Nocturnal Gaze by Marsel van Oosten

Nocturnal Gaze by Marsel van Oosten

If you wonder why you never see night photographs of wild tigers; the reason is that the tiger parks in India close at sunset. No one is allowed to stay inside after dark. This image was shot at a so called ex situ tiger conservation project in South Africa, where the only population of wild tigers lives outside of the Indian continent. I strongly believe in this revolutionary project, and our company has been running tiger photography safaris there for many years now. By bringing paying photographers we are supporting the cause, and therefore it gives me great pleasure to see that both the reserve itself and the tiger population are growing. After our first visit to the project, we sat down with the owner and discussed our plans to bring small groups to photograph the tigers. We had the safari vehicles redesigned to accommodate bigger lenses, and we talked about the creative possibilities. One of the things I wanted to do, was to experiment with artificial light after dark, and those experiments are the reason there are now night photographs of tigers that were not shot with a camera trap. On every tour we try this a couple of times, and this image is one of many from last year. – – – If you love big cats and you would like to photograph wild tigers, then this is the tour to join. There is no better place in the world to photograph these magnificent cats. Not only will you return with a massive amount of tiger images, you will also be supporting the project – the tigers really need your support. We are running three Tigers & Leopard tours this year. Two filled up in no time, so we opened a third tour on which there are only 3 spaces left. We will also be visiting the best place in the world to photograph the elusive leopard, so that makes two of the most beautiful big cats on this planet on one trip! We set up this photo tour a couple of years ago in an effort to create the most unique and productive tiger tour on this planet. You will be able to see many different tigers in stunning scenery, and photograph different aspects of their natural behaviour: walking, running, playing, drinking, swimming, climbing, interaction, etc. If you’re interested in joining us on this unique and spectacular trip, please check out this link for more pictures, a tour impression video clip, and a detailed PDF: Tigers & Leopards, a Squiver photo tour. Hope to see you there! Marsel ©2016 Marsel van Oosten, All Rights Reserved. This image is not available for use on websites, blogs or other media without the explicit written permission of the photographer.

Marsel van Oosten: Photos