Wildlife Photography How To

Today’s camera gear is faster than ever and much of it is tailor-made for capturing any sort of motion or movement. So then why do so many photographers struggle to shoot compelling images of action? Part of it has to do with timing and part of it has to do with composition. Your camera and lens can only do so much and there’s more to a great action shot than simply capturing the moment and making sure it’s in focus. For this assignment, we were looking for images of anything from basketball to dance to wildlife, just as long as there was some kind of action in the scene. For the winning images, we were looking for great composition, effective use of backgrounds and scenery, and powerful emotion: human, animal, or otherwise. Here are our six favorites.

The BBC has just released an extended trailer for the sequel to their wildly popular Planet Earth Series. Directed by Sir David Attenborough, Planet Earth II picks up where the original 2006 series left off, and is scheduled for release in the U.S. on January 28, 2017 and will be broadcast every Saturday on BBC America.

David Yarrow is an internationally acclaimed fine art/wildlife photographer known for his intimate work in remote regions of the world. We thought we’d share some of his breathtaking b/w imagery that appears in his new book, “Wild Encounters.”

Ulf Amundsen captured this epic image of a herd of elephants in Etosha National Park in Namibia, Africa. “It was a straightforward shoot during midday in dry and dusty conditions,” Amundsen explains.

California-based photographer/diver Alex Suh is someone you could conservatively describe as “fearless.” He has a passion for the ocean, and as you might suspect from his amazing images, he says he has always been fascinated with sharks—particularly the Great White. 

On Monday we shared the finalists in this year’s international Wildlife Photography of the Year Competition, and now we can show you the stunning winners of another contest: The 2016 British Wildlife Photography Awards (BWPA).

Konsta Punkka, aka “The Squirrel Whisperer,” is a 21-year-old Finnish photographer known for his amazing close-up portraits of animals reacting to his presence in their natural habitat. His unique approach to wildlife photography has earned him over 800,000 Instagram followers.