Standard: 40" x 23"

Large: 60" x 19"

None of my prints have required more trial and error than '57'. Created by combining three separate images in to one panoramic piece, there are stacks of failures on the metaphorical cutting room floor.

Shot in Amboseli, home to one of Africa’s last great elephant populations, the image is testament to the regions success in protecting its wildlife as well as to the vast, rugged landscape as dust devils dancing along the horizon.

I now spend more time in Amboseli than I do anywhere else. Working with elephants has become an obsession and frankly nowhere else I have been comes close to matching Amboseli’s image potential.

Last September I was there for ten days, working as ever with Eric Ole Kalama - a mercurial talent in the guiding world who I have eulogised about regularly in my image write ups.

We had already got our collections headline shot, ‘Michael’ in the can, so could now turn our attention to the herds.

Given our timing coincided with the peak of dry season, and rain had not fallen for months, the chances of seeing a large herd were slim. When food and water are abundant elephant families can form ‘super herds’, buoyed by the readiness of nourishment and safe in the knowledge of all members being able to eat and drink well. As dry seasons set in, herds split in to smaller families so as to reduce competition amongst themselves.

This left our chances at the slimmer end of the spectrum, but as ever Eric filled me with fresh confidence that all would be well.

We figured our best chance was at the start of the day, when the herds would be coming in from the eastern border of the park towards the Ol Tukai marsh in the center. We had seen small groups coming in on this route for the last few days but nothing close to the numbers we were hoping for.

It was on our ninth and penultimate day that we saw a swath of dust on the horizon. Dust displaced by what we hoped would be hundreds of wide, padded elephant footprints. Eric, always a step ahead of me, just smiled when I asked if he thought it was a big herd.

As it transpired, two herds of roughly 30 each were merging to form as one, the point they would join just a few hundred meters ahead of us. We got there first and, lying on the ground, awaited their arrival, finger hovering on my Nikon’s shutter release.

To create a panoramic image, I had to shoot three individual images, starting with one of just the rear third of the herd, before quickly panning through and getting another of the middle section and finally one of the front. This way I would be moving my camera in the same direction of the elephants and have more chance of things finally going to plan. I would then take the three images and merge them in an editing software, resulting in a seamless, intricately detailed panorama.

Knowing there was no way I could tell if this process worked until I got the images on my computer, we made a number of attempts. Driving along side the herd, making regular stops just ahead of them and repeating the process of panning. My camera making as much noise as the herd, who move so effortlessly and silently across the earth.

Thankfully, one of all the many attempted came together, the result being an image I am immensely proud of and one that shows in breath taking detail, 57 elephants moving as one through Amboseli.