About Me

Daniel Rosengren taking a selfie with a pride of lions (Mukoma Gypsies) in a tree. Serengeti NP, Tanzania. © Daniel Rosengren

Thank you for visiting my site. I am Daniel Rosengren, born 1978 in Gävle, Sweden. I don’t really know where I live. Currently I am spending most of my time in Frankfurt, Germany. But after my birth place, the Serengeti National Park in Tanzania, is the place I lived longest.

After completing a Master’s degree in ecology and evolution at the University of Umeå, I started travelling a lot. My two most memorable trips are both made on a bicycle. In February 2004 I embarked from the very northernmost tip of Europe, the North Cape of Norway, with the idea of cycling down to the southernmost tip of Africa, Cape Agulhas. I arrived there in July 2007 after a lot of good times, a couple of really bad ones and 31,270 kilometres (19,430 miles) covered, pedalling.

My second cycling trip, starting December 2008, took me from the very south of Patagonia in South America up to Quito in Ecuador. That trip took me 1.5 years to complete and about 15,000 kilometres (9,320 miles) were covered and I crossed the Andes seven times. I got my first SLR camera in 1997, but it was during this trip in South America that my interest in photography deepened and I felt I developed a lot as a photographer.

The best mistakes are the ones that make me get new ideas and realize new possibilities

While in Quito, I got a job offer, “Do you want to work with lion research in the Serengeti?” Employed by the University of Minnesota, I spent the next five years living in the Serengeti, getting close and personal with about 300 wild lions. There are few places in the world that can compare with Serengeti in terms of wildlife photography opportunities and my portfolio of African wildlife photos grew to being quite extensive.

In July 2015, I quit the lion research job and started working full time as a wildlife photographer. This job takes me to some amazing places around the globe and I constantly get new challenges for me and my camera.

I am mostly a self-taught photographer. But of course, there are some people who have helped me learn and develop. The first one was my father, Bo Rosengren, who lent me his old (even then) Pentax Spotmatic II when I was still in my teens. He was the one who explained to me about shutter speed, aperture and ISO-speed, and that old camera forced me to get it quickly. Esbjörn Nordlund, my primary school teacher and now a good friend, often took me out in the field and has an encyclopaedic knowledge of cameras and their history. Martin Alexandersson, a friend and skilled photographer, was the first one who started talking to me about image composition. He is also the one who introduced me to basic post production of digital images when I finally went digital. He still pushes me and is not afraid to criticise my photography, but usually does it honestly and constructively, a true friend. During my years in the Serengeti, National Geographic’s star photographer Michael “Nick” Nichols, came out for an assignment to photograph lions for a story in the magazine. All in all, he and his team spent nine months there and I came to their camp weekly as their lion expert. Usually we’d exchange information about the lions, but Nick also kindly took the time to look at and comment on my photos. He gave me some valuable advice on both equipment and things to think about while taking photos. I owe thanks to all of them.

However, the best teacher has been my own mistakes. Often, I learn a lot in trying to correct them. But the best mistakes are the ones that make me get new ideas and realize new possibilities.

EXPERIENCE

I have been working full time as a freelance photographer since September 2015. But as an amateur, I have been taking photos since 1997. Below I have listed a selection of my more important publications and recognitions.

Publications

I got the cover of the National Geographic Magazine (German edition) October issue 2021 and had two additional photos published inside the magazine. My photos have also been published on National Geographic's website five times and in 2016, the Swedish edition of their magazine published several of my photos in an ad for a NatGeo safari expedition to the Serengeti and Ngorongoro Crater that I was guiding.

As a finalist awardee in the Wildlife Photographer of the Year competition, my wide-angle shot of Marabou storks at a zebra carcass was published in the book Wildlife Photographer of the Year: Portfolio 27 (2017).

My photo picturing a wide-angle close-up of pride of lions in a tree was published in the BBC's book Life Stories: Many Lives, One Epic Journey (2014). I have always been a huge fan of BBC's work and I'm proud to be a part of it.

A year later, two of my photos made it onto another BBC book - The Hunt (2015). One of the photos was shot from a hot air balloon showing a big herd if migrating wildebeest. The other photo was of a group of 16 lions feeding on a wildebeest, forming an almost perfect circle around it, packed like sardines.

This photo was also used to promote BBC earth's new series with the same name, The Hunt, in the magazine Radio Times. To my greatest pleasure, the BBC quoted Sir David Attenborough on the photo, saying; "The visual is always more powerful than the words". I feel honoured and proud to have his words published on my photo.

One of my photos depicting a group of lions in a tree made it into the Remembering Lions (2019) - a book where all the profits go to conservation.

A large number of my photos (about 42% of all) was published in National Park Manu - A Legacy Landscape (2017), a large book about the world’s most biodiverse place on earth, Manu National Park in Peru. A fun fact is that this very book was given, by the president of Peru, to the Pope on one of his visits to the country.

Since late 2015, my photos have been published frequently in the Frankfurt Zoological Society's magazine published every four months.

Six of my photos were published in the book The World's Rarest Birds (2012).

Twenty of my photos - a third of all photos - were published in the book Antelope Conservation: From Diagnosis to Action (2017 by Jakob Bro-Jorgensen).

Two of my photos were published in the book Bird Photographer of the Year (2017), one depicting a wide-angle-close up of Marabou storks on a zebra carcass and the other two vultures silhouetting against a lightning strike, both from the Serengeti.

One of my photos was published in the inaugural edition of the Comedy Wildlife Photography Awards book with photos from the  popular competition with the same name.

My photos have also been published in several online articles by Africa Geographic.

Prizes & Awards

In 2017, my close-up photo of a Marabou stork was awarded the "Finalist Award" in the Wildlife Photographer of the Year competition. This, of course, made me very proud as it is the most prestigious wildlife and nature photo competition in the world, often referred to as the "Oscars" of nature photography. In total, 48,582 photos were submitted to the competition. I got the same award in 2021, then called "Highly Commended" in the Plants and Fungi category. This time the photo was of a giant sinkhole in the rainforests of Colombia.

In 2005, I entered a slide to a National Geographic Scandinavia Photo competition. The photo showed a praying mantis towering over a bee, both sitting on a thistle flower. I was awarded second place and the picture was published on National Geographic's website and my first accomplishment as a photographer was a fact. I was very pleased.

In 2010, I entered Birdlife International's photo competition - The World's Rarest Birds. I entered a number of endangered bird photos taken in Peru. One of them, picturing a Marvellous Spatuletail was selected as one of the winners. The competition got good media coverage and my image got published in various places including National Geographic's website and the Guardian. Later, a book was published with the same name as the competition - The World's Rarest Birds. Six of the photos I had submitted was published in that book.

In 2019 one of my photos with lions in a tree was one of ten selected in a competition where the winners were awarded a place in the Remembering Lions book.

In 2016, I was first runner up in the portfolio category of The Comedy Wildlife Photography Awards with a collection of photos from the Serengeti.

Exhibitions

In 2017 my finalist awarded photo in the Wildlife Photographer of the Year competition is exhibited in their exhibition at the Natural History Museum in London and also in their touring exhibition, travelling to some 60 countries worldwide.

In 2014 and 2015, 40 of my Serengeti photos were exhibited at the Four Seasons Safari Lodge in the Serengeti, Tanzania.

From 2016 and on, some of my Serengeti photos are exhibited on a permanent exhibition at the Kelvingrove Museum in Glasgow, Scotland.

In 2017, my photos from Kazakhstan were exhibited by ACBK (The Association for the Conservation of Biodiversity in Kazakhstan) at the EXPO 2017 - Future Energy in Astana, Kazakhstan.