Tim Laman wins wildlife photography award

American field biologist and photo journalist Tim Laman’s Orangutan ape pictured climbing into a tree to reach for figs has won the 2016 Wildlife Photographer of the year (WPY) competition. He captured the scene using a remote camera placed in the rainforest canopy of Gunung Palung National Park in Indonesian Borneo. His fearless bravery effort of clambering up himself to position his camera equipment has been rewarded.

 

Lewis Blackwell chair of the judges said “It’s a difficult –to-achieve shot, This is very often what wins Wildlife Photographer of the Year: a picture that has a high degree of technical difficulty, but one that also has something to say; and Tim’s image certainly has that as well”.

 

Tim’s picture tells a story when you look at the six pictures submitted to the WPY category for Wildlife Photojournalist Award, illustrates the pressure the Asian great ape is under because of habitat loss.

 

Last year several conservationists has to rescue several orphaned organutans, after vast tracks of forest in Indonesian Borneo and Sumatra were ravaged by fire due to El Nino weather.

 

This year’s junior award was won by 16-year-old Gideon Knight from the UK, a picture taken in London’s Valentines Park, which shows a crow in a tree backlit by the Moon   title “The Moon and the Crow.@.

 

The Urban category was won by India’s Nayan Khanolkar in the suburb of Mumbai for “the Alley cat” Leopards often creep through the streets at night which can lead to conflict with humans. It took four months of effort went into getting this shot which is lit with subtle flash.