How did you come to start taking DSLR camera trap photographs in Thailand’s forests?

My photography has really been a progression of subject concentrations - or obsessions as some of my friends would say. I started photography very late in life and initially concentrated on underwater photography with my preference being underwater macro. I then discovered land arthropods and how alike forest macro and underwater macro photography were in many ways and consequently started a few years of concentrating on forest macro photography. It was on one of my forest macro trips in the Dong Phayayen–Khao Yai Forest Complex that I had the incredible experience of seeing a wild tiger. From that day on the seed was set and my mind was stuck on the question - how could I photograph a wild tiger in Thailand? There was only one realistic answer, a camera trap.

Could you explain a bit about your process, what is involved in the process of gathering these remote images from deep within the forests? 

The main thing to understand about starting a camera trap project is that you are not just heading into a park for a day or two to take pictures. You will be spending a long time in the forest and your cameras may be in the forest for years. You will need a lot of support from the parks and this requires a lot of planning and arrangements to be put in place - so you need to adopt a project mentality to the whole process. 

Before one can even start thinking of placing cameras one has to define a project plan and then present it to the authorities for high level approval. Once you have the initial approval you can then start discussions with the national parks in question on the modus operandi of the project and the project support. I have to say that Thailand’s Department of National Parks (DNP) have been tremendously supportive throughout this project and without their professional and kind support there would have not been any images.

The photographic process starts with studying google earth, area maps, and seeking anecdotal information in order to find valleys and tracks that offer the promise of fauna, either resident or transitory. That’s followed by recce trips which may be concluded in a single day or may take up to a week. During these recces we are looking for animal tracks and sign as well as suitable locations in terms of light, background and orientation. At this point small trail cams will be placed in the area to check for species presence. It’s only when all this is finished, and the results show promise that the larger DSLR traps are brought in. These larger traps are self constructed.  It’s a design that took a few years to evolve as it kept having to be adjusted to overcome problems we witnessed when deploying the cameras in the field for extended periods of 2 to 3 months a time.

What are the trials and tribulations of placing cameras in Thailand’s forests, and what gives you inspiration when you are there?

The trials are many and the tribulations few, but when it all comes together it is an amazing feeling - an accomplishment against incredible odds. The reality is that you need to survive the trials to feel the eventual tribulation. If my camera-traps could speak the would tell you about: 

Ants finding the dryness of the camera and strobe enclosures the perfect place to build their nests; the bears that pry open the cameras to feed on the ants; the poachers that steal the cameras to keep their identities secret; the poachers who built a fire under the camera as they could not get it off the tree; the male elephants who are hell bent on destroying the cameras; the elephant herds of female and young who are intrigued by the cameras and play with them; the mustelids who eat the sensor covers; the wasp nests; the savage monsoon rains that flood and destroy the cameras; constant equipment failures in the severe jungle conditions; monkeys that swing on the flash cables; pigs that use the cameras as scratching posts; battery failures; the weird fungus growths in the equipment; light leaks; falling trees; to name just a few. 

And probably my own least favourite, but regular occurrence - opening a camera after it has spent 3 months deep on a forest trail to find the only picture it took was myself walking away from the camera 3 months previously.

But on those days when you trek in to open a camera and find a great image on it, all the trials are forgotten, it’s impossible to stop grinning for days!

You have a stunning collection of camera trap photos of Thailand’s marvellous wild cats. Is there a picture photograph you are particularly proud of, and why?

It would have to be the melanistic indochinese leopard on the hill top in Kaeng Krachan National Park. Every aspect of this picture was carefully set up with that exact image in mind. Everything in the image is exactly what it was setup to show, the hill top, the background sky, the light of the sun for that particular time of day, the frame. Everything matches perfectly what was in my mind’s eye when setting up the cameras.  Except one thing, it was supposed to be a tiger in the photograph. We had been targeting a male tiger in that particular area since we first glimpsed him a year before. I still have not gotten that tiger on this particular ridge but the melanistic indochinese leopard image more than makes up for that.

Is there an endangered or threatened species in Thailand that you feel is underrepresented in art or the media? 

One area that I find particularly interesting from a photographic perspective is the forest itself, its combined trees and plant life. It is the home of nearly all of Thailand's cryptic and rare species. 

Its not until you attempt to photograph it that you realise just how difficult it is to photograph well. 

All of the notable images I have seen are either of streams and waterfalls in a forest or the forest from above. Photographing the forest from within, with the trees themselves as the major subject component is something that is incredibly difficult to achieve and as such few significant images exist. It’s a subject I have been toying with for sometime now, creating images of the forest that actually give viewers the sense of a tropical forest’s sheer inner magnificence. I have yet to achieve any images in this genre that I am happy with. 

Part of the inspiration behind starting PARDICOLOR was the idea that some of these enigmatic and charismatic creatures rarely seen could ‘disappear without anybody noticing’. Your work does so much to ensure we can see into the lives of these species that share our world. What do you think we lose when we lose biodiversity?

When I am in a pristine section of tropical forest, where man has so far failed to influence the habitat and the perfection of a functioning bio-diverse forest, I get a feeling. It’s an almost spiritual feeling, one that it inspires awe in me. 

It is my realisation that this is what mother earth intended, what the whole of Southeastern Asia would be like if we as a species did not exist. Everything in harmony, life abundant, every organism playing a role both in life and death. What makes me sad is that many of my own species have never witnessed this aspect of bio-diversity and therefore don’t have have that particular experience to understand how little bio-diversity exists in their own homes, farms, towns and cities. I love the idea of giving the public a glimpse into that bio-diverse world as we are already losing bio-diversity over great tracts of our planet through so called development.

What inspires you to continue your work in photography?

On a purely internal level its the enjoyment I get from being in nature. It does not matter if it’s deep within a virgin forest trying to photograph a rarely seen mammal or sat by a reed bed next to an industrial estate in outer Bangkok trying to photograph a common bird. I just feel better when surrounded by nature. The Japanese have a well known phrase for it, shinrin-yoku, which describes simply being in nature, connecting with it through our sense of sight, hearing, taste, smell and touch.

On a social level its being able to show others what still exists in the wild in Thailand. When I show a picture of a cryptic species to a Thai person and they reply “Do we really still have those in Thailand?” Or I am in a DNP visitors centre and I see a family looking at wall mounted pictures of cryptic mammals with wonderment on their faces that Thailand has such marvellous wildlife still. Those moments inspire me because it’s another minor victory in the battle to make bio-diversity awareness more prominent in the public’s mind and therefore, hopefully, aid conservation in some small way.