Professional nature photography, or so I’m told, is a life of tedium and routine, but the downs are more than outweighed by not only the great photos one gets, but by the experience of communing with nature—especially animals. That experience is shown in an piece on deMilked called “20 pictures showing that nature photographers have the best job ever.” Go have a look; I’ll show just a few (image sources given when specified). I’m sure some of these are setups, but not all of them!
OMG!!!:
h/t: Rick
Great pictures; thank you for sharing.
Oh no I love them all <3
I wouldn’t trust that fox behind the woman! Looks like a goosing is about to take place!
That one cracked me up!
cr
Everything these days is OMG but these pics were the real thing OMG and wonderful to see.
I wholly concur with ALL that you state, Ms Rose: the true O M G these particular pix !
Just darling !
Blue
Wow. Those are just wonderful.
I am laughing, and totally agree. It is fun. I am also drooling at all of those ‘L’ series Canon lenses! The red ring of quality.
Sweeeet! Especially the fox near the iglo.
Grrrrrrreat!
This post was worth a forward! Very lucky, very memorable photos.
Plenty of the posts here are worth a forward, but I meant that this one will be of particular interest to some of my local naturalist friends who don’t read English.🐰
“life of tedium and routine”
Punctuated by moments of stark terror.
And ‘eewwww!!’
Ooo…
The cheetah has a collar. But the mongoose I seem to remember, it was an showcase of how adaptable/unafraid they can be IIRC.
The foxes shown seems hard to out-fox. Except possibly the understudy.
Oh, it’s “outfox” of course!
I was right on the mongoose. Where I saw it I cam’t remember, but here is more images and a video from Lucas. (With baby mongooses!)
“Of all the wild animals he has photographed, Will Burrard-Lucas has never encountered a species that utilized his body to get a higher vantage point to scout for predators.
Unlike lions, leopards, and elephants—animals requiring Burrard-Lucas to deploy his Beetle-Cam creation to photograph them up close—the meerkats of Botswana proved an easy “get” for the British wildlife photographer, who enjoyed a close encounter with the social animal.
“It was a completely unique experience,” Burrard-Lucas told GrindTV Outdoor in an email. “I have photographed habituated animals before, but they rarely climb all over you. Meerkats, on the other hand, like to get high vantage points so that they can scan for predators. This means they are more than happy to jump on your head if they can!
“The babies were also wonderful, and, since I was able to spend so much time with them, they were totally fearless of me!”
[ http://www.grindtv.com/wildlife/meerkats-use-wildlife-photographer-as-scouting-perch/ ]
Oops, “meerkats” is the specific species.
I would say that most of these photos were set up. The photographers with the ‘glass’ (i.e. the f/2.8 400mm/600mm lenses) would all have had tripods or monopods normally, but none of them do.
The one with the bluebird on the head is impossible, since that long lens probably does not have such a close working distance.
Isn’t that what is humorous about the situation? Photographer equipped with long lens to get pictures of shy wildlife. Wildlife not shy at all and lands on his head far too close for the lens to be any damn use! Unpredictable animals not doing what you’d expect is, I’d imagine, one of the frustrations of the job but in situations like this also one of its joys.
I don’t see any reason to assume this must be faked.
The bluebird is a scrub jay (Aphelocoma Sp.), a corvid.
I got up close and personal with some Florida scrub jays (Aphelocoma coerulescens) some years ago working on a fire ecology project. They travel in family groups and often check out people in their territory because they have learned they can get food from them. The group will fly in and one or two birds will take up perches and act as sentries, looking out for predators while the others try to get treats. I literally waved a peanut a foot in front of a sentry and (s)he ignored me while the others were eating. They would not be dissuaded from their task.
Plus of course, there had to be someone else there to take the photo.
I’d find some of those situations frustrating – how can you focus on something that’s got its face stuck in your lens?
But anyway, set-up or not, it’d be marvellous to be that close to those animals.
cr
I love them, and remember the kakapo too.
Sweet.
Cute photos.
Not hard to see why Professor Coyne crowned foxes as Honourary Cats.
Fan-TAS-tic! My fave is the fox looking in the lens sticking out of the “igloo” blind. 😀
I’d like to contribute The Famous Bear Photographer even though the owner of the camera seems to be out of the picture, somehow.
In the bear’s tumtum perchance?
Lovely pics – looking forward to visiting the original post – thanks for the link.
Let’s make up captions for the photos!
I’ll start. First picture:
“Not now, dear, I’m trying to get a good picture of a cheetah.”
Second picture:
“You’re going to need more lens, pal. You’ll never get close enough to a fox to get a good picture with that thing…you gonna finish that sandwich?”
What was the adorable little weasle-y looking animal in the 5th picture? It’s so cute!