I hope your 2024 is off to a good start. A highlight for me has been the publication in the Feb 2024 issue of National Geographic magazine of my story “Borneo’s Wild Green Heart”, written by long time NatGeo contributor Jennifer Holland. When so much news out of Borneo is about forest loss, this is a positive story about an amazing rainforest area that still retains its full complement of biodiversity, from orangutans to flying frogs to clouded leopards and the giant dipterocarps and other trees that create the habitat for all this life to thrive.
This story is a very personal one, since I first went to Gunung Palung way back in 1987 as a student volunteer with Prof. Mark Leighton at Harvard, and subsequently, my wife Cheryl Knott has carried on her orangutan research and conservation program there for 30 years. Our kids Russell and Jessica grew up spending summers there with us, and now things have come full circle, and Russell, a successful photographer in his own right, captured the dramatic opening shot you see below!
I hope you enjoy the article, which you can read online at NatGeo, if you don’t receive the magazine in the mail.
The opening spread of my story about Gunung Palung National Park in Borneo features an image made by my son Russell, who assisted me on the shoot, and did a lot of the drone photography. Working in cooperation with National Park staff and Indonesian drone pilot Tri Wahyu Susanto, we carefully familiarized this particular orangutan with our small drone by initially flying it at a distance from her but letting her see it and get used to it over a period of days. She is a female named Bibi who has been followed regularly by the research team for many years. At first curious about the drone, she soon ignored it completely, allowing us to get into position to capture a unique image that shows an orangutan feeding high in the canopy in the context of her environment – the intact lowland rainforest of Gunung Palung.
Photo by Russell Laman (@RussLaman on Instagram).
A TALE OF TWO COVERS
Wallace’s Flying Frog is one of the most famous and unique creatures found in Borneo’s rainforest, but extremely hard to find. It can’t really “fly” of course, but has the ability to use the huge surface area of its webbed feet as airfoils, and make controlled glides between trees. In October 2000, my fourth story was published in National Geographic magazine on “Borneos Wild Gliders”, and Wallace’s Flying Frog made the cover. It was my first NatGeo cover, and a very exciting moment in my early photography career. As editor Bill Allen said to me at the time, I had proven my ability to come back with images of nearly impossible subjects, because I had managed to get photos of not just Wallace’s Flying Frog gliding, but many other curious gliding species in Borneo that featured in that story.
Fast forward over twenty years, I was back in Borneo working on the coverage for my new story about Gunung Palung National Park, and we managed to find another Wallace’s Flying Frog and capture an image mid-glide. It didn’t make the cover of the US edition this time, but as you can see above, it adorns the cover of the international edition published in Indonesia. It’s a fitting tribute to the amazing biodiversity of Indonesia, and the young Indonesian biologists who helped me in the field. I hope this story continues to build pride and enthusiasm among our Indonesian colleagues who hold the future of their magnificent rainforest in their hands.
A FEW IDEAS FOR 2024
If you are into lifelong learning, supporting good causes, and being inspired, here are a few ideas for you to consider for 2024.
- Sign up for the “Save Wild Orangutans” Newsletter.
savewildorangutans.org
Every month, the team from the Gunung Palung Orangutan Conservation Program puts out their “Code Red” newsletter reporting on their activities, discoveries, and events in and around Gunung Palung National Park in West Kalimantan, Indonesia. It’s a wonderful window into the lives of wild orangutans and the people working to study them and protect their habitat and ensure that the communities around Gunung Palung are also thriving. The newsletter if free, but I hope you will be inspired to become a monthly contributor. It feels good to be making a small contribution to orangutan conservation each month, even if its just the price of one fancy coffee.
- Sign up for the “Lukas Guides” Newsletter.
https://www.lukasguides.com
Every week, David Lukas, a gifted naturalist, thinker, and extraordinarily curious observer of nature publishes a newsletter with his unique insights and research into a topic that takes his fancy. I look forward to these quick reads, where I always learn something that I find myself thinking about later when I’m out in the field. David’s newsletter is free, but if you find it as worthwhile to read as I do, he offers an option to be a paid subscriber to support his work and receive other benefits. Do check it out. - Commit to Improving Your Photography.
Are you interested in photographing wildlife? In the photo workshops that I sometimes teach for Lindblad/NatGeo Expeditions, I find that many photographers are obsessing about camera settings and not focusing on thinking creatively in the field about the elements that make a strong wildlife image. So I created my own online course called “Bird Photography Masterclass: The Creative Process”. It could be just the thing to help you take your photography to a whole new level this year. And for being a newsletter subscriber, I’m offering you an additional 25% off the price right now. Just visit the course page at the link below, and use the code 25percent at checkout. There is also an option to give the course as a gift. Valentines day is coming up. Just saying!
As always, thanks for tuning in. I wish you all a healthy, happy, and successful 2024.
Warmest regards,
Tim Laman
PS. We continue to add new images and update our galleries at TimLamanFineArt.com throughout the year, so be sure to take a look from time to time and see what’s new. Thanks!
