OP – The Blog

There are pretty few rules in wildlife photography, but there is one which you’d want a pretty good reason to break. This is it: the only thing in the picture that really needs to be in focus is the eyes. Case in point: with this head-on shot of a dwarf caiman in the upper Amazon,  

On my first day in Denali National Park, I encountered a large group of Dall sheep up the side of a mountain. I grabbed my camera equipment, including my 500mm lens, and hiked over 1500′ up to them. As I approached the group, they became aware of my presence but did not run away. I was unsure how  

I am often asked – at lectures and in interviews – what is the most dangerous thing I have ever encountered in nature. Frankly, I hate that question, first because of its inherent sensationalism, but also because it is so misplaced: I have very little to fear from the wild animals with which I spend  

It’s hard to pick a personal favorite bird – there are so many wonderful birds around the world – but I’d have to say that Puffins are right up there on the list. As with penguins, everything Puffins do seem simultaneously adorable and slightly ridiculous – like this fellow carrying grass back to line his  

This is not my picture, but it is one that sparked a lively discussion that I thought might be worth sharing with those of you who follow this OP forum. It is a shot of a spectacular rainbow over a vast field of Tidytip flowers on California’s Carrizo Plain, taken just a few days ago  

I just returned home from a 10 day trip shooting the low land coastal regions around Charleston, South Carolina. On the first morning of the trip, I visited an area known as Bone Yard Beach on Edisto Island. This amazing barrier island on the Atlantic Ocean has an area of trees that  

I have been in Bakersfield, California this week, looking for endangered San Joaquin Kit Foxes.  Foxes in the city?  Yes, in one of the most unexpected of situations, these rare foxes are holding their own living in the middle of the city, in some cases better than they’re faring in the surrounding agricultural land. As  

Wildlife photographers treasure their big glass, the long telephoto lenses that allow them to get close-up, dramatic images of their animal subjects. Inevitably, though, there are times when whatever lens you have is simply not long enough, when you kick yourself for not bringing along the 600mm (or whatever). Such was the case on this  

First of all, forget the image thumbnail… (God forbid anyone should have the subject off-center!) This is the story of a wild chicken – actually a wild Sri Lanka Junglefowl, a close relative of the Indian bird that was domesticated into the Colonel Sanders variety thousands of years ago.  These bizarre, familiar birds are common  

In the tropics, the sun doesn’t linger at the horizon at the end of the day : it plunges down as if in a hurry for tomorrow. It’s dark by 7, and inside the forest, much earlier than that. So what is a wildlife photographer to do for the next 12 hours until dawn?  Well,