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Orangutan in the Wild

Orangutan in the Wild

Marty’s photo of the day #4465: I shot this orangutan photo back in 2003, when digital photography was still relatively new. I had purchased a Nikon camera for my Borneo trip that promised to be the best of its class. The camera arrived just before I left the United States, and I didn’t have much […]

Coqui frog

Coqui frog

Marty’s photo of the day #4462: Coqui frog, photographed in Puerto Rico. This photo also appears in my four-time award-winning book, Endangered Edens: Exploring the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, Costa Rica, the Everglades, and Puerto Rico.

Day #2 of Seven Marty Essen Books in Seven Days

Day #2 of Seven Marty Essen Books in Seven Days

Day #2 of Seven Marty Essen Books in Seven Days, featured in order of publication. We continue with the four-time award-winning Endangered Edens: Exploring the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, Costa Rica, the Everglades, and Puerto Rico. “Join photographer extraordinaire Marty Essen and his intrepid wife Deb on their adventures through four Endangered Edens. You’ll be […]

The brown blunt-headed vine snake

The brown blunt-headed vine snake

Marty’s photo of the day #4439: The following short excerpt takes place in Costa Rica and is from my second book, Endangered Edens: Exploring the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, Costa Rica, the Everglades, and Puerto Rico: With flashlights in hand and rubber boots on our feet (to protect against snakebites), we started down a trail […]

Amazon outtake

Amazon outtake

Marty’s photo of the day #4202: This is an outtake from the photoshoot for the cover of my first book, Cool Creatures, Hot Planet: Exploring the Seven Continents. Yes, that is a real tailless whip scorpion on my forehead. They are mostly harmless, but having them crawl all over my face for the photoshoot tickled. […]

Whip-scorpion photo shoot

Whip-scorpion photo shoot

Marty’s photo of the day #3978: For the cover of the first edition of my first book, Cool Creatures, Hot Planet: Exploring the Seven Continents, my wife, Deb, took over two hundred photos of me with tailless whip-scorpions crawling up my face. Even though we switched covers after the first edition sold out, traveling back […]

The Red Ape Trail begins here

The Red Ape Trail begins here

Marty’s photo of the day #3940: This is the waterfall Deb and I had to climb up alongside to begin our epic backpacking trip with the Iban tribe in Borneo. The two of us were only the third outsiders to ever hike the Red Ape Trail (an old Iban hunting trail). Our adventure included losing […]

Villefranche de Conflent

Villefranche de Conflent

Marty’s photo of the day #3710: Let’s take a peek through the wall of an ancient walled city in France. The following excerpt from my first book, Cool Creatures, Hot Planet: Exploring the Seven Continents, further explains what you are seeing: We retrieved our car, drove back into France, and spent the rest of Sunday […]

Zebra longwing butterfly

Zebra longwing butterfly

Marty’s photo of the day #3217: I photographed this zebra longwing butterfly in the Everglades. A slightly different version of this photo appears in my second book, Endangered Edens: Exploring the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, Costa Rica, the Everglades, and Puerto Rico.

Lost in Spain

Lost in Spain

Marty’s photo of the day #3030: This is one of the many mountain villages Deb and I drove past while exploring northern Spain for the Europe chapter of Cool Creatures, Hot Planet: Exploring the Seven Continents. If I remember correctly, we were lost when I took this photo. Then again, we just needed to make […]

Athabasca River Elk

Athabasca River Elk

Marty’s photo of the day #3011: I’m so glad I no longer use film cameras! I used film cameras for about half of my travels for my first book, Cool Creatures, Hot Planet: Exploring the Seven Continents, before forever switching to digital. The bitch about film is that if something went wrong, I wouldn’t know […]

Did I cut the wrong one?

Did I cut the wrong one?

Marty’s photo of the day #2967: As I was finishing up the Costa Rica chapter in my second book, Endangered Edens: Exploring the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, Costa Rica, the Everglades, and Puerto Rico, I had to pick one of two Hecale longwing butterfly photos. This is the shot that got cut. Thinking about it […]

Zebra longwing butterfly

Zebra longwing butterfly

Marty’s photo of the day #2879: I originally featured this picture in my second book, “Endangered Edens: Exploring the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, Costa Rica, the Everglades, and Puerto Rico.” It’s a zebra longwing butterfly, photographed the Everglades.

The feet tell the story

The feet tell the story

Marty’s photo of the day #2846: Why am I posting a photo of Deb’s and my feet? If you’ve read my first book, “Cool Creatures, Hot Planet: Exploring the Seven Continents,” you know. We were only the third outsiders to ever hike deep into a section of Borneo’s rainforest. We lost our guide halfway through […]