by Jerome D.
Introduction
Nick Brandt (b. 1964, London) is one of the most distinctive and morally urgent photographers working today — a former music video director who walked away from a successful commercial career to spend two decades documenting the vanishing wildlife and landscapes of East Africa, and who has since turned his lens on the human communities most devastated by climate breakdown around the world.
He studied painting and film at Saint Martin's School of Art in London before moving to California in 1992 to direct music videos. His commercial work was significant: he directed Michael Jackson's "Earth Song" and "Stranger in Moscow", Whitney Houston's "I Will Always Love You", Moby's "Porcelain", and videos for Jewel and XTC. It was while directing "Earth Song" in Tanzania in 1995 that his relationship with East Africa — and with its animals — began.
By 2001, frustrated that film and commercial photography could not capture what he felt about the destruction of the natural world, he began photographing seriously. The resulting work bore no resemblance to conventional wildlife photography: no telephoto lenses, no action sequences, no colour. Instead, intimate medium format black-and-white portraits of individual animals — elephants, lions, cheetahs, chimpanzees — treated with the gravity and tenderness of Old Master portraiture of human subjects.
The resulting trilogy — On This Earth (2005), A Shadow Falls (2009), and Across the Ravaged Land (2013) — established Brandt as a major voice in fine art photography and conservation advocacy simultaneously. His subsequent projects — Inherit the Dust (2016) and This Empty World (2019) — expanded his practice into large-scale environmental installation, placing life-size panels of his animal portraits in the industrialised wastelands that have replaced their habitats.
In 2010, he co-founded the Big Life Foundation with conservationist Richard Bonham, which now protects approximately 2 million acres of East African wilderness through anti-poaching initiatives in Kenya and Tanzania.
As he wrote in On This Earth: "Every creature, human or nonhuman, has an equal right to live, and this feeling, this belief that every animal and I are equal, affects me every time I frame an animal in my camera."
Camera Gear Used by Nick Brandt
Nick Brandt's camera choices are among the most deliberately considered and extensively explained of any photographer featured on this site. He has spoken at length, in multiple interviews, about every aspect of his equipment decisions — always in terms of creative and philosophical necessity rather than technical preference. What follows is sourced entirely from his own direct statements.
Cameras
Pentax 67 / Pentax 67II — His camera for the entirety of his East Africa trilogy (On This Earth, A Shadow Falls, Across the Ravaged Land) from 2001 to 2013, and confirmed across multiple sources including Wikipedia, Amateur Photographer, and Photofocus. Brandt chose the Pentax 67 specifically for its waist-level viewfinder — a quality he described as fundamental to the way he sees and composes: "I really love looking at that magnified ground glass. Everything I've ever done has been shot with waist-level, magnified ground glass — there's something about the way the image looks on it that really turns me on."
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| Pentax 67 II |
The Pentax 67 shoots 6×7cm frames on 120 medium format film — producing negatives approximately 4.5 times the area of a 35mm frame. For Brandt, the large negative was not primarily about resolution but about tonal depth: the smooth, fine-grained quality of Kodak T-Max 100 on a 6×7 negative produces a tonal range and shadow detail that no 35mm system could match for his large exhibition prints, some of which measure up to 40×60 inches.
He used the Pentax with three fixed focal length lenses — 55mm, 105mm, and 200mm — and never a telephoto lens. This was an absolute creative principle: "You wouldn't take a portrait of a human being from a hundred feet away and expect to capture their spirit; you'd move in close." The 200mm lens on a Pentax 67 is equivalent to approximately 100mm in 35mm terms — a moderate portrait length, not a wildlife telephoto. Getting close to lions, elephants, and chimpanzees without a telephoto lens required the extraordinary patience and trust that defines his relationship with the animals he photographed.
