As a child I first got interested in wildlife from my interest in drawing it, and I first got interested in drawing it through my interest in wildlife! The two have always gone hand-in-hand for me. I still have many drawings from childhood – mostly copied from books such as the Readers Digest Book of British Birds (Ray Harris-Ching illustrations).
Although I have always painted, I only became more serious about it after watching a program about a guy who painted Birds of Paradise. The program was presented/narrated by David Attenborough – I think around 1990.
Photography was just another extension to this and after being trained in it, I worked as a technician for a while in the photography/darkroom and digital imaging department of a local uni/college.
At present my main income comes from my art - paintings, illustrations, graphic work and photography (almost all wildlife based). But I also make extra money carrying out restoration to antiques, picture framing and carpentry work.
The biggest benefit of this is my time is my own, so I can devote a large proportion of it to studying nature – and being logged on to WAB for all hours God sends while I’m working away! Oh the glories of self-employment!
I do think this kind of site attracts the arty kind, as I think wildlife appreciation in general often does. You can also detect the sort of people WAB attracts because unlike a lot of forums, the discussions usually are very polite. Again due to the nature of the members the subject attracts
