Meet The Pro: Will Burrard-Lucas

Welcome to episode 11 of the Pangolin Podcast, hosted by Toby Jermyn! In this episode, British wildlife photographer, author, and inventor Will Burrard-Lucas joins us to discuss his unique approach to capturing stunning wildlife images. 

Here is a link to a gallery of Will's images: https://pangolin.smugmug.com/SmugMug-Website/Website-Pages/Will-Burrard-Lucas

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Connect with Will: https://willbl.com/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/willbl

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Take a look at Shompole Hide: https://shompolewilderness.com/shompole-hide/

Known for using innovative tools like the self-built BeetleCam, Will shares stories and insights from his various projects across Africa, including photographing elusive animals like the giant pangolin and the black leopard. Get an inside look at some of Will's favourite photographs, hear about his technical setups, and learn how he collaborates with conservation partners. 

Also, see what photograph by another photographer he admires and find out where he'd love to have his humble dwelling. Don't miss this fascinating conversation about wildlife photography and conservation!

The Pangolin Podcast was produced and edited by Bella Falk: https://www.passportandpixels.com

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Chapters

• 3:14 1st Image: The Story Behind the Iconic Elephant Image
• 12:06 2nd Image: Capturing the Elusive Giant Pangolin
• 19:15 3rd Image: Photographing the Elusive Apex Predator
• 25:43 4th Image: Nighttime Wildlife Photography in Kenya
• 33:39 Inspirational Image: Kingfisher By Charlie Hamilton James

Transcript

Toby: Hello, and welcome to episode 11 of the Pangolin Podcast. I am your host, Toby Jermyn. Thank you very much for joining me.

In each episode, I've invited a professional wildlife photographer to imagine themselves in a remote location, and along with their camera gear, they're allowed to bring five photographs to hang on the wall of their humble dwelling.

Four of these must be their own, and the final image is one they admire by another photographer.

Now, if you're watching this on YouTube, you can see the images as we talk, but for audio listeners on other platforms, there's a link in the description.

On today's show.

Will: All these cameras, you can't be totally hands off because, for example, somewhere like the Congo, vegetation grows up in about a day in front of the lens and needs to be cleared.

Or a spider builds its web over the sensor or whatever.

Eventually, something like an elephant comes along and does something that they can't solve. And that's when I then have to book another trip to come out and fix something.

Toby: My guest today is a British wildlife photographer, author, and inventor. Known for using innovative tools like his self-built BeetleCam, which has helped him capture some incredibly immersive images of African wildlife.

He founded Camtraptions to share his technology with photographers and filmmakers, and his long-term projects have led to acclaimed books, including Land of Giants and the Black Leopard.

He's based in the UK, and when not on assignment in Africa, he collaborates with several conservation partners and is a Sony Europe imaging ambassador.

Welcome to the show, Will Burrard-Lucas.

Will: Thank you. It's a pleasure to be here.

Toby: It's lovely to have a fellow Brit on the show, which is always refreshing.

Will: I'm not the first, am I?

Toby: No, I don't think so. I think you might be the second or the third.

But whereabout are you? You are obviously not out in the wilds of Africa or the rest of the world.

Where are you today?

Will: Yeah.

So I'm at home. Well, I'm in my office, just outside London. Enjoying being back home, and it's just a start of term. So getting back into life.

Toby: Normal life, I mean, what a contrast. One minute you're out in the middle of
somewhere filming and photographing, and then you're back in a proper office, which is, I think, you are the first person to be recording this from a proper office.

So there we go. There's a first.

Will: Yeah, something to be proud of, maybe.

Toby: There you go. Well, especially in today's world.

Right. So, we asked you to select some images that you wanted to hang on the wall of your humble dwelling.

How difficult, I mean, you've got a ginormous portfolio of amazing images. 

How difficult was the selection process? 

Will: A task like that is always difficult. For me, I sort of get bored of images and
so I guess I, depending, when you ask me, I'd choose a totally different selection.

So right now, these were the four that I looked at, and I was like, 'Yeah.' That was a – that's a cool photo. And I guess you look at it and then you're transported back to that moment, and I guess also I've tried to include a variety so that it's not the same technique, the same project that each image comes from. So hopefully you've got a good selection here to cover a few different projects and places.

Toby: Brilliant. Well, on that note, shall we start with your first image, then, please, Will? Tell us about this one.

Will: Yeah, so this is an image of a very special Elephant in Tsavo, in Kenya. A black and white image from my Land of Giants project.

And this project, I partnered with the Tsavo Trust, and they're a conservation organisation that was set up to protect some of the last remaining big Tusker Elephants.

