As a left-handed hunter, you learn to be patient well before ever hitting the woods. A left-handed hunter is definitely a minority in the hunting industry. If I want a new flagship bow for example, I can guarantee you that it will be 6-8 months after my buddies (right-handed) receive their bow before a lefty will be available. What’s even worse is that if I want to go shoot the new bows, that usually means I have to shoot a RH model. I realize you must cater to the majority to make money in this industry, but I digress. Now that I’m off my soapbox, let’s take this struggle past equipment and apply it to how I SELFILM my hunts.
SELFILMED hunting is a struggle in itself, but lets dig into how one sets up to film a whitetail hunt from a tree. You never know the exact location where you are going to get to take a shot, so you must set up where the highest percentage of shots will take place. To successfully SELFILM your archery hunts, you must be setup so that you can have your bow in one hand and move your camera with the other to follow the animal. Once your target is in frame and your shot presents itself, you must come to full draw and take the shot, then quickly back to the camera to film the retreat and post shot interview. Lets go over the configuration of a majority of consumer and professional video cameras on the market today. Most of these cameras have a flip out LCD display to give you a clear view of what you are filming. However, these displays tend to be on the left side. This works great for right-handed SELFILMED bow hunters. You have the camera and camera arm on your right hand side facing the woods, and have your bow in your left hand. The LCD display of the camera is in plan view to follow game and capture good footage. For a left-handed hunter, you still need to place the camera on your right side so you can see the display and capture good footage. This is where you now have to be creative. I rest my bow cam on my left leg with the bow canted forward and left hand fingers holding the string. When a shot presents itself I can go from operating my camera with my right hand straight to my bow’s grip, reposition left hand to my Carter release and come to full draw….and pray the animal stays in frame and you don’t need to move/reposition the camera to get it back in frame.
Another more costly solution I have debated is to attach an external, battery-powered LCD display on top of your camera and place the camera on your left side. This would allow me to operate the camera with my dominant hand and still see what I’m filming…problem solved, right? Well sort of. This leads me into the next SELFILMED Struggle: “Packing In all your gear” which will be posted soon.
I’m sure there are a few of you rolling your eyes and wondering what the big deal is….I’d be willing to bet you’re probably right-handed. Give it a try sometime and you’ll see what I’m talking about. For you lefties out there…I hope this has helped you come up with a workable solution to help you SELFILM your next hunt. Good luck!
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