honorable mention
Mainak Ray india
Photo © Mainak Ray
title
Pre-Life
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entry description
Encased in her transparent “bubble-egg”, a lone Amboli bush froglet was curling up for one final night before taking birth into our world. The female frog lays eggs on mosses to get cover from torrential rains. Eggs are maximum 4mm in size no bigger than a grain and generally lay in a cluster. It was remarkable seeing the incredibly small almost full grown frogs move inside the eggs every now and then, as if going beyond the known world to experience creation of life in front of me. The Amboli bush frog (Pseudophilautus amboli), is a rare shrub frog species endemic to the Western Ghats Mountains of Southern India. This is the only known frog specie who does not metamorphose through the tadpole phase in their life cycle. This image was taken in late afternoon in between bouts of heavy rains while handholding the camera with an umbrella covering the equipment and using external flash.about the photographer
I am from India, a Chartered Accountant and was a Finance professional over a decade and half at two of the world’s leading organizations. My relentless desire and love for travel, nature and wildlife have forced me to take a break from my professional career and pursue my passions. Wildlife has always been my passion since childhood. I believe photography is a powerful tool that evokes a sense of awareness, joy and compassion at the same time, and plays a huge role in conservation of nature and wildlife. Like many of us in India, initially I was only following our magnificent Tigers across different Reserves and Sanctuaries trying to photograph the dangerously beautiful animal. With time I realized nature has so much more to offer in this country to get awestricken and speechless by. Now when I enter any forest I try to soak into the beauty of nature, breath in the fresh unadulterated air, listen to the subtle whispers and many a time I do not even raise my camera.back to gallery
