Making your wildlife photographs count
I just got back from my work trip to South Africa and Uganda. While it may seem ironic, I got no wildlife travel or photography in these incredibly bio-diverse countries. I had a plan to visit Pilanesberg while I was at Johannesburg, but on the weekend of 19th and 20th Jan, I ran into torrential downpour. There was no option but to cancel the trip. So it just ended up being me and some friends over a few beers. I didn't get any time to photograph at Kampala either, though the tree outside my apartment yielded some interesting lifers - Eastern Grey Plantain Eater, Ross's Turaco, Double Toothed Barbet, Grey Woodpecker, Meyer's Parrot, a Black and White Casqued Hornbill and an African Pied Hornbill. Shows that staying alive to the world around you, can be very productive!
I do want to go around traveling in Southern Africa and in Uganda. Uganda in particular has some of the best spots in the world to observe mountain gorillas. If you're keen to see and photograph these great apes in the wild, do let me know. I'll perhaps go on a trip sometime in December or January next year. Who knows, we may just have an encounter like the one you see above.
Photography for Good - A Spotted Creeper
One of the highlights of last year's birding for me was this encounter with a Spotted Creeper at Tal Chappar Wildlife Sanctuary. Mr Poonia, the Assistant Conservator of Forests at the sanctuary talks about the four guarantees of the park - Chappar (the village itself), Laggar (the falcon), Creeper (this beauty) and a puncture, after you've seen it all. And yes, we did have a puncture! It's amazing how Mr Poonia did find the bird for us. It's super small, extremely quiet, and moves with amazing speed. That I could fire a couple of shots was a bit of a miracle.
Anyway, when I was looking up Wikipedia for information about this bird, I discovered that the page had no picture. I'm of course not the first person to photograph this bird, so I found it odd that no one had contributed an image back. I'd just started contributing images to Wikimedia commons last year and this ended up being one of the images I added to the wiki. Contributing back to Wikipedia and adding my photographs there gives me a great feeling of joy. There are several pages about birds and animals that have no photographs and the ones which have photographs could often do with more. To be part of a worldwide effort to bring quality knowledge to the masses for free is something special. Plus, it's really easy:
Create an account on Wikimedia Commons
Add your images and select an appropriate license as you do so
Add a description
Embed the usage code that you get after this, onto any of the Wikimedia projects (e.g.:Wikipedia)
Can I still sell my images if I contribute to Wikipedia?
The way it stands, the version that you contribute to Wikimedia gives the world the right to use, remix and redistribute your photos as long as they attribute back to you and, as long as they share remixed work under this same code. This means that they can print your images full size if they like. And you can't stop that. You can't stop a newspaper or magazine from using your work as long as they attribute back to you as well. This particular use could well be under the doctrine of fair use in your country too. This said, there'll always be people who will be willing to pay for the service of a fine art print. Commercial users will often pay you as a gesture of goodwill. You also have the option of uploading a web-quality image to Wikipedia (1024 pixels on the longest side) and reserving your high resolution image for prints and for services like 500px. I wish Wikimedia allowed you to reserve rights to commercial usage, but that won't stop me from being a contributor. So, the next time you have a wildlife photograph that's really popular on social media or amongst your friends, do consider contributing a version to Wikimedia commons. Trusts me, it feels really good.