Mamiya RZ67 Pro IID — Confirmed as his camera for Inherit the Dust (2016), the project in which he placed life-size panels of animal portraits in Kenyan urban wastelands and photographed them as panoramas. He switched from the Pentax 67 to the Mamiya RZ67 Pro IID for a single, specific reason: the Mamiya's revolving film back, which allows the camera to be rotated between horizontal and vertical orientation without removing it from the waist-level position. "I switched to the Mamiya simply for one reason, which was the revolving back. I could crank the back round to vertical format and click away again. I've hardly ever used a tripod in all my photography — that's why I switched to the Mamiya."
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| Mamiya RZ67 Pro II |
The Mamiya RZ67 Pro IID is a large, heavy medium format SLR with interchangeable backs and lenses — a studio camera taken into the field with considerable determination. Brandt has been characteristically direct about the absurdity and necessity of this choice: "I spoke about 'the ridiculous lengths I've gone to' using film in the digital age. It is incredibly impractical."
For the Inherit the Dust panoramas, he shot multiple overlapping 6×7 frames with the Mamiya and stitched them in Photoshop to create panoramic images up to 120 inches (300cm) wide — constructed entirely from film negatives, not from digital captures.
Medium format digital system (unnamed, for This Empty World) — For his 2019 project This Empty World — his first work in colour, shot largely at night — Brandt confirmed switching to medium format digital for the first time, driven by the practical necessity of night photography: "The latest project, out of practical necessity, is for the first time medium format digital, and, due to much of it being shot at night, color." He has not publicly named the specific digital system used, and consistent with this site's editorial policy, no model is listed here.
Lenses
For the Pentax 67 and Mamiya RZ67, Brandt confirmed using three fixed focal length lenses: a 55mm, a 105mm, and a 200mm — the latter equivalent to approximately 100mm in 35mm terms. No telephoto lenses, ever. His reasoning was philosophical as much as practical: telephoto lenses create distance, both physical and emotional, between photographer and subject. His work required proximity — the kind of proximity that makes an elephant's eye fill the frame with a presence that feels mutual rather than observed.
Film
Kodak T-Max 100 — His confirmed black-and-white film for the Africa trilogy and Inherit the Dust, confirmed by Amateur Photographer and consistent across all documented sources. T-Max 100 is a fine-grained, high-resolution black-and-white emulsion — chosen for its tonal smoothness and the ability to resolve fine detail at the large print sizes Brandt requires. He also used heavy ND grad and red filters in the field, which he confirmed as standard practice: the red filter darkens blue skies dramatically in black-and-white, producing the characteristic deep, brooding skies that give his images their elegiac atmosphere.
He processed his film conventionally, then scanned the negatives for digital work. Despite the impracticality, he was committed to film for all black-and-white work: "Digital doesn't turn me on, and film does. I had some truly horrendous things happen where I've had to go back and reshoot. In spite of all that, I will continue for the foreseeable future — in black and white, certainly — to shoot film."
Infrared Photography
Brandt has confirmed using infrared film techniques for selected images in his Africa work. Infrared film renders foliage and grass in brilliant white while deepening blue skies to near-black — a technique that amplifies the otherworldly, timeless quality he sought in his animal portraits. Executing infrared photography with a medium format camera, in the field, with wild animals as subjects, is technically demanding in the extreme: infrared film requires careful exposure calculation, specific development, and meticulous handling in total darkness.
Technique & Style
Nick Brandt's photography is defined by patience measured in weeks, proximity measured in metres, and a moral commitment to his subjects that shapes every technical decision he makes.
He does not hunt moments in the manner of a conventional wildlife photographer. He waits for them — sometimes for days, sometimes weeks. To get the portrait of a lion on the Maasai Mara, he watched the animal sleep for seventeen days before a wind moved through the grass, the lion sat up, and the image he had imagined became available. The photograph was made in a fraction of a second. The preparation took more than two weeks.
His refusal of the telephoto lens forced a quality of relationship with his subjects that is visible in every image. He could not stand at a safe distance and frame with a 500mm. He had to be physically present in the animals' space — close enough that the animals could see him, smell him, and choose to continue whatever they were doing. This required the kind of patient, non-threatening presence that can only be built through years of repeated exposure to the same landscapes and the same animal communities.
