October 31, 2025
Sand, fog, and a plot twist
Photographing the rare brown hyena stalking a diamond mining ghost town
Ghost-town hyena pic wins big; commenters cry “AI”
TLDR: A rare brown hyena photo from Namibia’s ghost town won Wildlife Photographer of the Year after a 10-year pursuit. The comments exploded over whether it’s authentic or AI, with debates on camera traps, artistic credibility, and conservation overshadowing the celebration.
An eerie shot of a lone brown hyena prowling Namibia’s abandoned diamond town, Kolmanskop, just snagged the grand title at London’s Wildlife Photographer of the Year — and the internet instantly threw sand in the gears. While fans cheered the decade-long grind of South African photographer Wim van den Heever, skeptics flooded the comments with the same nagging question: is this even real, or just AI? The photo was captured with a camera trap after years of 2 a.m. set-ups, wrecked gear, blinding fog, and dunes swallowing tripods. Context check: the brown hyena is the rarest hyena on Earth, near-threatened but stable in southern Africa. That didn’t stop the hot takes.
One camp called the image a triumph of patience and luck, applauding the ghost-town composition like a movie poster. Purists fired back that camera traps feel “less human,” sparking a side debate over what counts as “real photography.” Conservation-minded commenters argued the bigger story is how wildlife adapts to abandoned places, while meme-makers went feral: “Hyena influencer caught on a midnight brand deal,” “Kolmanskop IRL Scooby-Doo,” and “10,000 hours? More like 10,000 grains of sand.” The museum’s winners page was dropped in replies, but the vibe stayed spicy: art vs. AI, grit vs. gadget, ghost town vs. ghosted trust.
Key Points
- •Wim van den Heever’s camera-trap photo of a brown hyena in Kolmanskop won the grand title at Wildlife Photographer of the Year.
- •The image culminates a decade of annual visits and attempts to photograph the elusive, nocturnal brown hyena.
- •Harsh desert conditions—strong winds, sand accumulation, and dense fog—repeatedly damaged equipment and obscured shots.
- •Strategic placement of camera traps based on anticipated hyena routes was crucial to achieving the desired composition.
- •Brown hyenas number an estimated 4,370–10,110 in southern Africa and are classified as near threatened, with populations considered stable.