The Wild in Motion: Filming Wildlife in Kruger with the Manfrotto ONE Hybrid Tripod

Shot by Bernard Masson, Sébastien Devaud & Rémi Vacher

In wildlife filmmaking, motion is the image.

A slow reveal through the trees. A long-lens pan following movement across the bush. A static frame waiting for the smallest shift in tension, an ear twitch, a glance, a breath.

In the Greater Kruger area, those moments rarely arrive on schedule. Sometimes you have less than a minute between spotting something and losing it again. The challenge is not only reacting quickly, but reacting without losing control of the image.

That was the reality of this shoot in South Africa, where we travelled to film the presentation movie for Izakithi, a newly built luxury lodge created by my friends Keshy and Rémi Vacher.

The final lodge film now appears as the opening hero video on the Izakithi website.

What this article can explain better than the finished video itself is the pressure behind those images: the waiting, the unpredictability, and the importance of working with a support system that never slows the moment down.

Our compact field setup

For this project, we kept our equipment lightweight and adaptable.

Rémi and I both worked with the ONE Hybrid tripod system side by side, in the same locations and under the same shooting conditions.

That became one of the most interesting aspects of the experience: two creators using the same platform for completely different types of image-making. Filmmaker vs photographer.

Two creators, two different pressures

The difference between wildlife filmmaking and wildlife photography becomes obvious very quickly in the field.

As a filmmaker, my priority was movement. Every pan, every hold, every tracking shot had to feel smooth and controlled, especially when working with longer focal lengths. In cinema, unstable movement immediately pulls the audience out of the moment.

Rémi’s pressure was different. Wildlife photography happens in fractions of a second. Stability, readiness, and lens support become critical when shooting with heavy telephoto setups like a 600mm lens.

That’s where the Manfrotto ONE concept started to make sense in real conditions. The same system answered two very different needs.

For me, the Carbon version made sense because we were constantly repositioning, moving between the terrace, vehicles, and open areas around the lodge throughout the day. The lighter build mattered during long shooting sessions.

For Rémi, the Aluminium version provided a feeling of rugged stability, while maintaining speed and precision when working with large lenses.

Same Manfrotto ONE platform, different priorities.

The Kruger rule: be ready in 30–60 seconds

One of the biggest misconceptions about wildlife filmmaking is that it’s constant action.

In reality, it’s mostly waiting. And then suddenly everything happens at once.

Around the lodge, speed and readiness mattered most.

We kept a telephoto lens permanently mounted on the ONE Hybrid so the setup was always ready to go. When wildlife suddenly appeared, elephant families moving through the bush, crocodiles surfacing near the riverbank, hippos emerging from the water, there was no time to rebuild or rethink the setup.

The camera was already positioned, already level, already balanced. We simply framed the shot and reacted in real time using the 500X fluid head fast, controlled movement.

Inside Kruger Park, the workflow became more situational. In tighter vehicle conditions where deploying a tripod was not realistic, I used the FAST GimBoom as a lightweight monopod-style support. It stayed responsive and quick to reposition while still giving enough stability for long focal lengths and fast reactions.

Whenever we reached locations that allowed us to step out and settle into a scene, we switched back to the ONE Hybrid tripods for more controlled shooting.

That stability became especially important when working at distance or waiting patiently for behaviour to unfold naturally, whether filming lions, cheetahs, rhinos, or quieter moments where precision and silence mattered more than speed.

What mattered most in the field

Speed under pressure

One of the biggest practical advantages during the shoot was how quickly the setup adapted to changing conditions.

Moving between wildlife movement, architectural shots of the lodge, and handheld gimbal work happened constantly throughout the day. Fast height adjustments with XTEND helped keep those transitions fluid instead of interrupting the momentum of filming.

The tripod never felt like something that needed negotiation before the next shot.

Low-angle shooting changed the kind of shots we attempted

The ability to remove the centre column and move quickly from standard operating height to a very low ground-level setup became surprisingly important.

In wildlife conditions, perspective matters enormously. A lower angle can completely change the feeling of movement, scale, and tension within the frame.

Vertical framing is now part of wildlife storytelling

Rémi’s photography workflow highlighted something that feels increasingly true today: we rarely shoot for only one final format anymore.

Fast transitions between horizontal and vertical framing helped maintain shooting rhythm without losing the moment to technical adjustments.

Switching between fluid and motorized movement

One of the most practical parts of the setup for me was the XCHANGE system.

On location, I could move from the 500X fluid head to a motorized head in seconds depending on the type of movement I wanted to create.

Fluid movement

For filmmaking, the tripod is only part of the equation. The fluid head is what ultimately shapes movement.

Throughout the shoot, the 500X became essential for:

• long-lens pans

• controlled reveals

• stable static holds

• and wildlife tracking shots that remained smooth under pressure

Long focal lengths are unforgiving. Even small imperfections become visible immediately. That’s why fluid movement is not simply aesthetic in wildlife filmmaking, it’s part of maintaining immersion.

When support gear disappears, it’s doing its job

What stayed with me most after filming in Kruger was not a specific feature or specification.

It was the fact that the support system gradually disappeared from my attention entirely.

The setup stayed fast, lightweight, adaptable, and reliable enough that I could stay focused on what was unfolding in front of us, the changing light, distant movement in the trees, the tension before something appeared.

From a filmmaking perspective, that meant I could stay inside the motion without thinking about the mechanics behind it.

Rémi experienced the same principle differently. As a wildlife photographer working with long telephoto lenses, it meant absolute trust in the frame at the exact moment of capture.

For both of us, in different ways, the best support system is the one you stop noticing.

And in the wild, that difference matters.