John Denton - Tigers at 09:00

Then we were off into, what for me, was the main part of the day. As a boy, Gerald Durrell was my hero. His tales of derring-do in far off jungles, chasing beasties of all descriptions, invoked a passion in me. When I finally visited his zoo in Jersey it was the nearest I'll ever come to making a pilgrimage.

So you can only imagine how I felt when we made our first visit, to the rhinoceros enclosure. Now this zoo holds batchelor rhinos on behalf of the worldwide breeding programme. A very noble act as the white rhino is an extremely endangered beast indeed. I've always imagined rhino as the type of animal that would charge an armoured Land Rover at the slightest inclination and win at every attempt. Now I'm not saying that's not that case, but these boys seemed delighted to see us and allowed themselves to be photographed, tickled and cooed over like amorous puppies. A rhino's hide is said to be inches thick and yet these chaps took a real delight in being slapped and stroked. A magical start to the day and much more to come.

It was then off to the Cats. I use the capital C seriously as these Cats were Lynx, Tigers and Lions. I feel honoured to have tiger spittle on my shooting jacket, I don't think I'll ever wash it again. She was one very grouchy girl when she was woken up and continued to stalk about her paddock. However it was amazing to see the relationship these animals have with the keepers they recognise and respect. They would snap and snarl if we got in their way and yet present themselves to their keepers without question. If only all my brides and models would react the same way!

The challenge in most of the animals' bed chambers was getting enough light for a shot, but not disturbing the natural behaviour of the creature or invoking an anger response by using flash. For this aspect my Lowel ID Light was invaluable as were the high ISO capabilities of the Nikon D300. At one stage I had the lens right against the bars of the tiger's bedroom with Mark holding the Lowel and the keeper ready to drag me back should the tiger decide she didn't want me there. It's strange how heights affect me and yet in this situation I loved every single moment.

So the day continued and was kind to us in that we had an overcast sky that lent itself to some strongly backlit images. By exposing off the animal we got some fantastic pictures that look as though they were set in a white studio but were totally lit by ambient light.

The Giraffes were my favourite of these as they are just so graceful and appear to run in slow motion. They are also extremely inquisitive beasts and, after a while, a cabbage leaf is as much as you need to attract their attention. Once again my mind wandered to brides and models I've worked with that weren't so easy to get a pose out of!

The most challenging environment to shoot in was undoubtedly the Reptile House. If this had been a wedding I'd have come from the cold into the warm(ish) church and put a camera and lens in there to acclimatise and prevent fogging when I needed to use it. No such luxury today and I was far too excitable to remember basics like this. Hence we walked from the cold outdoors into the tropical sauna of the Reptile House and immediately watched every surface of camera and lens cover itself with a solid fog. Nothing to be done but let them warm up and investigate the shooting possibilities further. I don't mind snakes, but find them a little boring, as they don't tend to do much. I could watch them move all day long though, as you watch those ripples of muscle move along their body when they glide across the floor. Unfortunately these guys were all well fed and docile and not feeling any necessity to move around. Not so the Poison Arrow Tree Frogs whose brilliant colours stood out beautifully against their enclosure. I had to strap the 85mm F1.4 lens on to get anywhere near enough light up at ISO 1600. That meant a wafer-thin depth of field, but we still managed some usable images.

The only time that flash was usable was in the Avian Dome. This is a fantastic structure that you enter through a double door system (to prevent the birds escaping). Once inside, though, you're treated to a free flying exhibition of the most incredibly coloured birds. Any photographer who is struggling with the meaning of colour spaces, curves and gamuts needs to spend time staring at a birds wing. Any bird, even a starling, and all the mysteries of colour difference will be revealed. The little burst of flash helped illuminate the fast flying birds against the white sky and capture their movement.

There were so many highlights to this day it's impossible to take you through them all. Being covered in fruit and having lemurs jump all over me was fab, having tapirs wipe their nose on my lens, wallabies tuck their joey's into their pouches at my approach, penguins take fish from my hand. It was truly magical and for a child of my generation the voice of Johnny Morris was never far from my head.

What is true though, is that whatever your style for photography, the opportunity to shoot out of your comfort zone can be a huge benefit. I learned a great deal from this shoot about fast-moving subjects, turning ambient light to my advantage and not least, dealing with my own fears. When you are shooting inches from a tiger you have to trust implicitly those who are acting as your minders, trust the bars and glass, and understand that you have no control whatsoever over how your subject is going to move or react. You also have to place a considerable degree of trust in your equipment as so many of the shots presented that day were one-off opportunities. You have no idea how long I waited for the hippo to yawn or the giraffe to move into just the right place, miss it and you start over again. Not too dissimilar to wedding photography in many ways but I would much rather work a wedding than become a part of David Attenborough's team.