Animal interactions

This is a lovely image. The pose of the subjects, the light falloff towards the back of the shot, the composition, pretty much everything is bang on. The level of the camera's really important here – by getting down low the photographer has really done a good job maximising the impact of a really interesting piece of behaviour. It's the tiny details that get me - glance over this image and you'll miss the flick of the tongue of the leftmost subject, but it's a small detail that makes a technically decent shot really fascinating.

You simply cannot beat a good bit of insect porn, and this damselfly image is a very decent example of its type. The photographer has made the most of a really interesting pair of subjects, which is no mean feat considering the small scale of his heroes.

Its composition and colour that makes this image, though: the gentle blurred shapes of the background, as well as the sympathetic colour of foreground and background make for a really striking, interesting image.

Seals in the UK are tricky blighters to photograph, not helped by the fact that a decent angle is very nearly impossible to come by when they're actually in the water. Angle-wise this shot is a belter, and the interaction captured by the photographer is neat as well. I also like the black and white treatment, which doesn't work for all wildlife shots but makes the most of what looks like reasonably flat light. The shutter speed is nearly, agonisingly nearly, bang on as well: the motion blur on the water is perfect.

This is a lovely one. Infant animals are rarely tough photographic subjects, but the photographer has done well here in spotting an interesting moment and getting it in the bag. The exposure looks like a tough one but it's basically there, and the pose is perfect. If I were nitpicking I'd want the crab on the left of the frame to not have had the ends of its legs cropped out; leaving a bit of margin for unpredictable wildlife is generally wise!

There were, for some reason, loads of gannet pics entered into this competition, so someone's clearly doing a good job with their PR. Most of the other pics – technically good though they were – tended towards fairly standard gannet behaviour, which is lovely to see but not that uncommon.

This composition, on the other hand, captures some interesting nesting behaviour, as well as a human subject. I love the apparent eye contact between the two, and the light in this shot is lovely too.

Man alive, what a shot. Macro photography – of which this is quite an extreme example, more microscopic photography – is tough enough when it comes to simply getting record shots, but to bag an interesting bit of interaction is a whole other ballgame. So much could have gone wrong with this image, and yet nothing has. The composition's great, and the focus is exactly where it should be, which is no mean feat considering the wafer-thin slice of depth of field available.

Open a competition for animal interaction and you run a risk: lots of pictures of animals shagging. This comp was no exception, but among fruity-feeling macaques, dogs and lions was this belter of a frame.

Macro photography is famously very difficult, very technical, and very labour intensive, so this shot is a triumph of composition, subject behaviour and lighting. Unsolicited advice for the photographer: a fill light on the background might blow it out a bit more – the mid grey is a touch unsatisfying, although the saturation in the rest of the image easily atones.

I really like this shot, conceptually speaking. The very high contrast treatment works well thanks to the strip of white at the bottom of the frame. In his caption the photographer talks about the ants in the shot appearing to be camouflaged – I'd argue they actually look a little too camouflaged, and would like to see a version of this frame where both subjects were isolated on the white strip below, rather than half-on, half-off. Still, this is well spotted and put together.

I like this so much. More than anything it's satisfying, as a rival wildlife photographer, to imagine our snapper perched waiting for the chameleon to strike, only for our feathered thief to swoop in and nab its prey.

Still, the photographer must be happy with the resulting shot – I love the line created by the eye contact between the two subjects, and I think the composition's a nice one too. This is a well spotted, well framed and well executed shot.

Yeah! Experimenting with slow shutter speeds is an easy talk to talk, but actually deploying draggy shutter speeds after you've spent the money to be in front of something dramatic such as these fighting petrels is a whole other game. Kudos to the photographer, then, not only for daring to risk it here, but also for getting things so exactly right. The face of the petrel on the left looks bang on to me, yet there's so much motion in the wings and surrounding water. The crop is perfect as well.

I absolutely love bee eaters, and like this photographer, my favourite shot of one that I've taken is one of a bee-eater doing the behaviour it was named for. The pose of the helpless about-to-be-lunch insect is perfect, suggesting cat-like reflexes on the part of the photographer. This is rather a heavy crop, though - perhaps the technical quality would take a step in the right direction if the photographer allowed the subject to breathe a little more easily in the frame.

Common gulls get such a bad rap, but images like this are a reminder that there's loads of interesting wildlife photography available in the UK for photographers who want more than the standard "bird on a perch" image. This shot has it all: it's really dynamic, it's well composed, and the exposure is perfect: sharp where it needs to be and blurry elsewhere. The temptation here would be to crop much closer to the subjects; something I'm glad the photographer resisted – the slightly wider composition works really well.

Giraffes are really hard to shoot: finding an angle that does such wonderful creatures justice is something I find really difficult – but the photographer's found a lovely sympathetic pose here that I really like.

Black and white toning is difficult too: too much contrast and you're left with something that looks like it just fell out of a photocopier; not enough and you've got a washed out mess.

The processing in this image walks the line beautifully, I think, as well as catching two marvellous subjects in a really nicely timed, graceful pose. That underexposed background is a total triumph, too.

This frame's a bit of a grab, but I like it all the same. Macaques are a major problem in India – they're intelligent, ferocious and have lost all timidity when it comes to people, which means anyone with the temerity to eat a bag of crisps finds themselves at risk from a monkey mugging.

This moment of caution between a chap with his shopping and the primates sizing him up has been smartly nabbed by the photographer, who's done well to spot and bag a great moment.

I have All The Questions about this image. It looks like it was shot in the wild, so how did the photographer manage to catch such a unique angle without running the risk of death by zebra?

It's the angle that makes this shot, anyway. This is a really dynamic, energetic bit of interaction that's easy to spot but fairly tricky to make much of, photographically. This really captures the kinetic energy expended by zebras at full flight. The shutter speed's perfect, too – just enough to give a bit of motion blur, short enough to leave a clear impression of what's happening.

The only – only – thing I dislike is the dark vignetted corners. This image has enough pizazz that it doesn't need 'em!

I love this image. It would be pretty strong with only the main subject – the eyeline is great, I like the slightly toppy exposure, and it's a really neatly captured bit of feeding behaviour.

Still, it's the pose of the secondary subject that got a chuckle out of me when I saw it – it's a really dynamic pose of a bird just waiting for the slightest chance to jump in and pinch dinner. Really nicely done, and I like the little splashes at foot level, too.

There were loads – and loads and loads and loads – of pictures of domestic animals in this contest, which is actually quite brave when you consider many of the other images were of far more exotic species.

Still, this one stood out. I love the toning, whether applied by the photographer afterwards or simply by the light the image was shot in. I also really like the very tight depth of field, the pose of the dynamic left-hand subject, and the splashes of water around the feet of mans' best friend. Lovely stuff.