Most dog photography is of dogs in “pet” mode.  The photographer is using a relatively short lens and is interacting directly with the dog while shooting, often keeping the dog’s attention by waving a yummy treat in front of his face.  This results in a photo with the dog looking towards the camera with total love and devotion, eyes large and tongue lolling as he tries to figure out what cute thing he needs to do to be rewarded with the bait.  This is the dog in total pet mode, which is the only way many people ever see their dog.

There’s another way to photograph dogs.  Under the veneer of domestication is the original canine beast, with its instincts and desires largely intact but suppressed when interacting with people.  Releasing and photographing that inner dog is often no harder than putting a long lens on the camera, taking off the leash, and shooting whatever happens.  This is the kind of photography that I really enjoy.

I live on the west coast and frequently take advantage of a beautiful beach as a shoot location.  Most dogs love to run, but none more than whippets.  They are lean, mean running machines, with long legs, well-muscled thighs, the leanest possible body, and everything streamlined from nose to the tip of the tail.  Take off the leash, give them room to run, and the show can be spectacular.

This is once again the lovely whippet Chanel, whom I have photographed many times.   She’s one of my favorite subjects because, despite being a top-ranked show dog, her inner canine soul is very much intact and wonderful fun to photograph.  We had her one afternoon on a beach in Southern California shooting some posed photos for her show career, and when we were done let her play on the beach until well after sundown.  She could have taken off down the beach and been hopelessly out of sight in minutes (a real danger with most sighthounds), but she’s as loyal as a retriever and ran up and down the beach at top speed in front of us until all she could do was collapse on the cold sand with a huge smile of satisfaction on her face.

I got many wonderful shoots from that shoot, but this one to me is the essence of whippet.  Sprinting flat out with all her energy, mental and physical, directed intensely forward, she is still the picture of grace and effortless elegance.  It’s breathtaking to watch.  It’s a whippet being a whippet.

Incoming search terms:

• doing what water dogs do

This handsome and elegant Smooth Fox Terrier is Dodger (CH J’Cobe Vigilante Justice), who swept the dog world off its feet in 2010 and retired from his American show career as the top dog in the country as well as the top-winning Smooth Fox Terrier of all time.  Still very much in his prime, he then went to Brazil for a year and blew the competition away there as well.

He was already topping the charts in June 2010 when I caught him while he was on the west coast at the Great Western Terrier show in Long Beach, CA.  Handler Amy Booth asked if I would take some photos and I jumped at the chance.  We were at a park right on the water, adjacent to the berth for the retired cruise ship, RMS Queen Mary.

I wanted a clean shot of the dog with blue sky and an uncomplicated coastline, but we let him move around a bit and he wandered over to a spot where the Queen Mary was going to be in the background.  I really didn’t want a big white (distracting) boat behind the dog.  I kept trying to adjust my position to get a better angle without success.  I wasn’t going to get that boat out of the background without moving the dog.  Then, Dodger turned his head and front towards the camera, leaving a sliver of blue sky between his body and the ship, and that was the money shot.

Dodger won Best In Show at the terrier specialty not only that day but the next.  When I look at this shot, I can’t help but think that this spectacular dog found his own place in the presence of royalty.

Incoming search terms:

• show dog photography

In the photo for Quiz 2, most people thought it looked like the dogs were having a less-than-friendly encounter, more like fight than fun.

The nature of the interaction becomes very clear when you can see the rest of the encounter.  Below are about 50 photos shot over about 4 minutes, in sequence with the shot I posted in Quiz 2.

The shot I pulled out for the quiz is very dramatic, but these dogs are clearly having a wonderful time.  The Jack seems quite welcome to join in, despite his preference for sneak attacks on the achilles.  So, were there enough clues in the quiz photo to indicate that the dogs were playing, and what were they?  How can we learn to see them?

On the suggestion of dog trainer friend, I’ve spent some time with Brenda Aloff’s excellent book, “Canine Body Language: A Photographic Guide“, which goes into great detail about the nuances of posture and facial expression in dogs.  Certainly you are aware that your own sometimes subtle facial expressions and posture are revealing – raised eyebrows, squinting, a twitch in the corner of the mouth, dilated pupils, blinking, looking away, lowering the head, etc are all part of our non-verbal language.  Similarly, tiny changes in ear position, a slightly lifted paw, staring, squinting, or wide open eyes, the tension in the lips, carriage of the tail, and so many other things are used by dogs to communicate with each other and reveal their emotional state.

