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Saving Animals With Photographs
Joe Riis talks about taking photographs that tell stories about science.
Courtesy of Joe Riis.
Pronhorns are animals similar to antelope.
Scholastic Art: What is your job?
Joe Riis: I am a wildlife photojournalist, so I’m a storyteller. I tell science stories through photographs. Typically, I travel with a group of scientists who are studying a specific animal. I photograph the scientists while they work and the animals that they are studying.
SA: How do you tell a story with your photographs?
JR: My photo essays are usually made up of 10 photographs. The first one should capture the reader’s attention. I also try to include a photograph of the landscape, a few emotional photographs of the animals, and some that are simply beautiful. I want the reader to learn something new by looking at my photo essays.
SA: Tell us what you hope to achieve as a photojournalist.
JR: My goal is to make science accessible to the general public. I went to school for biology, and I consider myself more of a conservationist and a scientist than a photographer. Photography is my mode of communicating, and it’s how I stir people into action to help protect animals.
SA: How have your photographs helped protect animals?
JR: I photographed the pronghorn migration—the longest land-animal migration in the U.S. One part of the migration was dangerous because the animals had to cross a highway. My photos of pronghorns almost getting hit by cars helped motivate the government to build a bridge for the animals over the highway.
SA: How did you get into photography?
JR: I won a Young Explorers Grant from National Geographic right after college. One of the photojournalists at National Geographic asked me to be his assistant. After working for him—and learning from him—I started to get my own assignments.
SA: How do you photograph animals when they are in the wild?
JR: Sometimes I hide and photograph them from about 50 feet away. But usually, if I’m there, animals stay away. So I set up a camera trap. A camera trap is a camera connected by a cable to a box several feet away. The box sends an infrared light beam to a trigger on the camera. If an animal walks between the camera and the box, it breaks the beam, and the camera begins taking pictures.
SA: How do you get the animals to look at the camera?
JR: Animals can hear the camera trap clicking. They hear the click of the first photograph and then turn to the camera. So the second photo is usually the best.