And these are Elephants with tusks weighing in excess of a hundred pounds on each side. And about 15 years ago, there was this huge sort of uptick in poaching, and they set up this organisation to try and protect these few remaining Tuskers, and in doing so, protect all of the Elephants and other wildlife in Tsavo.

And so I partnered with them to basically photograph the Tuskers.

I spent several months out with the team, tracking them down in these very remote areas, trying to get photos that did them justice and communicated the grandeur of these animals.

And then at the end of the project, I put together a book which they could then use to fundraise to stakeholders in the local area, and so yeah, it's a project that spanned the most part of a year.

And I went out there knowing that obviously I was after these Tuskers.

But actually, the male tuskers who are the ones with the heaviest ivory. I used the ones that I expected I would be focusing on most didn't actually turn out to be the most spectacular subject I encountered.

It was actually this female, and what made her so spectacular was that her tusks, in comparison to her body size, seemed even larger than the males.

So photographically, she was just stunning. And, I was able to spend quite a few days following her around and really working on getting photos that tried to convey this majestic being.

And one of the techniques that I'd been using for quite a few years at this point was this remote control camera buggy that I call BeetleCam. And with that, I'm able to get the camera right down on the ground in this buggy, looking up with a wide-angle lens.

And so for subjects like this where you have these long tusks sweeping down towards the camera, it was just the most spectacular perspective I could imagine, really. And so, this was a new version of BeetleCam I had for this trip for the first time using a mirrorless camera in it, which allowed me to beam back the picture from the camera and see in real time the composition and get a lot more advanced about how I was using BeetleCam.

And this particular photo is probably my favourite from the whole project, and it's actually the one I chose for the cover of the book.

I love Tsavo.

I think it's one of the most underrated places in Kenya. 

Toby: So this wasn't your first venturing into remote-controlled buggies with BeetleCam.

Which generation of BeetleCam you got to by this stage, if you're shooting with mirrorless now?

Will: This is like, I don't know, maybe third. There were sort of branches off in the BeetleCam evolution that didn't lead anywhere, but this one was, yeah, sort of third, fourth generation.

So I started the very first one I built in 2009, and that was very basic, just a buggy with a camera didn't even have a shell, and that didn't last too long.

And a couple years later, came back later with a shell, which I was then able to use for Lions and yeah, took another step forward. And then I moved to Zambia for a year with a new version. I was then focused on some of the more elusive creatures like Leopards and Wild Dogs.

And then after that year, this next version was the next evolution. And since then, I've got a whole new version, even that is now much smaller and more compact, built around mirrorless now.

Toby: I must say, actually, I haven't been on your website for a little while, so I popped on now, and I saw the video of the latest iteration of the BeatleCam and somebody who basically lives by the rule that he who dies with the most toys wins.

I saw it, and I went, I need one of these immediately. It's an incredible piece of kit.

Will: The new one, I was stuck at home for a year during COVID, and I was like, right, now I've finally got time to go back to the drawing board with BeetleCam and make the ultimate, that ticks all the boxes.

And so it's way over-engineered. I had too much time on my hands for once.

Toby: And tell me you studied physics at university, I believe you then went into finance, which bizarrely seems to be a common thread amongst photographers that we are talking to.

But where did the engineering and the design side come in? Is this very much self-taught? Have you always been adept at making stuff like this?

Will: I've always been, yeah, like from a young kid building Lego or whatever all the way up, and so I've always, yeah, enjoyed building stuff, creating stuff. I've always been quite technical to the degree there's elements of programming, electronics and things which all feed into being able to, I guess, teach myself what I don't know.

And so throughout my career as a photographer, which came after, I've been able to go back to that sort of engineeringly roots and basically, build what I need if
something out there doesn't exist.

And so that's become quite a common theme in all my projects and has led to this whole other side of my business, which is the products that we develop and sell as well.

Toby: It's very cool. And a lot of people will be asking, you know, people often inquire with us, and they say, 'Well, can I bring a drone?'

And I say, well, no, not really, in Botswana, you can't fly a drone. Where does the legislation sit with most places when you go on safari to use a BeetleCam, for example?

Will: For me, it's always a case of partnering with the place I'm going. So my current project is partnering with rangers, for example, and then through them they're able to get permission for us to set up the camera traps that we need to do.

So it depends, yeah, where you're going and who you're working with.

Toby: Well, yeah, okay, perfect. Well, that answers that question before
anybody jumps on your website and starts enquiring, and before we have everybody arriving with a BeetleCam, and we have droves of them driving around the Chobe National Park. I think that might be problematic.