It takes practice to see these (often fleeting) signals in dogs, and these photos certainly have convinced me that I’ve been missing most of what dogs were saying to each other.  I highly recommend Brenda Aloff’s book, and after some study I think you’ll start to see many things in these photos that you missed before.

Please let me know what you think about this “Fun or Fight” series, and I welcome any suggestions.

If you haven’t already, have a look at Quiz 3.

The Chesapeake Bay Retriever is the quintessential water dog among the sporting breeds.  It’s a sturdy dog with an even sturdier coat, and a non-nonsense approach to the task at hand.  This is an American breed, developed to be masterful in the hunt of waterfowl.

This is Coupe (GCh Quailridge’s Coupe De Ville), photographed at one of my favorite places, the lovely beach in Ventura, California.  He is a fine example of the breed, with the unique and unmistakable silhouette of a Chessie.  The color and texture of his coat look magnificant in this late afternoon light, and his keen expression suggests a dog of intelligence and determination that would be ready to hunt on a moment’s notice.  This was shot just moments before sundown when the last of the lingering light illuminated his beautiful head and glowing eye.

Coupe was the top Chesapeake in the country in 2011.

Incoming search terms:

• GCH Quailridges Coupe De Ville
• gch quailridge\s coupe de ville
• Quailridges Coupe De Ville
• chesapeake bay retriever valentine photos
• chessie dog
• QuailRidge chesapeake bay retriever Coupe De Ville
• chesapeake bay retriever caalifornia
• coupe de ville chesapeake bay
• quailridge\s coupe de ville photo

Please leave your thoughts below.

Most people thought the dogs were playing based on body position and balance, tail carriage, the lack of tension in the face of the brown dog (no wrinkling on the muzzle), and the non-aggressive face of the dane and the fact that she’s not in a defensive posture.

So, to answer the question, here are some more photos of the interaction -

From these, you can clearly see that this is play, even though the brown dog has grabbed a bit of skin in the second shot.  The Dane, who is a bitch about 15 mo old, has her teeth carefully protected by her lips, and neither dog is trying to get away from the interaction.  Actually, it looks very much like a dance, with the brown dog taking the role of the friendly aggressor and the Dane as the “prey”, dodging and jumping in response to the other dog’s moves.

Here’s where I need to give a disclaimer.  I’m a dog photographer, not a professionally trained canine behaviorist (although I am a PhD biologist).  When I started taking photos at the local dog park just for fun, I was amazed to see the behavior of the dogs that had happened too quickly for me to follow by eye.  There were lots of teeth, bulging eyes, and athletic moves that were really fascinating for me to see.  It seemed to me that there was lots of information in these photos and that it would be useful to share them in some way.  That’s how I came to start this “Fun or Fight” series.

If people find this interesting and useful, I’ll continue to develop it.  Please let me know if you have any suggestions.

You can subscribe to these posts either by email or RSS using the tools in the sidebar.  And please do share this with your friends on Twitter and Facebook.

You can leave more comments on this series of photos below.  And check out Quiz 2!

Incoming search terms:

• boxer dogs play fighting
• mixed faces quiz

PHOTO 2

What about this one?  Fun or Fight?  Leave your thoughts below…

——————

See the rest of the photos at Fun or Fight?  Quiz 2 Redeaux!

Incoming search terms:

• aggression dog

PHOTO 1

Welcome to the first “FUN OR FIGHT?” Quiz!  (If you missed the Introduction to these quizzes, you can read it here.)

These quizzes are going to test your understanding of dog behavior and communication.  Below is a photo taken at a dog park.  Decide whether the dogs are playing or fighting (or thinking about playing or fighting), and identify the clues you used to come to this conclusion.  You can enter your responses in the Comments box below the post, and you can also comment on other posts (maybe you disagree and why).  Everybody is welcome – the pet owner as well as the professional trainer.  The more people participating, the more we can learn.

