Jonathan Griffiths: Up Close and Personal Wildlife Photography

It's been some time seen this blog has seen some animal photography, so this post should be a welcome break. The creatures here however are far from the cute and cuddly kind. This is up close and personal wildlife photography as captured by Jonathan Griffiths.

Jonathan Griffiths is a photographer who spends his time between taking portraits of people in the studio, and of animals out in the wild. He was introduced to the world of photography as a child but only very recently got his feet wet in the industry when he acquired a DSLR. Now Griffiths is famous for some of his up close wildlife images found all over the web.

The images of bears, lions and tigers up close and snarling a few feet away from the lens look too good (or too scary) to be true, but they are in fact all real. However, Griffiths states that all of the photography done with these majestic predators were done in a controlled environment. It took two or three days spending time around the carnivores in order to gain their trust and respect. In order to get them up close to his camera, the photographer would dangle little pieces of meat in front of him.

Griffiths had to wake up at 5:30 in the morning, endure freezing temperatures of 40 degrees below zero centigrade, and above all hold his ground as he took pictures of the animals in the wildlife breeding reserve.

While the illusion of dangerous wildlife in nature might have been broken now that you know that Griffiths took the pictures in a breeding refuge, the pictures are nonetheless impressive. Doubly so because the photographer is an amateur who pursued his passion and came out with a great set of photographs.

For anyone aspiring to take these kinds of picture, Griffiths' advice is too always, always bring along your camera; you'll never know that whatever is happening before you might just become a priceless moment in the future.

This is Jonathan Griffiths' website. More up close and personal wildlife photography in this section.