Will: Yeah, exactly. I decided it was probably a bit like drones. It's probably too much of a headache to figure out for most people. 'Cause you know, the other problem with BeetleCam, it's great for bold animals like Lions, Elephants, Hyenas, but there's literally a handful of animals that are actually brave enough to have this
unfamiliar object move through the grass and to let it get close enough. The majority of creatures run a mile. So yeah, that's where something less obtrusive, like camera traps, really comes in if you want that close-up, wide-angle perspective.

Toby: Well, we're definitely going to touch more on the camera trap side of things as we go along. I mean, it's a big part of what you do and what you are known for, but what was your motivation to go down the remote camera route in the first place?

What was it that made you say, Okay, I think what I need is something innovative, something different.

Will: Yeah. Well, it all starts, and every project I've ever done, it starts with the photo that I want to get, and then working back from that. Okay, how do I go about getting that? And so back in, when I was getting into
photography, really trying to capture wildlife images that really had an
impact for me when I was looking at them. And back then, particularly this close-up, wide-angle perspective wasn't commonly seen, but as soon as I started
experimenting with it, you know, I kind of fell in love with that perspective.

It's just so much more intimate, and the results can be so much more spectacular. And so I started by crawling up to animals that I could crawl up to. So animals like Penguins and Meerkats are the, probably the two most obvious ones.

And yeah, love those photos. But pretty soon, I wanted to do it with Lions and things.

And so it just came from, okay, how can I do this without dying?

And the idea of the remote control buggy was, I guess, quite an obvious one, but what I didn't know is whether it would work or not. But I guess taking that step, taking the risk, has been something that I've now continued to do in all my projects, really, and that's the way you get something different, is taking some chances and giving it a go. 

Toby: Oh, there we go. Necessity is the mother of invention, isn't it? And you must have had a couple of moments. How many, if you were to estimate, how many BeetleCams have you lost?

Will: So it's only been a couple. So the very first one got carried away by a Lion. And that one didn't have a shell.

So the Lion actually picked it up from the camera, and that camera was a write-off.
After that, with the shell, it got stolen a few times by Lions. But I was able to retrieve it every time, and the shell kept everything protected.

But then, another time, this was in Sri Lanka, actually, I had always photographed Elephants with BeetleCam, and they'd always been kind of respectful.

Like, if I move it, they would, they would back away from it. They would never sort of interact with it. So I assumed the Elephants in Sri Lanka were going to be the same. And I didn't bother packing the shell. I just had the BeetleCam with the
camera, like that very first version. Just 'cause lighter to pack.

Anyway, these Elephants in Sri Lanka were totally different, and the moment they saw it, they charged up to it and stamped on it.

And so again, lost a camera that way. So those are the two write-offs.

But other than that, now, you know, I've learned a lot about how to use it, without risking it, and so now I tend to keep it very close to my vehicle. If things are getting out of hand, I can just reverse it under my vehicle, and then it's safe, and so I don't take risks.

Toby: You live and learn, don't you? I still want a BeetleCam. So we'll chat after this.

And let's move on to your second image, then, shall we?

Now, obviously, this is, thank you, Will, thank you very much.

Will: I had to choose a Pangolin. And honestly, they are one of my favourite creatures. And so there was a choice of two Pangolins.

I could have chosen the Temminck's Ground Pangolin or this project, which is just, for me, still incredible and mind-blowing that I ever got to photograph one of these. This is a Giant Pangolin.

And so for this project, this is in Kenya, just above the Maasai Mara, on top of the escarpment, there's a forest back there called the Query Forest.

And I'd started working with the Pangolin Project, which is a small conservation organisation set up by my friend Claire Okell. And she'd set it up to focus on the Temminck's Pangolin, which were known to be in the Mara.

And I got my first chance after, what, 20 years of travelling to Africa, a lot. I still hadn't seen a Pangolin. And so got my first ever sighting of a Pangolin in the main reserve with them, which was, obviously, a very special moment for me.

But then, within a year, they'd got some pictures from up on the escarpment and instantly noticed that these Pangolins up there were looking much bigger and slightly different to the Temmincks.

And they realised that they could be looking at Giant Pangolins, which are usually associated with the Congo Forest, West Africa, and hadn't really been recorded for a long time, East of sort of Uganda, really. 

And it took a while before they actually managed to find one of these Pangolins themselves because they're so hard to find. Just if you wander around at night, you really need somebody to bump into one by accident, and then call you at that point and stay with it until you can get to them.

And so, the first few weeks, really, that I was out there, we never even got a call and didn't see anything.

