I concentrate on the southern African subcontinent.

I carry a notebook full of sketches of pictures I want to take - they are really scruffy sketches, but at least I am going out there with a clear objective.

All I really wanted to do was wildlife photography.

My first serious project was photographing badgers - very, very difficult as they are shy and nocturnal.

So about twenty years ago I gave up on painting - and got into terrible debt after buying a load of camera gear!

A large wildlife book, start to finish, could take one to two years, but then I would expect to get several good (nature) magazine features off the back of this, plus of course a lot of stock.

Close encounters are bad. Bad for the animal, as it causes stress, and bad for me for exactly the same reason.

In The States I would have no edge, no advantage at all.

The Kalahari is brilliant - and easy to visit.

Photography started as a means of getting reference material for my paintings of nature subjects.

For the first few years we lived in a tiny rented cottage at the bottom of a friend's garden. We often joked that there was plenty of film in the fridge, but not too much food!

I've always had a keen sense of history. My father was an antiques dealer and he used to bring home boxes full of treasures, and each item always had a tale attached.

I didn't know whether to duck or to run, so I ran.

May you build a ladder to the stars and climb on every rung. May you stay forever young.

I'm not one of those actors who sits around the table and intellectualizing anything, or discusses much of anything. Everything for me is intuitive and instinctive.

Nobody can tell your story the way you can tell your story.

Speak less but act more.

We come into the world whole, all of us, but we don't know that, don't know that life will be taking large chunks out of us, forever.

The distance between taking social action and having the knowledge is as wide as the mouth of the Mississippi.

A lot of it's experimental, spontaneous. It's about knocking about in the studio and bumping into things.

If you have an ego of any sort, this course [Augusta] will take it and shove it down your throat.