Perspective

Perspective, Mara North Conservancy, Kenya

There are images that happen and images that are built. This one sits precisely on the line between the two.

The composition is almost impossibly balanced — two giraffes silhouetted to the right of the frame, two bushes silhouetted to the left, the shapes counterweighting one another across a central space occupied by nothing except breaking light. The giraffes are taller, more complex in outline, carrying the distinctive interrupted verticality of the species. The bushes are lower, rounder, simpler. Neither side dominates. The eye moves between them across the gap and finds, in that gap, the reason the image works — a break in the storm cloud through which the light is coming, illuminating the horizon with a warmth that the surrounding darkness makes extraordinary by contrast.

That light is the subject. The giraffes and the bushes are the frame around it.

The decision to shoot in colour was straightforward. The breaking light carries warmth — amber and gold in the narrow band where it reaches the horizon — set against the cool blue-grey of the storm above. That contrast between warm light and cold sky is the chromatic argument the image makes, and it is one that black and white cannot replicate. Monochrome would have preserved the tonal drama and lost the temperature, and the temperature is everything.

The balance of the composition rewards close attention. The two bushes are not identical, and neither are the two giraffes — one stands slightly taller, one slightly ahead — but the overall visual weight of each side has been arrived at, by chance and timing, with a precision that formal landscape photography spends considerable effort trying to achieve.

About These Prints

Every print is produced by Whitewall, voted the world’s best photo lab by TIPA for multiple years. The quality speaks for itself.

Fine Art Print — Hahnemühle Photo Rag paper, printed with a 1cm border. A museum-quality archival paper that renders tone and shadow with exceptional depth.

Framed Print — As above, with a 3cm passe-partout mount and a 2cm natural or black oak frame. Ready to hang.

Artbox — The image mounted behind glass in a slim aluminium frame. Clean, contemporary, and particularly striking at larger sizes.

Do visit my Prints and Framing page for more information on these products.

A note on sizing

All sizes refer to the image area only — the border, mount, and frame add to the overall dimensions. If you’re buying for a specific wall space or an existing frame, please factor this in. Not sure? Drop me a message and I’ll help you work it out.

Something else in mind?

Different size, different frame, different format entirely — I’m happy to help. Get in touch via the Contact page and I’ll do my best to sort it.

All prints are supplied without watermark or copyright overlay.