But eventually, they, when I wasn't there, managed to get eyes on sightings, confirm that these were Giant Pangolins.

And one of the main ways you could tell the difference is that these Giant Pangolins walk along on all four legs, whereas the Temminck's kind of go on their back legs with their front legs up like this.

And so they confirmed they were there, but, this forest was being rapidly cut down like in the last 10 years, it was split up and each individual owned a separate patch, and a lot of people started clearing their forest to make room for grazing and to sell charcoal.

And so there was then this urgent need to see, you know, how many of these Giant Pangolins are there, and are they actually able to survive in this environment where so much of the forest is being lost?

And, at that point, I was able to go back out, and they'd found this one Pangolin where they knew some of his burrows. And then you've got to wait for him to come out.

And these Pangolins, any Pangolin, I guess they're like, they've got this supernatural ability to know if you are outside the hole, no matter how quiet you are.

And so we spend a few nights, you know, waiting outside holes for a Pangolin to come out. And he just doesn't come out until you leave. So for this one, we had one guy close who could just about see the hole, and we were all like a kilometre away to try and give it enough room so that it wouldn't know we were there.

And eventually, at about 10, 11. You're sort of losing hope that he's ever going to come out. But he did come out, and so at that point, the whole team moved in, and I was given about a minute to get some photos before they then were going to put a tag on him so they could track his movements and see how he was navigating this rapidly changing landscape.

And through some of the other photography we've done with the Pangolins, it had been established that they're very sensitive to white light and disturbance. And so I've been taking all my photos using infrared.

So that's another interesting thing about the technical side of this photo is this is taken without any visible light. I've got a mirrorless camera where I've converted it so that it's sensitive to its infrared light.

And then I've got a couple of the researchers, I gave flashes that have been converted with a filter over that cuts out the white light. And so you just get some infrared cut light coming out of these flashes.

And I had to try.

We're in quite dense thicket here with this Pangolin who's obviously, trying to work out what the heck's going on? And I've got to try and focus on him. Compose my shot as I can't really see anything unless I'm looking through my mirrorless EVF, and so it's pretty hard to even find the animal in that position, let alone compose your photos.

But eventually, we were able to get this shot where he kind of looked up.

My two assistants had nailed the lighting and got that pointed at because they can't see where the Pangolin is either.

Toby: So it's complete. Guesswork.

Will: Yeah, exactly. So we all had everything we needed pointing at the Pangolin. And I got this photo. I got a couple of other photos.

Then they were able to then catch him, weigh him.

I think he was like 40 or 50 kilograms, which is crazy for a Pangolin.

And they then punch a hole in one of the back scales, and they put a tag on so that they can see where he's spending his time. And since then, they've made great progress in basically leasing patches of forests that haven't been cut down, so that they can stop the felling. So hopefully they got there just in time, and the Giant Pangolins of Kenya will be saved.

Toby: I think it's an amazing story, and it sounds like it's on the way to becoming a conservation success. We obviously do a lot of work with Pangolins. This is one of four African Pangolin species.

If you would like to learn more about the Pangolins of Africa, then you can do our Pangolin Guardians course, which is a 15-minute online course, and you can learn all about Pangolins and become a Pangolin Guardian.

You can also learn about what to do if you're lucky enough to see one in the wild.

So we'll leave a link in the description down below, and you can go and become a Pangolin Guardian.

What an amazing encounter. Obviously, it took you a long time. You are very unlikely to see this, but they are huge. They are 40, 50 kilograms, and yet nigh-on impossible to find. I mean, they're very nocturnal. These ones aren't they?

Will: Yeah. Oh, very. I mean, look, all the ones I've found in Kenya have been incredibly nocturnal. You know they would come out of their burrows very late at night. If you're anywhere where there's night drives, it was well after the time that night drives are due back, they would start coming out.

So pretty unlikely to see them unless you really know where to look and working with the right people.

Toby: It's a lovely photograph to highlight a very, very rare animal.

Would you say this is the hardest animal, the hardest project that you've had with the most risk of not being successful, of all the target species?

Will: No, probably not. 'Cause the fact is that Pangolin Project had invested so much time and energy, and so as long as I was there for long enough, eventually one was going to pop out of its hole, and we were going to get it.

So it was kind of a case of perseverance with this. The hardest subject for me was that black leopard back in 2019, where there was just one of these that had never been properly photographed. And so that's a single animal. An elusive animal that I didn't even know if it was in the area.

And it was basically on me to try and set up these cameras and not even know if he was still there. So that was quite a gamble and one that could easily have not paid off.

