"When photographing lions with remote cameras, you often have to rely on their cat instincts for an image to materialise. This makes lions great subjects for remote cameras as the smell of something peculiar is often enough to draw them towards the camera; but this also hugely increases the chances of losing your camera.

The best time to photograph lions is at first light when they are most active. This lioness was walking back to her pride after a failed attempt at hunting wildebeest some 20 minutes before. This presented the opportunity to place a camera in her path up ahead. The image was captured at 6.40am on my last morning in the Mara but my camera ended up in the possession of the pride for the best part of an hour which was quite unnerving but equally interesting as the cubs took their turn in playing with their new toy.

Thankfully, my trusty Pelican case protected the camera from the whole experience and the image is now with us forever.
"

Instinct, Maasai Mara, Kenya
20% of sales goes to support The Mara Elephant Project
Available sizes
18" x 20.24" Edition of 15
30" x 33.74" Edition of 10
40" x 44.98" Edition of 5

"Wildlife fine art photographer and conservationist, James Lewin, is entirely self-taught and first became interested in photography whilst in Kenya. He chooses to take black and white photographs using a wide-angled lens and shoots from a low level set against a dramatic background. This approach accentuates the magnitude of his subjects, most usually African wildlife. James has held his own fundraising events whilst also donating prints to charity auctions. In 2018, at the National History Museum in London, his photograph ‘The Big Friendly Giant’ raised just over £4,000 at auction in aid of The Whitley Fund for Nature. Several of James’s photographs have been shortlisted for the final round of judging in the Wildlife Photographer of the Year and in 2019, his photograph ‘The Baron of Borana’ received an Honourable Mention in The Monochrome Awards. He has won a number of other awards (Outdoor Photographer of the Year, BBC Wildlife and The Neutral Density Awards). Alongside his love of photography, James is an ardent conservationist and donates a proportion of his profits to conservation charities to ensure the protection of the animals he photographs. The big tusker elephants are particularly close to his heart. James's photographs are offered as archival pigment prints (the most commonly used among professional photographers), silver gelatin (the gold standard in black and white printing which surpasses archival pigment prints in longevity, quality and detail) and platinum palladium (these prints are made in a darkroom with photo chemistry and have the very best archival rating of any print - the image is embedded into the fibres of the paper, as opposed to an archival pigment print where the inks are sprayed onto the surface)."