Zoos are weird. I spend over 300 hours a year at zoos and they’re still weird. That fine line between conservation and exhibition, providing a better life and taking away wild freedom. it’s just… yeah. Weird.
Part of how I reconcile that with my zoo photos is attempting to make them not look like they were taken in a zoo. Whether it’s opening the aperture wide to mask a wire mesh, zooming in tight to hide enclosure elements, I want my zoo photos to look like animals in their natural habitats.
So what do I do when a Sumatran Orangutan has its face up against a filthy, scratched up window? Against the kind of glass I would put in the trash before I’d put it in front of my camera? Well, if that orangutan is staring into my soul and smiling, I take the damn picture anyway. No focus tricks are going to eliminate this window. Without a massive lens hood, I’m not going to get rid of that reflection of my hands. But I don’t care.
Part of the reason we walk that fine line at zoos is for connection. I can’t speak for Cheyenne, but Denver Zoo’s mission statement is to provide a better world for animals through human understanding. And it’s moments like this, feeling a deep connection to an animal that is so painfully close to human that it kind of hurts to see it through a window like this, that lead to that human understanding. That make you want to provide these animals, all animals, with a better future. And if I can show that in a photo, I don’t give a damn about reflections and scratched up glass.
The Zootographer 