For this photoshoot, I visited different zoos and took pictures of the various animals which are trapped there. This photoshoot was inspired by Zed Nelson who is often seen taking pictures of animals in zoos and highlighting this idea of a false landscape being created in order to mimic the animals’ actual habitats. The problem with this being that we are destroying these animals’ actual habitats in order to replace them with manmade ones which are evidently too small for them. In order to narrow down my photographs, I imported all of the images onto Lightroom and then flagged each image with either a white flag or a black flag (white= wanted to use, black= didn’t want to use). I then pressed the filter button and selected so I could only see my white flagged photographs. I then rated all of these out of 5. I then filtered it to only show my images which had a 4 star+ rating. Finally, I edited all of these images by adjusting different settings on Lightroom.

For this set of images, I focused on photographing different animals in their enclosures which are made to look natural by adding things such as trees and rocks. However, it isn’t natural and is evidently way too small for these animals. This links to the artist Zed Nelson as he explores how people have put in effort to recreate these animal’s natural habitats when the animals could have their actual natural habitat if it weren’t for humans destroying their homes in order to build places like these which create a false reality of these different habitats. Another thing I noticed when taking pictures is that there were often paintings of natural/ earthy landscapes seen behind the animals, further emphasising the idea of recreating a landscape which we would already have if it weren’t for human kind.

For these images, I wanted to try and capture the barbed wires and fences that are stopping these animals from escaping from their miniscule prisons. I also tried to take photographs of the animals when they were looking into the camera as I feel eye contact makes it harder for people to overlook the animals horrific conditions they are kept in and are forced to face the reality of how these animals are suffering at the cost of our entertainment.

Overall, I like how this photoshoot came out as I think I managed to successfully link my photoshoot to Zed Nelson’s work. I also found my images of different animals looking into the camera be very effective in making you feel sympathy for them and looking at them more than just a source of entertainment. However, in some of my photographs you can see a glare from the sun hitting the glass which makes my images look less professional. However, I also think it is important that you see that these animals aren’t just free roaming and are actually trapped in these ugly, unnatural cages.