It’s a tiring job being a little lion! This one couldn’t fight off the wave of sleepiness that hit the whole pride any longer. This photo was taken in the Masai Mara last year, and this cub belonged to the famous Marsh Pride (from the BBC’s Big Cat Diaries program)

I love to use negative space in my photos – I just like end result. In this case though it was necessary to use it in order to not include various limbs belonging to other lions that would have otherwise been a distraction in the final image. Composition-wise it also helped me with getting a tighter shot of the facial expression and still give the lion cub enough space to gaze into.

Tech Specs: Canon 5D Mark III | Canon 200-400L f4 with 1.4 Extender @ 560mm | f5.6 | 1/500s | ISO 100