August 29, 2024

Most people come face to face with only a handful of wild animals in their daily lives and have little opportunity to observe their behaviors, experiences, or suffering at length. This can limit their understanding of, and empathy for, wild animals. By bringing images of wild animals’ lives to the public, wildlife photographers — such as field researchers, animal advocates, or hobbyists — have the potential to represent the experiences of wild animals through visual storytelling, creating opportunities for understanding and empathy.

Wild Animal Initiative (WAI) is a scientific organization that researches wild animal welfare and supports other scientists with funding and career support. When we select photos to feature in our communications at WAI, we think about not only the story that an image tells, but also the ethical considerations related to how it was captured. We’ve put together these guidelines for photographers who want to present their wild animal subjects accurately, beautifully, and ethically. We hope they will help you avoid common tropes in wildlife photography and represent wild animals in a way that helps your audience understand their individual experiences.

How to improve your wildlife photography and select the best photos

Compose better photos by focusing on individuals.

Many photos of wild animals are used in stories about conservation, which seeks to preserve species and ecosystems. But wild animal welfare science focuses on individual animals, recognizing that within those species and ecosystems are sentient individuals who merit our attention and concern. Taking and selecting photos to use in wild animal welfare communications therefore requires particular considerations.

Effective photos of wild animals will help an audience appreciate the subjects as just that: subjects. Particularly helpful images might highlight an individual or a family unit, either by zooming in to frame them in a close-up or by capturing a discordant individual in a wide shot.

Visual storytelling can showcase animals’ unique personalities and behaviors.

Traditional wildlife photography often represents wild animals as tokens of their (often charismatic or endangered) species. They might appear as models in field guides, as representations of abstract ideas, or as extensions of the landscape around them. Instead, photos can feature wild animals in ways that highlight their personhood and agency, reminding us that the animals we see in photos have unique experiences that matter to them.

One way to achieve this is by capturing photos of wild animals in action. A hedgehog standing still might be cute, but that image might also reduce that hedgehog to inert (and therefore, perhaps inanimate) cuteness. A photo of a hedgehog carrying nesting materials back to their den tells us something very different: Hedgehogs spend their time pursuing their own ends, indifferent to how their human audiences would like them to appear.

The most common animals are often underrepresented in media and science communications.

The ultimate goal of wild animal welfare science is to produce research that informs interventions to alleviate suffering for the greatest number of animals possible. This is why we at WAI are especially interested in research into the lives of common species whose members are highly abundant. So while we often feature photos that highlight individuals, it can be equally helpful for other images to call attention to animals’ numerousness.

Rare and charismatic mammals like elephants and tigers can make stunning and inspiring photo subjects, but they are only a tiny proportion of both wild animal lives and the rich visuals and behaviors available to wildlife photographers to capture. Some of the most numerous wild animals belong to species that rarely attract the interest of photographers.

The majority of wild animals are invertebrates like crustaceans and insects. They could benefit from much more visual representation — as could other common but “unpopular” animals such as fish, reptiles, amphibians, members of non-native species, and species typically seen as pests (like pigeons and rodents).

Remember to include juvenile wild animals in your photos.

Because many wild animals die before reaching adulthood, and because juveniles are especially susceptible to welfare threats like disease, starvation, and predation, their lived experiences are of particular importance to wild animal welfare researchers. Yet we usually imagine the adult form of an animal when we think of their species, perhaps in part because wildlife photos tend to feature adults. By increasing the representation of juvenile animals in visual communications, we can help remind our audiences that juveniles are highly abundant and have their own specific kinds of welfare concerns.

Use photos that tell true stories about animals, their challenges, and their environments.

To understand what wild animals’ lives are like and convey this to an audience, we need to capture and share information about their experiences as accurately as possible. We therefore avoid featuring heavily edited photos of wild animals — which could make a photo aesthetically appealing, but could also misrepresent the animal’s situation. For example, if an animal’s environment contains debris or litter, we recommend leaving these in the photo. At Wild Animal Initiative, we often feature photos of animals in urban environments, or who are navigating challenging terrain like large rocks or logs. These photos truthfully capture the realities that the animals are facing, and the natural and anthropogenic factors that might affect their welfare.

How to choose between photos of animals thriving or suffering

Photos of animals suffering or in discomfort can help challenge romanticized ideas about life in the wild, so we encourage photographers to capture these kinds of images in addition to ones depicting neutral or positive experiences. But we also encourage scientific and advocacy organizations to consider how their particular audience is likely to respond to different types of photos. Communications that predominantly feature photos of suffering animals might be effective for some audiences, but can make others feel too uncomfortable to engage, potentially pushing them away and ultimately undermining an organization’s goals.

At WAI, we work to accelerate research that will be used to alleviate wild animal suffering in the future, but we tend to feature photos of animals who are not visibly suffering. We’ve made this choice both because high welfare, like that depicted in our photos, is the end result we'd like wildlife management to achieve, and because a website that is emotionally challenging to visit might deter otherwise interested audiences from engaging with wild animal welfare science.

The ethics of wildlife photography

An animal’s welfare should never be compromised for the sake of a photo.

An animal’s welfare might be negatively affected if the presence of a photographer frightens them or disrupts their normal activities. To avoid this, photographers should keep a suitable distance from their subjects. The appropriate distance will vary depending on the location and species, so we recommend following local guidelines. But generally, it’s good practice to kneel down to the height of the animal, stay silent, and avoid sudden movements.

It’s important to note that even animals who do not show outward signs of disturbance could be negatively affected by the presence of photographers and their equipment, including drones, which may disturb them. Large numbers of photographers and tourists visiting the same locations can also disturb animals and the environments that sustain them, so we recommend thinking carefully about where and which animals you choose to photograph. If you know a certain site is particularly popular, consider choosing another location.

Is it harmful to take selfies with wild animals?

We generally caution researchers against taking selfies with the animals they study. Taking extra time to photograph animals who must be handled for research can prolong their stress. These selfies can also normalize the handling of wild animals among general audiences who view the photos and might be unaware that the animals pictured may be suffering in ways that are not clearly visible. By taking selfies with wild animals, scientists can unintentionally set an example that untrained members of the public might follow, endangering both themselves and the animals. In the past, we have shared photos of our grantees handling animals during their fieldwork, but in 2024, we made the decision to no longer feature these kinds of photos for these reasons.

Learn more about best practices for wildlife photography

For those seeking further guidance, the International League of Conservation Photographers offers ethical guidelines, as well as practical considerations and resources to help wildlife photographers determine whether they are photographing animals appropriately.

Learn more about Wild Animal Initiative

Read about our mission, check out more posts about wild animal welfare science on our blog, or donate to support our work and the growth of our field.