I think it’s great if people are interested and want to do more and work on conservation using
Adam Oswellphotography . It’s very rewarding, and it’s very effective.Photography is a very powerful medium to use for change. It can tell stories that are universal and easily understood.
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Our 365 Days of
We have a very special episode for you today! In this interview, I talk to investigative journalist Adam Oswell. Adam has been documenting illegal wildlife trade for decades. Recently, he received the Wildlife Photographer of the Year for Photojournalism award. As you can imagine, we had a wide variety of eye-opening topics to discuss!
Adam and I talk about:
- His foundation, which focuses on wildlife conservation
- What it was like for him to receive the Wildlife Photographer of the Year award and how it has impacted his career
- The advice he’d give to aspiring photojournalists
& much more!
Talking with Adam was a pleasure. He generously shared a lot of tips on how to communicate with strangers, how to take care of our world, and an abundance of other important things. I hope his story inspires you to look at photojournalism from a fresh perspective.
Here is a preview of our conversation with Adam Oswell.
Q: Which of your photography projects has had the biggest impact on you?
Adam Oswell: I managed a program training rangers in Burma for about 10 years in some of the ethnic areas there. I don’t know if many people are aware of what’s happening in Burma right now, but there was a coup earlier this year and it’s now fallen into a really bad state of affairs. It’s basically an all-out civil war in a country and it’s been like that since they gained independence from Britain.
It’s a hub for a lot of different illicit industries, including wildlife, narcotics, timber, gold, human trafficking and all of those things have been scaled up because the military government is trying to create more revenue as they become more isolated. There’s some really special high-value biodiversity in Burma which mostly lays in ethnic controlled frontier areas. So I spent a long time training rangers there.
It was just very rewarding, taking young guys without any experience and some people who had a lot of experience with war. They had great skills to apply to being field rangers. Training and watching the transformation of those people, and learning about indigenous respect for nature and how they manage the forests was very rewarding.
We deployed about 150 rangers in a very large area of very high-value biodiversity. It was a very effective program and they’re still there, protecting those areas. So that was very rewarding.
A lot of the other work I do is similar to that. It depends on what’s happening in the region. Things can change very quickly, politically, here and there’s a lot of different dynamics going on. But the bottom line is that I work for organizations to protect wildlife and biodiversity through communications. And sometimes it’s sensitive. Sometimes it’s working in sensitive areas. Sometimes it’s not.
Q: What has been the most difficult obstacle for you to overcome as a photographer?
Adam Oswell: Most difficult obstacle? It’s an interesting question. I think one of the most difficult things has been maintaining my independence. It’s difficult to work for clients or work for people while you’re trying to maintain your own ideas and your own integrity without following people’s agendas. It’s been a challenge sometimes, especially when you work for big organizations.
There’s always an agenda. You know, there’s always something behind what they want you to do. I’ve always tried to be as independent as possible. It’s very difficult because everyone has to work for somebody. But maintaining your independence in the sense of the work that you want to do has been the most challenging thing for me.
Q: If someone wants to help stop illegal wildlife trade in their own way, what can they do?
Adam Oswell: I think people need to ask themselves first, what is it they really want to do? You can’t do this unless you’re passionate about it. I’m not motivated necessarily by money or recognition. I do it because I care. I’m very passionate about it. There’s a huge need for it. I’ve managed to make a living out of it at the same time.
But anyone who’s contemplating doing this type of
There’s lots of types of
There’s a lot of organizations and there’s a lot of demand for good stories. There’s a lot happening in the world right now, with the environment, facing biodiversity collapse, climate change issues. And the more stories that are told effectively about what’s going on, the more effectively we can influence governments and people to change.
Check out Adam’s work:
Website
Instagram
Wildlife Photographers of the Year (award code – WPY57)