Toby: Brilliant. Thank you very much for choosing a Pangolin. Much appreciated.

Okay. We are going to take a little break now, and when we come back, we are going to talk to Will about his third image.

Welcome back to part two of the Pangolin Podcast with my guest today, Will Burrard-Lucas. Now we're on to Will's third image. So, Will, will you please
tell us about this image?

Will: Yeah, so this is an image I took two years ago now in the Congo. And so this is a leopard, one of the most impressive specimens I've ever been fortunate enough to photograph. And it's a camera trap photo, the only camera trap photo in this selection.

And so this project, I was partnered with WCS Wildlife Conservation Society, and they basically work with the Congolese government to protect this national park in the north of the Republic of Congo, called Nouabalé-Ndoki.

And one of the problems is that they have all this incredible wildlife there, but it's also incredibly elusive and hard to see. And so, there's not a lot of photos of it. And that obviously is a problem if they want to try and show people what it is this habitat is harbouring. And so I partnered with them to undertake this camera trapping project, where I went out three times over the course of a year.

And each time, set up camera traps and then on subsequent visits, move them around to try and get as much variety and really showcase all the incredible wildlife that this forest harbours.

And the forest itself is incredible. It's this primary forest, huge, huge trees and just insanely thick undergrowth, really.

And so you could walk through this forest and you're on these narrow trails that have been cut through the foliage to get to these research stations, just getting to that point, it's like three days of travelling from Brazzaville in the south of the country. 

You've got this all-day drive. You've got a boat, you've then got a  4x4 on these forestry tracks, and then to one of the research stations. It's like then a 20-kilometre trek in through this thick forest. And this whole time that you're in the
forest, there's this wall of vegetation that surrounds you, and you can hear animals.

You can see signs of animals everywhere, from their spore on the tracks and droppings here and there, but you don't see it. 'Cause you can barely see further than your own arm in places. But yes, obviously, camera traps the most effective way to photograph elusive wildlife like this.

And so, my aim was really to get the variety. But of course, the apex predator that was the most highly sought-after thing that I was desperate to capture.

And you feel a lot of pressure in a project like this, where a lot of people have put in a lot of effort to get you to this point, and then it's down to you to actually deliver. And so we had a team of porters to get the gear there.

We had, you know, researchers helping us try and pick suitable locations, and this particular location, the trackers showed me this track and said, you know, she thought this was going to be a good place to try.

And so I kept set up a couple of cameras on this track and after a week had this image on there. And yeah, my jaw dropped because this is so different to the Leopards I'm used to photographing in East Africa. You know, slight, slender creatures. This male is, you know, a complete tank, and I don't think he has to do much other than drop out of a tree and squash the duiker that he's after.

So yeah, very impressive specimen.

Toby: I think everybody who saw this image for the first time before you said it's a Leopard. I mean, I saw it and went Jaguar? I mean, it is absolutely immense. But, 

Will: Yeah. There's people online who saw it, and you cannot change their minds.
They are adamant it's a Jaguar, and I'm like, look, I know where it's taken, and I'm pretty sure there's no Jaguars there. But yeah, some people, once they make up their mind, there's no persuading them that it's not a Jaguar.

Toby: No one's backing down. No, I know what I saw. It was definitely a Jaguar. You are wrong, Mr Burrard-Lucas, you are wrong.

So just to clarify, this is Congo-Brazzaville, not DRC?

Will: Congo-Brazzaville, yeah. Right in the north. So this is right on the border with CAR, Cameroon and obviously just over the border into Congo-Brazzaville.

Toby: These places are such amazing hidden gems when it comes to wildlife, you know, DRC. We've done one trip; once we went to go to the Virungas, but then obviously it's too dangerous to go back now.

But I've never been to Congo, Congo-Brazzaville.

What's it like if you want to go there as a photographic destination? Is it possible?

Will: Yes, it's possible. So there's Odzala National Park, where Kamba Africa have some camps, and it is possible to go to Nouabalé-Ndoki.

And one of the reasons for this project was actually to get images that they could use to start encouraging a bit more tourism.

It's so just incredible the things that you can do. So Gorilla Trekking is one thing where the Western Lowland Gorillas, so you can do a couple of Gorilla Treks, then they've got the Forest Elephants, and in Odzala, it's a bit more open. There, you can go down the river in a boat and see some of them, the monkey species, lots of birds, African parrots, all these animals that you don't see elsewhere in Africa, and you really do feel like you've gone somewhere pretty remote.

So I definitely recommend it. And it's quite an intrepid trip, but, it is possible.

