  Getting close to birds is a great challenge in wildlife photography. Bird
photography blinds may be the most effective and least intrusive way if
properly designed. However, the acoustic design of the blinds has been
overlooked so far. Herein, we present noise-cancelling blinds which allow
photographing birds at close range. Firstly, we conduct a questionnaire in the
eco-tourism centre located in Yunnan, China. Thus, we determine the birders'
expectations of the indoor sound environment. We then identify diverse
variables to examine the impact of architectural and acoustic decisions on
noise propagation. Finally, we examine the acoustic performance of the blinds
by considering the birds' hearing threshold. The numerical simulations are
performed in the acoustics module of Comsol MultiPhysics. Our study
demonstrated that photography blinds require a strong and thorough acoustic
design for both human and bird well-being.
