The Quiet Work of Noticing
Why Paying Attention Matters in Nature Photography (and Life)
I’m often told I have great eyesight. It’s usually after I’ve pointed something out no one else has noticed… A baby frog the size of my thumbnail, tucked up on a leaf, three meters away or a small bird perched amongst the dense foliage of the trees high up for example. My good eyesight goes out the window when I’m trying to find something in the fridge and it's not exactly where I expect it to be.
But the truth is, my eyesight’s pretty average. One of my eyes has astigmatism due to a mishap where I was lifting a roller door after the rain, my hand slipped and I punched myself in the eye (like the actual eyeball) so hard I literally changed its shape. I don’t wear my glasses nearly as often as I should. It's not sharp vision that helps me see these things, it's pattern recognition. An unconscious ongoing scanning of the world around me.
This habit, this way of seeing, it's what shapes me as a wildlife photographer. And a person.
I don’t remember when it started or when I became aware it was even happening and perhaps wasn’t to everyone else. But a particular memory comes to mind when this stood out to me.
I was out the back at a mate’s place, having a beer. I spotted this tiny frog, brand new and barely lost its tail, sitting on a leaf near some basil. To me, it stood out straight away, a soft little adorable jewel folded up in the middle of a leaf. I pointed it out and my mate just couldn't see it. I had to explain exactly where to look. It was like trying to explain to someone which star you're pointing at. When they finally did see it, they were gobsmacked. “How the hell did you notice that?”
I didn’t really have an answer. I felt the opposite - how didn't they ?
This lil friend was about the size of a cherry tomato
Noticing is my default mode. I don’t flick it on when I go out or pick up the camera, it’s always running. It’s knowing how a tree usually sways, and catching the fractionally different movement when something disturbs that pattern. Or what the ambient sound of the bush is and picking up the disturbance, was that a gecko running under a leaf? That kind of attunement is what makes nature photography possible for me.
It’s mostly visual but sound is a huge part of it too. Absence of sound when I’m in nature is often a really good sign I need to slow down or stop because I’m disturbing everything too much. I’m being watched too much.
When I was a kid, we had a spa out the back of our house in Darwin. Frogs would sometimes leap in during the night, thinking they’d found a great place to lay eggs, not realising it was full of chlorine and there was no easy way out. I learned to wake at the sound of a splash—not the loud ones, but the gentle little “plip” that meant a frog was in trouble. I’d go out in the rain, half-asleep, and rescue them. I don’t remember how old I was when this started but it remained that way until I moved out. I remember how it felt: like unconditional love. Like being in tune.
Noticing, over time, grows empathy. You watch a lizard long enough, you start to get a sense of its habits. Its little decisions. What makes it pause. What makes it dart. You stop thinking of the little scaly friend as an “it.” I guess its the same with people. Paying attention to someone over time, noticing their rhythms and silences—you learn them, a little. You know when to make space.
This habit of attention shapes everything about how I approach photographing wildlife. I rarely plan images beyond choosing a general place and a rough time of day. I let the noticing do the rest. It’s not passive or lazy it’s deliberate stillness. I go where the details lead me. I don’t often chase a subject. I wait for it to get comfy with my presence.
And although I believe I've partly developed this kind of pattern recognition because I have aphantasia it doesn't mean I'm special in this. Anyone can notice more. You don’t have to hike into the bush or go on a silent retreat. You can start by sitting on your driveway for ten minutes, with nothing in your hands to distract. You’ll probably get bored. That’s fine, good in fact. Let yourself be bored. Boredom is the crack where curiosity gets in.
And then maybe you’ll spot some ants doing something cool. Or hear the creak of a branch to look up and see a bird you've never seen before. Or maybe it's about to rain and you'll wonder what that smell in the air actually is.
You don’t have to become a monk or learn to sit cross-legged without losing circulation. You just have to stop long enough for the natural world to get a word in.