Toby: Well, if you want to avoid the crowds, which seems to be on everybody's the top of their priority list at the moment, then these are certainly the places to go to.

We'll go on a trip. We've talked about camera trapping before.

Last time I saw you in London, we were at the Photo Show. We were like, hang on a second. Can we do a camera-trapping safari? We haven't quite figured out the logistics of it yet, but this is something that I think we should explore.

What amazes me is you are travelling backwards and forwards three times a year. You are going to check these images.

Have you got – you don't have any way of remotely accessing these images, or are
the researchers collecting the cards and sending you, telling you what's on it?

Will: I've experimented with all sorts of ways to both retrieve images remotely and control cameras remotely using Starlink or mobile data or whatever. The problem with all that is it's nice to be able to see and to keep track that way, but it doesn't necessarily help get the photos, and it's just another thing that can go wrong, and then the whole system stops working. And so I try to keep my setups as
simple as possible with as few points of failure as possible.

And I rely on my partners on the grounds to go and swap out memory cards and change batteries. And, you know, all these cameras, you can't be totally hands-off because for example, somewhere like the Congo, vegetation grows up in about a day in front of the lens and needs to be cleared.

Or a spider builds its web over the sensor or whatever.

So, somebody has to go and keep an eye on the stuff.

And eventually, something like an Elephant comes along and does something that they can't solve.

And that's when I then have to book another trip to come out and fix something.

But that, for me, is what works best. It's a unique, a unique problem to have.

Toby: Okay.

Brilliant.

Let us know in the comments if you think you would like to join Will on a Camera Trapping Safari, and we'll see what we can do to pull one together.

Okay. Let's move on to your fourth image, please. Will, can you tell us a little bit about this?

Will: So this is a nighttime image of a pride of lions that have come up to the water to drink. And you've got a nice reflection of them, and this is in Kenya, in an area called Shompole Conservancy. And it's a place I've been back to a lot.

I first went in 2020, stayed in place called Shompole Wilderness Camp with friends Johann and Sam, and I think you; you guys know them as well.

And so when I first visited this area, you get there, and it's this very harsh environment, dusty, dry, hot. You drive around in the day, and you wonder how any wildlife could survive in this place. This area it's community land, and during the day, you see the community come out with their cattle using the landscape.

And again, that then, you know, makes you think that there can't be much wildlife here. But what's so special about this area is that after the cattle go back to their boma at night.

The whole area then becomes the domain of the wildlife. And all this wildlife emerges from who knows where. And I've had some of the best night drives of my life around Shompole. You know, one night seeing five different cat species, things like Striped Hyenas, Genets, Owls, just tonnes on these night drives.

And so, for me, I really have gravitated towards nocturnal wildlife quite a bit in my photography, 'cause it's been this kind of frontier wildlife photography when there's all these unusual species that people haven't photographed a lot before.

And so this was a perfect place for me to get stuck into some projects. And I started by setting up camera traps at some waterholes. I was just amazed at the number of species. So this one camera, for example, in about a week, just got almost every cat species, Hyenas and Genets, Civets, just incredible variety.

It was probably still my most productive camera trap I ever set up.

And then Johann mentioned that one thing he'd always wanted to do was set up a hide and a waterhole, and having seen the results of this camera trap, I agreed.

And so we decided just to give it a go and see what would happen.

So Johann found this spot about five kilometres from any other water source. Away from where the community were mostly spending their time. And we started by just using a Hilux with some barrels of water. We drive out there, dump water on the ground to make a temporary waterhole.

And I set up a camera trap just to see what was coming. And pretty soon, we were getting animals. Very skittish animals, but they were coming.

And then maybe five or six months after the water was first established, we then dug a big hole and put in two sunken containers with windows cut out so that you could then spend the night in these containers, looking out at this waterhole.

And then it was a case of me getting in this hide and seeing what would come.

The Lions here in particular were incredibly wild. They, I guess, have only got by avoiding people. And so super skittish. Indeed, all the wildlife, really, I'd be in this hide anything that came, you know, the slightest movement or click of a bit of
equipment, and the wildlife would scarper, and you'd then have to wait like an hour before anything turned up again. So it was hard, and I had to get very good at working and moving around in complete pitch black.

But yeah, after I was probably in the hide for a week or so, dreaming of Lions turning up, and then eventually, as I was sort of dozing, you just hear this very, very loud lapping and look up and there's a pride of Lions, I guess 10 metres away.

They sort of knew I was there. 'Cause they're obviously highly tuned with their environment. They were as far away on the other side of the waterhole as they could get, and sort of looking at you as they drank. I was in there on my own. So this incredible connection, I guess you feel the vulnerability, I suppose.

