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

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.

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!

Currently I am working on another three books, doing a lot of magazine work, am shooting for fifteen stock agencies, plus my own photo library - all this keeps me quite busy!

Happiness is not the absence of problems, it's the ability to deal with them.

What need does the earth have of us?

Actually Grandad Christmas is a pagan holiday and Jesus probably hates you for celebrating it.

Cussing like a commoner wasn't something I was tested on. I picked that habit up outside of high school.

I haven't written in a week. It's like holding your breath under water. You feel an awful constriction and then the instinct to propel yourself.

Our business is about technology, yes. But it's also about operations and customer relationships.

I always said that though I was the first, I wanted to be the first of many.

A companion loves some agreeable qualities which a man may possess, but a friend loves the man himself.

My autobiography is one of the truest, most frankly written books ever published in the western hemisphere.

A Christian in his surroundings should encourage everyone to be better, instead of being the one who stoops to be like everyone else.