His use of overcast, flat light is as deliberate as his lens choices. He has stated explicitly that none of his daytime images would work in direct sunlight: "The soft flat light imbued by overcast skies creates a melancholic, somber atmosphere that I believe is completely necessary." The overcast sky also eliminates the harsh shadows that would destroy the tonal smoothness of his T-Max 100 negatives at large print sizes.
The transition from the Africa trilogy to Inherit the Dust involved a radical expansion of his practice into large-scale environmental installation. He printed his animal portraits to life size — an elephant panel 12 feet high, a lion panel 6 feet — erected them in Kenyan industrial wastelands where those animals once lived, waited for local inhabitants to stop noticing them, and then photographed the scenes as black-and-white panoramas. "I always try and photograph in camera as much as possible," he has said — meaning the animals and the environments are real, placed together in the world, not composited digitally.
His post-processing is described as enhancing rather than transforming: improving shadow detail and tonal range after scanning, but rejecting any manipulation of the image's content. "He rejects more overt tampering, such as 'cloning in' additional animals or replacing skies," confirmed Amateur Photographer.
How to Imitate His Style in Post-Processing
Brandt's black-and-white aesthetic is one of the most admired in contemporary fine art photography — tonal depth, brooding skies, smooth shadow detail, and a quality of presence that feels more like a nineteenth-century portrait than a wildlife photograph. Pixlr is a useful tool for approaching his look:
Darken the sky aggressively.
Brandt uses red filters in the field to darken blue skies to near-black in his black-and-white work. In Pixlr's Black & White conversion tool, pull the Blue and Cyan luminance sliders down significantly. This is the single most effective step for approximating his sky treatment — the deep, almost black skies that give his images their weight and drama.
Protect the shadow detail obsessively.
T-Max 100 on a 6×7 negative holds extraordinary detail in the shadows. In Pixlr's Curves tool, add a gentle lift to the shadow point — bringing pure black up to a very dark grey — so that shadow areas retain texture and information. His prints never have empty, detail-less shadows.
Keep the midtones smooth and gradual.
The tonal signature of his work is a slow, smooth transition between zones — no abrupt jumps from light to dark. Use Pixlr's Curves tool to create a gentle, extended S-curve rather than a steep one. The goal is gradation, not contrast drama.
Print large.
Brandt's images are designed to be seen at exhibition scale — prints up to 40×60 inches and panoramas up to 300cm wide. Much of what makes his work extraordinary is invisible at screen size. If you want to understand what he is doing tonally, the image needs to be printed, ideally at a significant size. Use Pixlr's export at maximum resolution before sending to print.
How to Shoot Like Nick Brandt
Get close rather than zooming in.
His entire practice rests on physical proximity rather than optical distance. The relationship between photographer and subject that his images communicate cannot be faked with a 500mm telephoto. Whatever you are photographing — animals, people, landscape — ask whether you can achieve the same result by moving closer rather than zooming in. The answer is usually yes, and the result is usually better.
Wait longer than feels reasonable.
Seventeen days for a lion portrait. Weeks on location for each panorama in Inherit the Dust. The patience Brandt brings to each image is not a personality trait — it is a working method. Build time into your projects that allows for genuine waiting, and resist the pressure to leave with something rather than nothing.
Use flat light, not dramatic light.
Against every instinct of landscape and wildlife photography, Brandt avoids golden hour and harsh sunlight, preferring the flat, even quality of overcast conditions. For black-and-white work especially, flat light preserves tonal range and shadow detail in a way that direct sunlight destroys. Reconsider your relationship with the overcast day.
Commit to the waist-level viewfinder.
The Pentax 67 and Mamiya RZ67's waist-level viewfinders place the camera at a fundamentally different height and angle than an eye-level SLR. Shooting from waist height with wild animals is more neutral, less threatening, and produces a different spatial relationship between camera and subject. If you use a camera with a tilting screen, try shooting from waist level and observe what changes.