And then, because I had total control of this scene. I had set up lighting exactly as I wanted for a hide. You know, nice soft lighting and the flashes where I want them. And this is one of the resulting photos; I could have chosen a few, and now it's what it is. So I guess, rewarding is looking back at that and thinking about that and now seeing what it's like today.

And the wildlife is now used to the hide, used to people being in there.

And the cats: Leopards and Lions and even Cheetahs now are regular visitors. So it's been really rewarding to see how it's evolved, just how much wildlife is now supported by this hide. Everyone going to the hide pays a fee that goes to the community and incentivises them to, you know, keep this area protected and keep it the domain of the animals.

And so, a lot of sort of strands of this project have come together to benefit, you know, a lot of people and the wildlife, and gives the wildlife now somewhere to drink where the cattle aren't going, and helps reduce human-wildlife conflict in that respect as well.

So yeah, all around a really rewarding project to be involved in.

Toby: I think it is; it is extra fascinating for me. I went there in March 21, so the tail end of COVID, so you'd been there, but before you built the hide. And Johan was telling me about you were going to come and build a hide. And then going out for a game drive with him, literally leaning out the sunroof of his Toyota Land Cruiser.

And I, like you say, I was like, sorry, is that Polecat and then Caracal, and then all this stuff running around, you know, like, you're not supposed to see all of this, but you're right. It just appears from nowhere.

But also, we always say to people, we have to manage expectations. When you go to do hide photography like this. I mean, this is a spectacular image, but you obviously understand lighting and what you need to make it work to get these sorts of images.

It's not just a case anymore of just, I'm just going to go and sit at the hide and take this photograph there.

It is a very technical form of photography, isn't it?

Will: Yeah. And I mean, in this hide, we've sort of now set up a lighting setup, it's pretty easy for beginners to basically pick up their camera and start shooting with it. With mirrorless cameras now, it's much easier 'cause you can see the lighting
beforehand, how it's going to expose. But at the time, with this, I was still using flash rather than constant lights because it would stop the animals approaching if there were constant lights on.

But now we're able to just have constant lights, which we can then turn up using dimmer switches, and the animals are used to that. And that's much easier then 'cause you can basically look through your lens, twiddle your exposure settings to get the exposure right. I really enjoyed it as well.

Toby: We went off to go and see some of the community, the Maasai community as well. And they're very happy to allow us to photograph them coming through.

That's amazing. 'Cause you've got these amazing Maasai warriors with their spears, and they're walking through the dust with all the cattle, with these huge horns as well. So it's not just the nocturnal animals as well.

Shompole is a, it's a lovely part of the world, and we'll leave a link in the description down below if you want to go and check 'em out as well.

Will: Yeah, for sure.

Yeah, it's great. And the Masai there, it's very authentic. It's not put on for tourists.
Like you get a sense it is in other places. 

Toby: There we go. And so, I mean, like, you have certainly put Shompole on the map more so than anybody else.

I mean, we don't have a Black Leopard photograph in your selection of images. But again, that put Laikipia very much on the map. That was in 2019 as well, wasn't it?

That photograph?

Will: Yeah. It was. Yeah, that project was crazy at the amount of, I guess, attention it generated, and yeah, Laikipia, now is very much known for Black Leopards now. Mostly because after that project that I did there, this young female Black Leopard was then born, Giza. And so all the Black Leopards pictures I took was actually of a different one, a male that was probably her half-brother, or maybe even father.

But now with Giza there, yeah, it's gone crazy. 

Toby: We get inquiries from people who go, I want to do the migration, but then I want to go and photograph a Black Leopard. Okay, well, there we go. This is where you have to go. This is what you have to do.

Okay, brilliant. Well, we're going to take a little break and then when we come back, we are going to introduce a photograph by another photographer that Will has chosen.

So we'll see you in a minute.

Toby: Welcome back to the final part of the Pangolin Podcast. And my guest today Will Burrard-Lucas. This is the part of the show where we've invited Will to choose an image taken by another photographer that he admires, or maybe an image that he wishes he had taken himself.

So, Will, will you introduce the photograph and the photographer, please?

Will: Yeah, so this is a photo of a Kingfisher returning to its nest in a bank. It's taken in the UK by Charlie Hamilton James, who's a photographer that I've respected and followed for a long time. And what makes this photo, I guess, different and special is it's actually a slightly slow exposure. So you've got this blur of the kingfisher, and then a flash at the end of the exposure to then create a sharp image at the end of this light trail that the Kingfisher has produced.

