A brief biography of Francesco Tomasinelli

I have always been fascinated by nature, especially by weird creatures. I took my first nature photos in 2001, while studying for my Environmental Science degree at the University of Genova, Italy. In following years I began to collaborate with various magazines as photographer and author, specializing in neglected animals, like insects, arachnids, reptiles, amphibians and others from all over the world. My experience in breeding insects and arachnids in the lab actually proved very useful for obtaining special pictures. In 2003 I became secretary of Aracnofilia, Italian Arachnological Society and later as I travelled my archive have grown.

Many of my pictures are marketed by my photo agents, Natural Visions in the United Kingdom (mostly animals), Tips Images in Italy (travel, some animals), Photo Researchers in US (animals) and, since 2002, appeared in various magazines, including Parchi e Riserve Naturali, Focus, GEO, Quark, Explora, Airone, Oasis, Aqva, Piemonte Parchi, Reptilia, and others. Hundreds of my images (not only animals, of course) were featured in many other publications like text books (BBC, Mondadori, Zanichelli, De Agostini, Audobon, National Geographic and many more...), in newspapers, cards and museum exhibits. I also have had photo exhibitions and presentations on special nature subjects, like praying mantids (Milan 2003 and 2004), Arachnids (Bergamo 2005, Brescia 2005, Pisa 2006, Genova 2007) and more general topics. Although I work as a reporter and biologist, in recent years nature photography has become increasingly important in my life.

Pictures use and equipment

The images you see here are obtained with Nikon & Sigma equipment. Many of them are Fuji slides, scanned with Microtek 35, cheap but useful for web pages. In 2006 I started to use digital reflex cameras (DSLR) extensively. Anyway I'm not very interested in lenses performance and equipment and usually I'm much more pleased by the results and contact with nature. If you want to use some pictures just drop me a line. I can arrange lectures, presentations or exhibits too.

Aknowledgments

Many people helped and encouraged me in my work. Here is an always growing list of them (not in particular order): Filiberto, Antonietta and Roberto Tomasinelli, Laura Marchese, Emilio e Nicolò Scoti, Fabio De Vita, Emanuele Biggi, Renato Cottalasso, Massimo Campora, Jean Jacques Peres, Andrea Mangoni, Vera Pasquale, Andrea e Fabio Bartolini, Giovanni Schimmenti, Stefano Capannini, Valentina Fabris, Riccardo Jesu, Ron Tremper, Matteo Dei, Matteo Grotto, Lidia Cannatella, Daniele Migliorini, Matteo Gozzini, Carlo Paoletti, Paolo Ghislandi, Luca Demicheli, Roberto Benelli, Claudio Arnò, Andrea Raineri, Matias Civitella, Manuel Mariotti, Manuel Montaldi, Paolo Vassalli, Michele Arena, Fabrizio Rigato, Carlo Pesarini, Paolo Tongiorgi, Heather Angel, Guido Alberto Rossi, Pietro Greppi, Laura Floris, Anna Pisapia, Corinna Montana Lambro, Stefano Verzura, Giuseppe Brillante, Giovanni Delmastro, Lilia Capocaccia, Arianna Beretta, Giuliano Doria, Stefano Cannicci, Sara Fratini, Alessio Bruni, Francesca Neonato, Luca Longo, Andrea Dell'Asta, Attilio Arillo, Massimo Baxa, Nicola Bressi, Mara Calvini, Laura Calevo, Giusto Benedetti, Egidio Nicora, Enrico Lana, Sara Fratini, Alessandro Catenazzi, Alessio Bruni, Gaia Aplington, all the Evans family, Maria Camilla De Palma, Elena Gagliarli, Fabio Pupin, Elisa Riservato, Gigi Esposito, Michele Ferro, Matt Cormons and many others.