Ian Wilson

Ian graduated with a PhD in optics in 1977 and spent his professional career working on the design, manufacture and testing of optical systems. He was the leader of the Optical Systems Engineering team at CSIRO in Melbourne and the Technical Director of a CSIRO spin-off company. He has a special interest in photographic science and is the author of numerous articles on technical aspects of bird photography. He has been an active birder since childhood and in retirement has spent much of his time absorbed in bird photography. Ian enjoys the challenges of avian flight photography and capturing high-speed action using flash photography. He has photographed birds in many parts of Australia, Southern and East Africa, Indian Ocean Islands, SE Asia, Western Pacific, New Zealand and sub-Antarctic islands of New Zealand and Australia. Many of his images have been published in books, guides, magazines, reports, and used in educational and promotional material as well as signage in parks and reserves. Ian was the BirdLife Photography Photographer of the Year in 2016 and 2017. For the last few years he has been the BirdLife Photography competition moderator, a Mystery Reviewer, critic, teacher and mentor for many bird photographers. Over 1000 of Ian’s images that have been carefully selected and moderated can be found in the BirdLife Photography images library.