I’m hoping there will be some lively discussion and a useful learning experience.  After a few days for comments, I can also post additional photos from a particular interaction if necessary to provide more information.

Have fun!

———————–

To see the followup, click here.

Incoming search terms:

• dog photos fun or fight
• fight quiz
• Introduction Photography quiz
• photography quiz 1

How well do your understand dog behavior?   Understanding what your dog is thinking, feeling, and trying to communicate can be harder than you think.

If you don’t know what to look for in your dog’s behavior and body language, you might not be able to tell the difference between fun and a fight, or whether that dog is saying “Nice to meet you” or “I’m about to kill you.”

See how well you can read dog behavior. Put on your dog hat and check out QUIZ 1.

Incoming search terms:

• military dog sledteam

The Herding Group is a hodgepodge of flashy breeds with charisma and coat (e.g., Bearded Collie, Rough Collie, Old English  Sheepdog, Sheltie, German Shepherd), and “the rest” – understated, workmanlike, low-profile (in both senses of the term) breeds like the Australian Cattle Dog, Corgis, and Vallhunds.  Among the latter, I’ve always had a soft spot for the Cardigan Corgi.  The Pembroke always seems to have a mischievous twinkle in the eye, like he’s hiding a secret or has the inside on a joke that he’ll tell you if you lean in close.  To me, the Cardigan seems like the shy cousin who is just as clever as the Pembroke but doesn’t care if you know it; who knows his job and loves his people, but responds to praise with “Aw, shucks”.  I especially love the sincerity in the Cardigan Corgi’s face, and the warm, soft eyes that reflect self-confidence without arrogance.

Harvey (GCH CH Mariel’s Harvest Moon) has been among the top-ranked Cardigans this year, with a Best In Show ribbon on his wall and many group placements.  When I was asked to photograph him, I wanted to capture all the qualities of the breed that I admire – intelligence, sincerity, loyalty, and understated confidence – as well as Harvey’s exceptionally handsome head and sweet expression.  The perfect backdrop turned out to be the outside wall of a building painted a complimentary shade of tan.  Pulling him away from the wall left it out of focus and put some of the rich green grass in the bottom of the shot for a punch of color.

This is the shot that was the winner for me.  A lovely but no-frills – almost old-fashioned – portrait, perfect for this kindly, sincere, but businesslike gentleman.  It’s all Harvey.

Incoming search terms:

• cardigan corgi play
• australian corgi
• cardigan herding cattle
• german shepherd australian cattle dog
• bearded sheltie
• corgi cardigan
• corgi dog photography blog
• mariel\s cardigan corgi
• mariel\s harvest moon

We think of photography as capturing “a moment in time”, but how long is a moment?

With a fast enough shutter speed you can freeze action without blur, and the resulting photos can allow us to see events that happen too quickly to see with the eye.  But the camera can also record events happening over time in a way that we also cannot see.  By reducing shutter speed you can capture that fourth dimension, and the resulting photos can be magical.

If you want to have some fun, experiment with different shutter speeds and you’ll be amazed at the new perspective this can add to your photography.  And even better, slow shutter speeds will allow you to shoot after dark.  I captured both of these images after dark.  In the first one, I’ve caught an Australian Shepherd looking back over his shoulder while running.  In the second one, my English Springer Spaniel is being chased by a Jack Russell Terrier, and the image captures both their speed and their playful interaction.

It’s great fun to shoot at really slow shutter speeds because you never know what you’ll get and the results can be really amazing.  When the light is fading and you think it’s time to pack it up for the day, try slowing down the shutter and maybe you’ll capture something magical.

Incoming search terms:

• running dog photography
• dog photography ebook
• shooting the fourth dimension
• add dimension to photography
• photographing the 4th dimension - time ebook cover
• photographing the 4th dimension
• fast shutter speed in boxing
• dogs in slow shutter speed
• can you capture fourth dimension
• speed and the 4th dimension

Through the end of the year, you can get my 2012 Calendar at 50% off the regular price of $14.99 through Lulu.  Use this Promo code when you check out:

HOLIDAYSUPERSAVINGS355

Incoming search terms:

• dog calendar 2012
• 2012 december puppy calendar
• shooting dogs calendar 2012
• calendar 2012 dogs
• calendar 2012
• free dog calendars 2012
• 31 of december 2012
• 2012 calendars 50% off
• pics of calendars in may dog 2012
• catalogo beuchat 2012

My new 2012 Dog Calendar is hot off the press, featuring photos that will appear in my forthcoming book, DOGSPLAY: The Joy of Being A Dog (due out any day as well).

