Wildlife Photography Part 1 – Tracey Lund

Tracey has been interested in photography since she was a child and has always loved wildlife.  On a dream trip to Africa in 2004, with her first (film) SLR, she began to take photography and wildlife much more seriously.  She currently works as a telecoms engineer with the local Hull telephony company to fund her numerous trips and the photography.  Wildlife photography makes her happy, it creates memories, and provides a challenge and wonderful experiences.  She regards it as a blessing to watch wildlife let alone photograph it.  “To get images is just a bonus.”

Tracey’s gear is now quite old.  But she would rather spend money on travel than update the kit.  She uses a Canon 7D II (a robust, advanced enthusiast’s, crop-sensor camera, now discontinued), her usual lens is a 100-400mm zoom, and she shoots on manual with auto-ISO (up to 1600).  She like to use an aperture of f7 or f8 if possible, a shutter speed of at least 1/1000s, and continuous focus.  She mostly shoots handheld (she hates tripods) and she takes lots of shots – 49,000 in a two week trip to Japan!  Her top tip was to shoot at the animal’s eye level whenever possible.

The presentation took us around the world.  We started in Japan (in winter) with macaques, red crown cranes, swans, eagles, deer, and red foxes.

From Finland we had black grouse, a goshawk, a waxwing, golden eagles, a capercaillie, bears and wolverines.  From Greece (Lake Kerkini) we had Dalmatian pelicans.  From France (Camargue) we had horses.  From Iceland we had rare “blue morph” arctic foxes.  And from the UK we had puffins, seals, a barn owl, hares, swans, deer, red squirrels, a crested tit, red grouse, a ptarmigan, mountain hares, otters, and gannets.

Tracey also shoots captive animals, but only at “proper places” that are concerned with conserving and/or rescuing wildlife and have big enclosures etc.  She finds it good practice for shooting in the wild.  Again, she travels extensively.  From trips to Holland she showed us images of orangutans and gorillas.  From Spain we had lynx and bears.  From the USA (Yellowstone) we had grizzly bears.  And from the UK we had lions and leopards (Kent) and a polar bear (Yorkshire Wildlife Park, Tracey’s “local”).

This presentation was a memorable evening of stunning wildlife images.  Tracey’s passion for the subject – “photographing wildlife is an adventure but most of all a privilege” – shines through her work.

And – Good News! – Tracey is “visiting” us again on 2 September to treat us to Part 2 of her “Wildlife Photography” talk.  Put that in your diary now!

More of Tracey’s marvellous images can be found at https://traceylundphotography.co.uk/