(“Late-night feed”
by Susan Scott)
South African director recognised by Wildlife Photographer of the Year
Competition for her image from award-winning film STROOP
The world’s top photographic competition, the Wildlife Photographer of
the Year Competition held annually in London, announced this year’s winners at
a gala event which took place in the city's Natural History Museum. Submissions
for this prestigious competition are made by photographers from around the
world with only 100 images out of the 45,000 entries submitted making the final
selection.
South African film director Susan Scott was a recipient of one of those
100 awards given out for her image of two black rhino calves orphaned by rhino
poaching in KwaZulu-Natal. Scott took the image when she was filming at an
undisclosed orphanage for her film STROOP
- journey into the rhino horn war.
The feature length documentary, four years in the making, was recently
screened in the US to critical acclaim, winning awards at major film festivals
such as the San Francisco Green Film Festival and the San Diego International
Film Festival. Last week saw the film win an additional three awards at
festivals in Los Angeles - the film capital of the world.
Says Scott: “While filming STROOP
I often found myself in these incredible situations and I always felt so
privileged to be there documenting it for the film. So I often switched the
camera off video and would quickly click one or two stills of the moment.
"A film powerfully transports us into that world and that is what STROOP does, but an image is something
special; it’s that moment frozen, always there for us to absorb the power of
it.
Describing the lead up to the shot, Scott says: "When I followed
Axel in to feed the black rhinos, I knew it was pitch black and that I could
not light with a flash or a handheld light due to the strict conditions they
had set up to reduce stress on the animals. So when he walked to where they had
been sleeping under the lights to feed them, I was struck by how beautiful the
moment looked and of course the black forms in the red light signifies so much.
The red is unfortunately the colour of where they came from ... red blood from
the deaths of their mothers and black for their name, black rhinos ... but also
the human who represents the species who changed their lives. It also very
powerfully sums up the rhino poaching crisis, especially as they are now
dependent on humans to live. So capturing this moment in the small space of
time was difficult due to having to capture it handheld on a grainy ISO, but I
think it all adds to the feel of that moment.
"I was struck by the two colours - red and black; our human eye
captures so much more than what a photograph can, in terms of light range, but
this is exactly how that moment looked and I couldn’t even see Axel's facial
expression but I knew he was tired and that the babies were also tired and
sleepy.
For me, it’s such a peaceful moment representing a backstory of
tremendous violence. So it’s the two colours that I like the most," she
adds.
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