PORTFOLIO
Some of the best shots from the annual Wildlife Photographer of the Year competition.
The Wildlife Photographer of the Year competition, which is developed and produced by the Natural History Museum in London, attracts inspirational images from photographers around the world. This year was no different: WPY 2019 had more than 48 000 entries from 100 countries. Yongqing Bao from China walked away with the overall prize for his comical shot of a Tibetan fox and a marmot, frozen in the middle of an altercation.
On the South African front, Cape Town resident Thomas Peschak did well with three photographs in the top 100 (his shot of a curious grey whale is featured in this portfolio) and young Branson Meaker from Durban North received a Highly Commended award in the 11 – 14 age category for his photo of a lechwe titled,
“The Aquabatic Antelope”. Seems like photography runs in the family: Branson’s brother Skye won the Young Wildlife Photographer of the Year prize in 2018.
For a gallery of all the winners, point your web browser to nhm.ac.uk/visit/wpy.html. If you happen to be in the UK, the exhibition is running at the Natural History Museum until 31 May 2020, after which it will travel to countries like Canada, the USA, Germany and Australia.
Entries are already open for the 2020 competition. What are you waiting for?
The Art of Conception Stefan Christmann, Germany
Stefan won the Wildlife Photographer Portfolio award for his series of images depicting the tender lives of emperor penguins in Antarctica. The penguins form a bond with a new partner each year and are monogamous for the season. Courtship includes bowing, preening and calling to each other. After the female chooses her mate, she lies down on the sea ice to signal that she is ready, then the male climbs on her back.
“The male struggled to keep his balance,” says Stefan.
HOW? Nikon D810, 400 mm lens, shutter speed 1/400 second, aperture f5.6, ISO 800.
Touching Trust Thomas P Peschak, Germany/South Africa
A curious young grey whale approaches a pair of hands reaching down from a tourist boat in San Ignacio Lagoon, off the coast of Mexico’s Baja Peninsula. The whales often seek out contact with people for a good head scratch – this one came so close to Thomas that he battled to focus his camera.
Grey whales once shared this breeding ground with fishing boats. The whales were aggressive towards the boats, perhaps because they associated them with the whaling industry that nearly saw them become extinct. Since the bay has received conservation protection, interactions have been friendlier. The population is recovering, and responsible whale watching is now a booming industry. Thomas’s photo was highly commended in the Wildlife Photojournalism category.
HOW? Nikon D3S, 16 mm lens, shutter speed 1/400 second, aperture f9, ISO 1 250, in a Subal underwater housing.
Scatter Pattern Jérémie Villet, France
Spooked by the sudden arrival of a gyrfalcon, hundreds of guillemots leave their cliff-side nesting ledges and take to the sky. Every spring, breeding pairs of guillemots – along with kittiwakes, Atlantic puffins and razorbills – return to nest on this uninhabited island off the Varanger Peninsula in Norway.
Jérémie had switched to a relatively wide 35 mm lens moments before the gyrfalcon swooped in. With no time to change back to a telephoto lens, he was forced to be creative, shooting upwards as the mass of seabirds flew overhead.
Jérémie left his studies to travel alone to wild places, by ski and sled. His series of Arctic images won him the Rising Star Portfolio award.
HOW? Canon EOS 5D Mark IV, 35 mm lens, shutter speed 1/2 500 second, aperture f14, ISO 2 500.
The Challenge
Françoise Gervais, Canada
In August, mid-summer, a lone polar bear cuts a diminutive figure as it scales a steep scree slope on Baffin Island in the Canadian Arctic; an ice-dependent marine mammal out of place in a dry, barren landscape.
Climate change has reduced the expanse of sea ice that polar bears use to hunt seals. Forced onto land after all the ice has melted, the bears essentially fast for several months, although they will scavenge anything from kelp and bones to seabird eggs and chicks. In the Baffin Bay region, as with most places in the Arctic, the ice is melting earlier in spring and freezing later in autumn, forcing bears to spend significantly more time on land and less time hunting. The result is a loss of body condition and reproductive success, and lower cub survival rates.
Françoise’s photograph was highly commended in the Animals in their Environment category.
HOW? Nikon D800, 70 – 300 mm lens, shutter speed 1/500 second, aperture f8, ISO 1250.