Aug
06
One point five million wildebeest cross the Mara River every year on the way to or from Kenya and Tanzania. On this occasion, some 10,000-15,000 traversed at this point in the river, taking almost an hour and a half to pass. What a photograph cannot capture is the sound, and I also think any photo would find it difficult to catch the mayhem involved as well.
This one small part of the crossing last September featured one wildebeest who found himself facing the wrong way while trying to make it to the other side. The surge of his fellow wildebeest made it near impossible to turn. I watched for a while but eventually lost sight, so I did not know what became of him.
It is one of three images that reached the final round of the Veolia Wildlife Photographer of the Year for me this year. Which was a good bonus because I entered this quite literally at the last minute, because I felt I had nothing to lose by doing so.
Taken using a Nikon D700 with 70-200 zoom lens at 200mm, f/5.6, 1/350th, and ISO 400.
Aug
03
Elephants, Kwando, Botswana.
Today I’ve posted another free desktop wallpaper of an elephant family available for download at my Facebook page. It’s a high quality full resolution image, suitable for all monitor sizes. But to download the images you’ll have to join my page by liking it first which gives you free access to the download links.
This one is of an Elephant family traversing a waterhole in Kwando Botswana. The sun was setting, providing the wonderful light that Africa is well known for at that time of day.
This download is available for a limited time only, so be quick and get it from my Facebook Wildlife Photography page while you can. It’s under the Freebies tab to the left of my page there.
Links:
My Wildlife Photography Page on Facebook
Click here to download a free desktop wallpaper of this elephant family.
Jun
25
Pride of Place, Serengeti National Park, Tanzania, 2007.
I put my photos up at 500px.com/davidlloyd these days which has shown in recent months to threaten to become the premiere photo-sharing website on the internet, usurping even firmly established sites such as flickr and Photobucket in more ways than one.
My Five Top Wildlife Photographers on 500px
Following on from Trey Ratcliffe’s recent Favourite Five 500px Photographers post at Stuck in Customs, I’ve decided too to cobble together a top five such list myself, under the Wildlife genre.
I’m sure there are many I’ve not had the priviledge to discover yet, but these are the top five I have found so far. For wildlife photography, I am defining that as photography of animals in the wild – untamed and free, so while there are very good captive animal photographers (i.e Marina Cano and Wolf Ademeit), I’ve decided to keep my selection to just that – exclusively that of photographers of free roaming wildlife.
So, in no established order, my current favourite wildlife photographers on 500px are:
Read More»Jun
05
A seven day Masai Mara annual migration photo tour for only $3,300 (or £2,000).
I am offering an exclusive photo tour to the Masai Mara in Kenya during the last week of August for seven days for a price that I think would be very hard to beat. The price is good because I am organising this as a strictly one-off non-profitable tour.
We’ll be staying in a private luxury mobile camp, set aside especially for our group in what I believe to be one of the best locations within the Masai Mara itself. You’ll also have access to exclusive vehicles of no more than two photographers per 4×4 vehicle, just perfect for wildlife photography.
And we will be photographing the greatest wildlife spectacle on earth, the annual migration in the Masai Mara in Kenya. We can photograph the great river crossings where crocodiles lie in wait for the wildebeest to cross, and we will also see elephant, leopard, lion and cheetah and even, if we’re lucky, black rhino.
For more about the tour, the dates and cost, read the details at the Masai Mara Photo Tour page where you can also find more about camp and vehicles and the full tour itinerary.
May
16
While photographing a leopard last month in Kenya, this seven month old cub surprised us all by bundling out of the bushes having been called by the elder one, its brother as it happens, who was baby sitting while mother was out hunting. We were fortunate, cubs are seen infrequently, and I don’t think there are many things to photograph that are cuter than leopard cubs.
This was a cub of Olive, a leopard made famous by the BBC’s big cat diary.
Taken using a Nikon D3s with 200-400 zoom lens at 400mm, f/5.6, 1/250th, and ISO 1600.
May
02
This elephant female certainly looked to be dancing, and to be honest I’m not too sure what she was trying to do here. She was just metres from our vehicle, so maybe it was a half hearted mock charge, given the position of her ears. I shot this at wide-angle, and a few inches above the ground last month in the Masai Mara, Kenya.
Taken using a Nikon D3s with 24-70 zoom lens at 35mm, f/9.5, 1/750th, and ISO 400.
Apr
25
Last week’s Masai Mara trip may not have yielded my hoped for black cloud and rain – it was meant to be the short rains there – but more than made up for it with six encounters with three leopards and one cub, which is the most I’ve experienced in one visit there.
I’d like to say it’s good to be home again, but I’ll be honest and say I’d rather still be out there. Oh well, August, my next trip, is only four months away.
Taken using a Nikon D3s with 200-400 zoom lens at 270mm, f/5.6, 1/500th, and ISO 400.
Mar
28
This is the original colour version of the monochrome one of an elephant matriarch which I posted here last December. It’s one of a few pictures that proves just as strong in colour as it does in black and white. I took her picture from quite low down, about two inches or so off the turf, last November in the Masai Mara in Kenya.
I couldn’t have been luckier with the sky and light, and when I saw it, we quickly located and chose this matriarch, primarily because she was in the right place, and certainly because she had the nicest looking tusks in her group.
I posted this here today much because this picture appeared on EarthShot’s Photo of the Day today.
Taken using a Nikon D300 with 12-24 zoom lens at 20mm, f/11.0, 1/180th, and ISO 500.
