Eye contact

With regularity I get the question: How is it that animals look at you like that? How do you get them to look into the lens?

Until I first got the question, I never really noticed that I make a lot of such photos. I never noticed that others don’t make photos like that. What am I doing? Well, nothing. I watch and wait and wait and wait and snap when I see something that appeals to me. Emotion in any form. Eye contact is emotion. The result is often a penetrating photo. Is my goal to make a penetrating photo? Not really, I want to capture the moment, the emotion, the contact. Why do those animals look at me? No idea. I don’t do anything to attract attention. Maybe that makes me different. I’m often surrounded by people who do all sorts of strange things to attract attention. Of course they the don’t respond to that. They see that 24/7. Maybe the fact that I am sitting / standing still with the camera in front of my face is what looks different.

Of course it can also be that they think: Who is that weirdo with that camera in front of her face 🙂

Anyway, a collection of photos from recent years with animals looking straight into the lens.

Colombiaanse slingerapen – Spider monkey (Apenheul)