“African elephants are just the most amazing characters in the world. They are an incredible species, and to spend days and weeks just hanging out with them and watching the way their minds work and their bodies move is really beautiful.

Whether I’m close to them or far away from them. I always feel the sense of their mental solidity. They feel like they occupy space in a very deliberate way, that they know that they are there on Earth and that they are making judgments about who they are and what they’re doing as they occupy the Earth. That may just be all rubbish projected from my brain – it may simply be because they weigh several tons and when their feet hit the ground, they hit the ground with great deliberation and not just dancing around like an antelope or a rabbit. But I just can’t help feeling when I’m around them that they are there and they know they’re there.

I’ve photographed them in South Africa, Botswana, Kenya, Tanzania and Zambia. I’ve enjoyed photographing them enormously.”

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My Big 5

Elephant
Orangutan
Black Bear
Brown Bear
Moose