only way to deal with that is to see if there's a (safe!) angle that avoids that. 2. Underwater photography in an area with hot/warm spring sources. The water in those areas will be massively blurry.

Thank you. Don’t forget the opposite- cold. This is the result of a colder equipment (air conditioner) going out into a warmer climate. Sometimes it is very obvious in condensation building up on the lens. Other times not so obvious to the naked eye, but will appear on the photo as softness or light fog/haze. In this case time out for equilibration of temps. I have done this inadvertently when in Florida. The equipment sits in the house which is cooler. This can happen when driving in an air conditioned car for a prolonged period time too. I grab the bag and go to a location 30-45 minutes later and open the bag. The camera could feel cooler. Simple matter of waiting 15-20 minutes with camera out of bag. It would be good to keep lens cap on to avoid any excessive moisture build up. Times may vary in higher humidity areas and temperature differential.

I was out 1 day where the clouds were passing over like zebra stripes, sun, clouds, sun... once the clouds would block the sun I would have to wait 5 minutes until the distortion started to lower and my images would get sharper and sharper, right as there was almost no distortion the sun would come back out! So frustrating, so that day I had only 2 minute intervals to take photos.

Thank you for great tips as always. But I have a question. I shoot with Nikon d500 never had any of these issues. And then all of a sudden pictures are not as sharp and soft ish. I tried different lenses and same affect. I tried the lenses on my d850 and no problem. Any help is really appreciated.

This has even happened to me in a heated cathedral.

Very good as always, Steve. I have a supplementary issue that I'd be keen to know your thoughts about. While staking out an area before dawn, the lens acclimatises but, if it's cold and damp weather, condensation can then form on the lens. I have used an astrophotography heat band to stop the condensation occurring, but presumably then run the risk of lens hood induced heat haze? Thanks very much 😊

Refraction and humidity are the #1 reasons I hate to love soaring birds.

I had heat refraction issues recently with a 4 degree Celsius morning and a warming sun running the ambient overall temps higher, cooler ground and warming air, nightmare

Also, just plain atmosphere. The more atmosphere between your lens and the subject, under any conditions, the more sharpness suffers. This is why I am always skeptical of photographers who claim they use high megapixel cameras because it "allows" them to crop in on distant subjects. Sure, you got the pixels, but you also have the atmosphere! That's why I always tell them: high megapixel cameras are great for making huge prints, but as a substitute for doing the hard work of getting close, not so much.

Hi Steve! In the astronomy world we suffer the same problem, except now the tube of air, say between us and the Moon is the whole thickness of the atmosphere including winds in the stratosphere moving at hundreds of miles an hour! We solve this by shooting movies and stacking the frames. The software then looks for the best frames and stacks only them improving your chances of getting the sharpest shot. This of course assumes the subject does not move. I wonder if anyone has tried this with a stationary animal.

Thanks for this tutorial, Steve. Who would have known! By the way, it would be great to have your take on printing your wildlife images. Do you do it yourself or do you use a printing service? Your insights are always most welcomed!

The fact you are using a Real camera smells simple. Most now think their grease covered phone is a Million dollar camera.

Bald Eagles are rare in my area, one day I spotted one across a pond near me and I fired away... no one single keeper, all images soft due to heat refraction.

I recently took my 800mm lens plane spotting and the haze led to me not getting a single sharp photo. It can be a real bummer!

At times when filming video my Nikon tries to continuously focus, in n out, in n out. This explains my struggle. Thank you. Would change in focal length in setup help?

can a UV filter help? thank you for the video btw

Perry... I dream of heat refraction. I live in the UK!

Hey Steve can I use exposure compensation in manual mode with auto iso on the z8 ?

I first noticed this effect when taking pictures of the moon which was positioned over a house...The results were a picture of the moon that looked like it was boiling. Session learned. What is your opinion on heated lens hoods ?? Thank you.

Hallo Steve. What about heat refraction with a filter placed in front of the lens? Thank you. Jan, The Hague, The Netherlands.