Outdoor Photography Letter

Dear Sir

I would jut like to congratulate Outdoor photography on the interview with Tom Mangelsen.I wholeheartedly agree with his comments on phony wildlife photography and the North American game farms and their dreadful practices. I have read the article by Ted Williams,which is called “Picture perfect” and can be found at WWW.Audubonmagazine.org and I would encourage everyone to read it. It does makes pretty depressing and disturbing reading.

Depressing because one of my favorite images in the book “Dynamic wildlife photography” which I had believed was taken at an animal sanctuary was taken at a game farm. I now feel I have been cheated.

Who are these people that think photographing a captive, trained animal is “wildlife” photography? what are they trying to achieve and who is complicit in this? The North American Nature Photographers Association even condones these practices by advertising game farms and using their images. Because Its not wildlife photography. Its fraud, perpetrated by the bone idle or those that don’t have the wits,skills,patience or intelligence to go out into the wild and do it for real. Not only are they deluding themselves that they are wildlife photographers but they are giving the wider public an unnatural view of the wild. As Ted Williams says at the end of his article when you see a wildlife photo that looks to good to be true, it probably is.

Now when I started in wildlife photography there was no guidance as to what was acceptable. I looked at my images and compared them to some from the top pros. A bit demoralizing, I’ll never be that good I thought. Then I noticed “taken under controlled conditions” and had a light bulb moment. So thats how they do it! There is a saying “if it doesn’t feel right it probably isn’t” and it certainly didn’t feel right.

So to try to move the debate on I have the following suggestions for the industry and those that use our images.

First,to provide some clarity, could the ILCP come up with a definition of what a “wildlife photographer” is.


Second,the adoption of the ICLP ethical standards and core values(perhaps they could add publishing guidance for the people who use our images). Problematic in some areas admittedly, but there is no reason why wildlife and photographic magazines can not adopt them as standard practice.

Third,We all used to seeing the copyright symbol, why not have one for the origins of a wildlife shot?

Wild,with the letter W in the centre. Meaning a totally wild free ranging animal.

Semi wild,with SW in the centre. Meaning animals that are housed in conservation sanctuaries like the Africat Foundation or the International Wolf Centre.

Captive,with a letter C in the centre. Game farm animals.

I would also suggest that the wild photos carry a purchasing premium to reward the photographer for doing his/her job correctly.

I would further suggest that this is a topic for discussion at Wildphotos this year.

Yours Faithfully

Doug Breakwell.