So, for me, what's special about it, you know, it's something that I guess I often try to incorporate into my work, is this blending of artistry and then technical wizardry in a way to try and create something different.

And so this technique of a slow exposure plus flash, plus exposing the backdrop as well as the habitat. Yeah, that's a lot of elements to balance.

I know it's incredibly difficult. The subject itself, you know, in the UK, that thrill you get if you ever catch a glimpse of a Kingfisher streaking past, you know, they're such beautiful birds, so hard to photograph, because they are just so small, fast and difficult to come across. So for me, special, and yeah. Nice that it's one that's in the UK showing, you know, what we have here, which is something I'd love to
do more of, is to try and capture some of these special images closer to home, which Charlie's done an incredible job with this project.

Toby: I think it's an amazing photograph. There is so much going on, and
technically, possibly one of the most difficult photographs I could imagine trying to take. This was, this was not a camera trap.

This was set up as he's in a hide, maybe.

Do you know, do you know the story behind that? How the image was taken?

Will: I think, I mean, Charlie has used both before, like sensors and remote triggers. I imagine for this, he's manually remote triggering it. I can't remember off the top of my head what the caption said for this image, but I think he would probably have been there in a hide watching for the Kingfisher returning to its nest and then
triggering the camera at the right point.

But this is an image that must have been a lot of trial and error to get everything to come together. So again, a real showcase of persistence and experimentation, trial and error. Which is really what's key when you're trying to get photos that do take things to another level and are different. You've got to start with the concept
and keep building on it and building on it and persevering until you literally can't think of a way to do it any better.

Toby: Keep going, keep going until you've done absolutely everything. So what we can do is, we'll get hold of him. We tried to get hold of him just before we recorded this, but when we do get hold of him, we will invite him on the show so he could tell exactly how he did this. 

Will: I'm sure he's got lots of stories he can tell. 'Cause he's done some incredible
projects over the years. 

Toby: Okay, well, I'm afraid we are out of time, but as is tradition, we end the show by asking you one simple question. The premise of this was that we were going to leave you in a humble dwelling with these images adorning your wall, but you get to choose where that humble dwelling is going to be located.

So you could choose anywhere in the world, and you're going to be photographing in perpetuity. Will, where is that going to be?

Will: Okay. Well, it'll certainly be in Africa. I think for me it will be South Luangwa, which is a place that's very close to my heart. We spent a year there, in 2012, 2013.

My wife was working in a rural hospital just near there, and I was spending a lot of my time in the park. And for me, it's just such an intimate safari experience.

Just beautiful, intimate habitats and fantastic for Leopards, Wild Dogs, Lions, Birds.

And then for week to week, going back, it would change so dramatically through the season. And so from being in the height of the
dry season, incredibly hot, dry and dusty.

And then a few months later, after the rains have arrived, the river bursts its banks, you can be going on a boat safari through forests that you'd been driving through just a couple of months earlier, and you get all the migratory birds arriving.

So, somewhere that will always be very special.

Toby: There we go. Zambia is, to coin a phrase, very hot right now. Everybody seems to be wanting to go there. We are looking at doing other stuff in Liuwa Plains, Kafue, Lower Zambezi and things like that.

Will: Yeah, I did a whole project in Liuwa Plains. Back in 2015. So incredible for Hyenas Lions, Cheetahs, and it's got its own like mini migration, like the Serengeti with Wildebeests. So yeah. Very spectacular.

Toby: And not too far from the Chobe. Quite easy to reach as well. So yes, that's where we're looking to expand to next. Will, thank you very much for making time to join me on the show. It's been lovely chatting to you. We will continue to try and figure out how to do a camera trap safari at some point, and hopefully we get you
out to the Chobe at some point because you've yet to come and visit us there.
So, we're waiting.

Will: I'll try.

Toby: Brilliant. Will, thank you very much indeed.

Will: Cool. Yeah. Nice speaking. Thank you.

Toby: Thank you for joining me on episode 11 of the Pangolin Podcast. We hope you have enjoyed it. As always, we'd love to hear your comments and feedback, so please leave them below. And if you don't want to miss another episode or any of our other wildlife photography videos, make sure you subscribe to this channel.

Finally, don't forget to sign up to the Pangolin Photo Safaris Friday Focus Newsletter. You can do that by heading over to pangolinphoto.com or you can scan the QR code on your screen now. I look forward to seeing you on a Pangolin Photo Safari soon, and all that's left for me to say is that the Pangolin Podcast was hosted by me, Toby Jermyn, and produced and edited by Bella Falk.

Thank you.