2023 Epson International Pano Awards – Silver Award
2021 Nature’s Best Photography Asia – Highly Honoured Birds
2020 Nature’s Best Photography International Awards: African Wildlife – Highly Honoured Winner

One For The Road
A spot-billed pelican scoops a bill full of water to carry back to its chicks in the nest. As it scoops the water, it rushes into its lower pouch which causes drag and the head snaps back with the weight of the onrushing water. This cause the head to snap back momentarily. I waited for this moment and made this image as the water dribbled out of its bill, as it dragged its head back to normal.

Towering Inferno
A tower of giraffes silhouetted against an amazing twilit sky in Ndutu, Tanzania. I switched to a wide-angle lens to capture the scene as wide as possible, to celebrate the magnificent colours of the sky and the scale of the giraffes against it.

Spin Dry
A trio of cheetahs, a mother and two sub-adults were caught in a thunderstorm. Anticipating that they would shake themselves off to get rid off the water, I leveraged my ISO enough to get me a shutter speed of 1/125 which was slow enough to to capture the rain as streaks, while still being fast enough to freeze the head movement. Right on cue, the sub-adult in the middle shook itself and sprayed its sibling in the process.

The Lion King
In The Serengeti, there are clusters of rock outcroppings called kopjes. I followed this lion as it crossed the grassland and disappeared into a thicket at the base of a kopje. Hoping that he would emerge at the top of the kopje, I swapped my telephoto lens for a wide-angle and waited. Moments later he emerged at the top, like a scene in a Disney movie, wind blowing through his mane as he surveyed his kingdom

Clash of the Titans
A pair of bull elephants clash in a battle for dominance in Ndutu, Tanzania. I swapped out my medium telephoto lens for a wide angle lens, to capture the scale of the landscape and the sky.

Zhayynn James

Wildlife photography is a passion and a means of artistic expression for me, as both, a lover of nature and as a designer. I grew up on the outskirts of Chennai, surrounded by nature and wildlife, waking to the sounds of sparrows, catching dragonflies, exploring monsoon-soaked fields, chasing fish and frogs when the streams overflowed. Experiences that shaped my love of the wild open spaces that we have since lost.

To me, photography is the art of telling a story without words and through my images I try to bring those stories to life. Stories that convey a sense of place, of scale and context, the emotion of a moment, the awe of a spectacle, of love, of struggle, of life and death. Through these images I hope to kindle an interest in the wild, a curiosity to know more about the natural world, to bolster conservation and to challenge a new generation to get out there and explore the wonders of our planet.

Talking about some of the thrilling encounters, we had cases where animals make a kill and devour the carcass right near the vehicle. You have a ringside view. I have also had the experience of having elephants charging. Once I was in a vehicle with others sandwiched between a massive tusker right behind me while photographing lions in front of me. It was a surreal experience because my photographic energies was focussed on the lions and my self-preservation on the other.

Being a wildlife photographer is not just about glamour. There are moments that are not necessarily beautiful but you have to tell that story, human-animal conflict, animals in danger, animals being hit by traffic, you need to be sensitive to that.

To start off as a wildlife photographer, initially, you don’t really need fancy equipment. Start with any camera or lens that you are able to get good quality pictures with. Learn what your camera is capable of and its limits. First go into a park and start making images, then you move onto national parks. Don’t spend money on a tour before you get your skills. Sachin Rai, Rahul Sachdev, Jayanth Sharma whom I have been associated with here are award-winning photographers whom I look up to.

Places on my bucket list include going to Norway to shoot polar bears, the great wilderness of the Antartic, jaguars in Brazil , grizzly bears in Russia, there’s so much more to explore.