This World Earth Day, learn about the world’s endangered species in British photographer Graeme Green’s latest book, ‘The New Big 5’

British photographer and journalist, Graeme Green has released a book, The New Big 5. It brings together over 165 wildlife photographers, conservationists, and advocates from across the world, to raise awareness on the crucial issues facing the world’s wildlife, including habitat loss, the illegal wildlife trade, pollution, and climate change.

“Wildlife photography is a far better way to celebrate wildlife than killing it,” says British photographer and journalist, Graeme Green. In his recently-released book, The New Big 5, the author brings together over 165 wildlife photographers, conservationists, and advocates from across the world, to raise awareness on “the crucial issues facing the world’s wildlife, including habitat loss, the illegal wildlife trade, pollution, and climate change”.

Graeme says the project’s idea came to him over a decade ago when he was in Botswana on an assignment. “The original ‘Big 5’ is an old term used by colonial-era hunters in Africa for the most prized and dangerous animals to shoot and kill: elephant, rhino, leopard, Cape buffalo, and lion. I spent a lot of time thinking about how outdated trophy hunting is and how wildlife photography is more meaningful to people. I realised it would be cool for a Big 5 of wildlife photography, rather than hunting, to exist,” says Graeme who started work on the project in 2019, and launched the website (newbig5.com) a year later.  

In the book, the Big 5 includes the elephant, gorilla, tiger, lion, and polar bear. “We ran a global vote on the website and asked people across the world to vote for their five favourite animals to see in photos. More than 50,000 people voted, and despite their popularity, all five species are endangered,” says Graeme, adding, “They’re just the tip of the iceberg. Around a million species of animals and plants are at risk of extinction. The idea of the project and book is to raise awareness about all the remarkable species we share the planet with. The New Big 5 species stand for all the creatures on the planet, so many of which are in danger.”

He explains how he reached out to photographers, conservationists, and wildlife charities for their support of the initiative. “I spent months working on articles, interviews, photo galleries, education packs, and a series of podcasts for the website, with people like Ami Vitale, Nick Brandt, and Iain Douglas-Hamilton from Save The Elephants. After the project had got such positive attention and made such a great global impact, I wanted to use the book to be the next step in the mission,” says the photographer.

It took Graeme about two years to produce the book for which he spoke to experts around the world, such as Farwiza Farhan (Indonesia), Kristine Tompkins (Tompkins Conservation), and Daniel Sopia (Maasai Mara Wildlife Conservancies Association). “I also spent a lot of time working with the people who contributed essays to each chapter of the book — Jane Goodall, Tara Stoinski (Dian Fossey Gorilla Fund), and Krista Wright (Polar Bears International).”

Released during the 50th anniversary week of the conservation programme Project Tiger, the book features 226 portraits of animals in the wild shot by the likes of Ami Vitale, Marsel van Oosten, Paul Nicklen, Steve McCurry, Lucas Bustamante, Suzi Eszterhas, among others. “More than 16,000 photos were submitted by photographers around the world, and I also searched through Instagram accounts and websites for a particular type of photo or a specific endangered species. I wanted every photo in the book to justify its place,” he says, adding that Indian photographers are “very well-represented”, with photos by Ketan Khambhatta, Sudhir Shivaram, Aarzoo Khurana, Shivang Mehta, Rupayan Datta, Latika Nath, and many others.

There is also a section on endangered species such as cheetahs, giraffes, monkeys, pangolins, snow leopards, bears, etc.  Graeme’s highlights from the section include Thomas Vijayan’s photo of a critically endangered and incredibly rare Amur Leopard standing on a clifftop in Land of the Leopard National Park (Russia), Magnus Lundgren’s photo of Chilean Devil Rays in the ocean taken in the Azores, Portugal, Dhritiman Mukherjee’s photo of a gharial in the National Chambal Sanctuary, India, among others.