I watch many hunting programs and few are not jammed with by “buy this best latest and greatest product commercials” and I understand that bills have to be paid. What I have a problem with is “In range footage”! I have seen numerous hunters have a big buck in range with it’s head down feeding and relaxed and they are more concerned about extensive footage of him alive than taking the best shot offered! They wait until he is about to leave and is on edge and then you here, ” I am going to take him “! Now comes a bad or marginal shot that would have been a great shot 30 seconds earlier. Do they not realize that a real hunter doesn’t want to see the big buck walking around alive. We are all screaming ” Kill him “! I also here the excuse that the camera man had a different angle and he wasn’t an open shot for the hunter ! Really, you are in a pop up blind and the deer is wide open! I know the object is to get the kill on film, but when the good shot is offered, it should be taken then! In this day and age, we have slow motion and rewind on every TV so we know when a bad shot is made and we can see if the deer really jumped string, or if it was just a bad shot! The question is I guess…Why do these guy’s try to have so much in range footage when no real hunter wants to see that? I love you video’s and it’s nice to see guy’s trying to do it right! Keep it up!
There's a lot to unpack in here. First off, thanks for watching the show! We appreciate it. I can't speak for all shows, but having more than a decade of experience filming hunts, I can tell you that in most cases this is clever editing, and the fact that the cameraman and hunter truly do have different points of view of the animal. I know it doesn't seem like much, but a few feet to one side or higher/lower in a stand can make a world of difference between what the camera sees and what the hunter sees. I experience this quite a bit even when I'm filming myself and the distance between me and my camera is only a foot or two.
Editing plays a big part in this as well. Many shows have a tendency to chop up the footage to make it appear longer. Show the deer in the field - cut to the hunter in the stand/blind - back to the deer - back to the hunter - and so on. Many times, the footage of the hunter in the stand or blind is recreated after the shot. This whole thing makes it appear that the animal is in range for much longer than it is. People who film for these shows are real hunters just like everyone else, and they almost always shoot as soon as the first good opportunity presents itself.