Use the project as advocacy.
Brandt did not separate his photography from his conservation work — he made the Big Life Foundation and his images mutually reinforcing. The photographs create the emotional urgency that funds and motivates the conservation work; the conservation work gives the photographs moral weight beyond aesthetics. Consider what cause or community your photographic practice can serve beyond the images themselves.
Embrace the impractical.
Shooting medium format film in the digital age, in the African bush, with wild animals, using infrared techniques — Brandt's method was, by his own admission, "incredibly impractical." He continued anyway because it produced the images he wanted. The most interesting photographic practices are rarely the most convenient ones.
Legacy
Nick Brandt's contribution to photography is inseparable from his contribution to conservation. The two cannot be disentangled, and he would not want them to be.
His East Africa trilogy produced some of the most celebrated animal portraits in the history of photography — images that succeeded in doing what he set out to do: making viewers feel the moral weight of what is being lost, rather than simply documenting its existence. The photographs have been described by critics as elegies, as requiems, as artifacts from a world that is vanishing. The comparison to portraiture of dead civilisations is not hyperbole — it is Brandt's own explicit intention.
Inherit the Dust and This Empty World extended his practice in a more radical direction — moving from documentation to installation, from wildlife portraiture to environmental commentary, and from Africa to the global communities most affected by climate change. His latest work addresses the human dimension of ecological collapse as directly as his earlier work addressed the animal one.
His Big Life Foundation has protected approximately 2 million acres of East African wilderness and employed hundreds of rangers from local communities. The foundation's anti-poaching work represents a direct translation of photographic advocacy into institutional action — a reminder that the photographer's responsibility does not end with the exhibition opening.
His work is exhibited at major galleries internationally, including Fotografiska in Stockholm, New York, and Berlin, the Edwynn Houk Gallery in New York and Zurich, and in permanent collections across the United States and Europe.
Books by Nick Brandt
On This Earth (2005, Chronicle Books) — His debut monograph and the first book of the East Africa trilogy. 66 photographs from 2000–2004, with introductions by Jane Goodall, Alice Sebold, and Vicki Goldberg. Brandt has since disowned the first edition for its printing quality; the 2010 combined edition On This Earth, A Shadow Falls provides the best reproduction of this period's work.
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| see it on Amazon |
A Shadow Falls (2009, Abrams) — The second book in the trilogy, covering 2005–2008. 58 photographs with an introduction by philosopher Peter Singer.
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| see it on Amazon |
Across the Ravaged Land (2013, Abrams) — The conclusion of the trilogy, completing the sentence formed by the three titles. Introduced humans into his photographic practice for the first time, including the celebrated Ranger with Tusks of Elephant Killed at the Hands of Man.
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| see it on Amazon |
Inherit the Dust (2016, Edwynn Houk Editions) — His most technically ambitious project: life-size animal panel installations photographed as panoramas in Kenyan urban wastelands, all on medium format film. The book reproduces the panoramas at 13×27 inches; the exhibition prints measure up to 300cm wide.
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| see it on Amazon |
This Empty World (2019, Thames & Hudson) — His first work in colour, photographed on medium format digital at night. A further expansion of his environmental installation practice, addressing human communities affected by climate breakdown.
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| see it on Amazon |
Conclusion
Nick Brandt photographed the vanishing wildlife of East Africa for two decades with a Pentax 67II and then a Mamiya RZ67 Pro IID — medium format film cameras used with three fixed focal length lenses, Kodak T-Max 100 film, and red and ND grad filters, without a single telephoto lens. For his first colour work, he moved to medium format digital out of practical necessity.
Every camera choice, every lens choice, every film choice was in service of a single purpose: making images that transmit the moral weight of what is being lost, rather than simply recording its existence.
As he wrote: "These photos are my elegy to these beautiful creatures, to this wrenchingly beautiful world that is steadily, tragically vanishing before our eyes."
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