Photograph Details

The great gape

For several years Bence has been photographing the huge Dalmatian pelicans of Lake Kerkini in Greece, fascinated by their size, shape and spectacular breeding colours - bright orange bill pouches set against silvery-white plumage. In this breeding site, where they are used to being fed fish offal by the local fishermen, they are unafraid of people. What Bence most wanted was an underwater view of the great bills at work. Thwarted by the poor visibility of the water, his vision became an obsession. So he built a large, floating, deep-water pool, designed a complicated water-filtering system and then set about devising a way to photograph the birds remotely. To control what was being taken under water and to check the images on a laptop, he devised a special remote-control system involving a lot of wire. Eventually, attracted by dead-fish bait, the pelicans started to hunt in the clear pool. After six weeks of hard work, he achieved his vision with this single but unforgettable image of wide-gaping pelicans from a fish's point of view.