Wild individuals

Wildlife pro Matthew Williams-Ellis heads to Kenya’s Maasai Mara to capture the character of some of Africa’s most magnificent creatures

- Matthew Williams-Ellis

My Individuals photography series focuses on telling the personal stories of animals from the Maasai Mara in Kenya. By highlighting unique, personal stories and showing animals to be emotional individuals, rather than just an anonymous statistic in a wider population, I hope to promote a desire to protect and care for this precious wildlife. This collection was captured over the course of a month at Alex Walker’s Serian, a tented camp in Mara North Conservancy. Spending that length of time and following specific individuals every day, their unique characteristics, personalities, behavioural patterns and displays of emotion became increasingly apparent. It isn’t just the markings that differentiate one lion from the next, for example, it is the way an individual behaves and how he or she interacts with other lions in the pride.