Art in Nature

David Rennie is a late-blooming, self-taught photographer. He jokes that when he started out he thought ISO was a measurement for radioactive materials, photoshop a place where you bought camera gear, and shutter speed an indication of how fast your venetian blinds closed! Today, just six years after his love affair with photography began, he is a highly acclaimed, award-winning nature photographer, with a career that culminated in 2013 with him being crowned Australian Geographic ANZANG Nature Photographer of the Year.

David credits his bipolar disorder with helping him refine his photographic skills. During his manic phases, sleep would evade him for days — and it was during those times that he would spend days at a time watching his subjects and learning their ways, developing new techniques so that he could capture his breathtaking images. He now uses his photography to assist him in his work as a passionate advocate for conserving our wilderness areas, especially our valuable wetlands that are increasingly under threat (including the Ramsar-listed Mandurah Wetlands near his home in Western Australia).

As David says, ‘It would be gut-wrenching if our children’s children could only see what we can now through books like this and not out in nature.’