How did it all start?

As a child on a farm in Berkshire I was fanatical about sticklebacks, tadpoles, foxes, all wild animals. Armand and Michaela Dennis (who presented On Safari for the BBC in the late 1950s and early 1960s) were early inspirations. Born Free captivated me, embodying everything that was then my idea of Africa - game wardens, wildlife, excitement, danger in the bush. But watching wildlife on television wasn't enough.
I read zoology at Queen's University Belfast. I could always draw too: I loved drawing wild animals and never had any trouble reproducing the specimens in my zoology classes. I might have inherited this from my father, who was an architect. He died when I was two, and, looking back, I realise how much I missed having a father.

What was your first experience of Africa?

It was in 1974 - I came out to Africa with Encounter Overland. The journey - London to Nairobi - gave me a wonderful sense of the continent's diversity.I stood up nearly all the way, sucking in the African air. I was in a state of almost permanent exuberance - except when lying delirious on my camp bed in Rwanda with both amoebic dysentery and malaria. I completely missed seeing the gorillas. (Happily I caught up with them in 1999 through working as a TV presenter.)

After spending a few weeks in Kenya, I went on down to South Africa, and was offered a scholarship to study predators in Southern Africa for a Masters Degree. My conscience found it difficult to accept life in South Africa as it was then, and I moved up to Botswana where I had a friend with a houseboat on the Okavango Delta. We were meant to be studying Pel's fishing owls but most of the time I was taking out visitors. There I improved both my photography and art, and later I got a contract to have some of my drawings reproduced as prints. With a whole lot of these in the back of a minibus, I drove back up to Nairobi in 1977. Selling my own prints helped me find my feet in Kenya.

Were you trained in photography?

Never, I have picked it all up as I went along. I bought a Canon and a separate lens to take photographs on the overland journey down to Kenya. When I collected the prints from the lab in Nairobi, they were almost all just black! My camera had been set on automatic and the lens wouldn't respond to the camera's instructions and only took at f22. The only pictures that came out were of camels in the brilliant light of the Sahara.

How did your lifetime link with the Masai Mara start?

In 1977, there were very few camps around in the Mara. Alan Root and Richard Leakey set up Mara River Camp together and I persuaded the manager to take me on as unpaid camp overseer, co-driver, relief guide and general factotum. It was the start I needed and from my five years there emerged my first book, The Marsh Lions. I had great help from Jack Block too, whose family owned the Norfolk Hotel. He supported my art and helped me get the right permits to work here. After Mara River, I spent 10 years at Kichwa Tembo Camp, and there I met Angie.

What's a typical Big Cat Diary day?

Incredibly strenuous - up at 5am (our helpers may have been up since 3.30) and off in the car at daybreak. We work straight through to 7.30 in the evening - 14 hours sitting in the car. Then we have to help the editors in their editing suite, and by the time supper is over we're dropping.

Is filming sometimes dangerous?

Often. Recently I was co-presenting a new BBC Animal Planet series called Elephant Diaries down in Tsavo East National Park, doing a story about rehabilitating young elephants into the wild. A huge bull in must came into camp; he looked quite relaxed and the cameraman and sound technician filmed him drinking. There was a commotion over by the bar and the elephant moved off towards the noise. Then he suddenly turned and rounded on us. Thank heavens the sound lady got unhooked, but we didn't have time to move the camera. We just ran for our lives. The elephant got down on its knees and pulverised £30,000 worth of equipment, and we had only just got out of the way in time.

What advice would you give to anyone trying to do what you have done?

We have a website and get a lot of questions like this over the email. I try to respond to them all and am particularly anxious to help local Kenyans into the conservation field. I feel the reason for my success is that I don't just cover one thing, and therefore it would be very difficult to follow in my footsteps. Still, it's good to have a degree in zoology. This at least shows you are interested in the subject. Then you must have persistence, enthusiasm and drive. I've always been prepared to forsake the crowd for my passions, even though I am a very social person. And if you want to take pictures of wildlife, concentrate on cinematography - it pays much better.

After the Big Cat Diary shoot is over, what's next?

In November, Angie and I fly to England for the launch of our book Big Cat Diary: Cheetah. We then have a week off before heading to South Georgia, our twelfth visit to the Antarctic as guest lecturers on tour ships.

Antarctic Safari, our 17th book, will be out in 2007. Angie and I stipple together and we have already started on some of its illustrations. After Africa, Antarctica is our other passion; with a name like Scott I've already got a foot on the continent. One of my proudest moments was receiving the 1987 Wildlife Photographer of the Year award from Peter Scott, whose paintings hung on our walls when I was a child.

What's life like at home?

I love the mornings, but when we are at home we hardly ever stop working. I almost never get any time to read, although we read to each other in bed. I like to know what's going on and am a bit manic about newspapers. I am the most domesticated wildlife photographer imaginable, and love looking after Angie.

Everyone says "Your life is just one long holiday," and if that means doing what I love doing, with someone I adore, then perhaps it is. You live on the edge a bit in Africa, and even in Nairobi there is always the promise of being able to go on safari. I wouldn't swop lives with anybody - except perhaps with George Schaller, the great naturalist.

Anything missing?

Just some time to slow down, go away and do absolutely nothing.

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