These are wonderful photos of dogs having fun that I think you’ll really enjoy looking at over the next 12 months.

You can have a look and order a copy here!

Incoming search terms:

• whippet calendar 2012
• dog calendar photographer parks
• 2012 dogs
• new year 2012 puppy
• dogs having fun
• fun dog calendar 2012
• Dogs Having Fun!
• dog photography calendar 2012
• dog photographs for calender
• dog photo calendar 2012

Dog – Black Russian Terrier – MOSKVORECHIE YASON – World Winner, Crufts Winner, Interchampion, Champion of 34 Countries, 5x BIS, 40xCACIB, IPO-1
Russian Handlers 2012 Calendar – “Gothic and Lolita“.  Photographs by Oleg Bochkov

I first met the Russian dog photographer Oleg Bochkov at the AKC/Eukanuba show several years ago, and since then he’s been a regular at that show and Westminster.  He’s the Editor of the Russian dog show magazine HotDog, which covers shows all over the continent.  Oleg’s latest creation is his annual calendar of Russian dog handlers, and this year he knocked it out of the park.  These aren’t stuffy handler-with-dog photos.  The theme of this year’s calendar is “Gothic and Lolita“, and to pull it off he assembled a creative team in his studio for makeup, hair styling, clothing, props, and lighting.  The result is a collection of stunning images of show dogs and their handlers unlike anything you’ve ever seen.  The calendar will be available at all the big shows in Europe in 2012, and Oleg will also have them at Westminster.  If you want a copy and won’t be at a show where they’re available, drop Oleg a note and I’m sure he can work out how to get a copy to you.  Check out his  calendars from previous years at 2009, 2010, and 2011.

Incoming search terms:

• russian dogs
• crufts show bull terrier
• eukanuba terrier dog show winner
• gothic dogs
• gothic calendars
• gothic russia pictures
• hot gothic
• Hot photo calendar photografing
• hot russian dog
• hot russian gothic

Becoming good at anything requires time and effort.  You might be born with natural talent, and that might allow you to get better faster and achieve a higher level of competence, but the path will still be uphill.  Musicians and singers, painters and poets, all that achieve success got there by making a significant investment in honing their skills.

So, how much effort does it take to become really good at something?  Hours?  Absolutely.  Months, yes.  Years, actually.  There’s a rule of thumb kicking around (popularized by Malcolm Gladwell in his book The Outliers: the Story of Success) that mastering something takes about 10,000 hours.  If you have the typical full time job (40 hr week with some vacation time), you’ll spend about 2,000 hours a year at it.  So, according to the 10,000 hour rule, mastering something will take about 5 years of full time effort.  That’s a long time.

These days, anybody can pick up a nice little digital camera and take decent photos.  But this doesn’t make you a photographer any more than being able to pick out a tune on an accordion makes you a musician.   The digital camera has made it easy for anybody to take that first step into photography.  But whether photography is your hobby or your profession, it is a craft and getting really good at it is going to take work and time.  Certainly years.

Whether you want to become a professional dog photographer, or you just want to get better at dog photography as a hobby, make the best of time you invest by focusing on a few key things.

1)  Shoot a lot of photos.  How many?  Thousands a months, at least.  Try to aim for 1,000 a week.  The goal here is not to shoot perfect pictures (because most certainly will not be), but to shoot mindfully.  That is, pay attention to what you’re doing.  Don’t be afraid to experiment.  Go ahead and deliberately shoot some bad ones.  Put the camera in manual or one of the creative program modes (aperture or shutter priority) and play around with settings.  See how changing a setting affects the image.  This is how you will learn.

2)  Shoot a lot of the same thing.  If you want to learn how to photograph dogs, find some place with a lot of dogs and go shooting.  Look at the photos you take and analyze them.  What makes the good ones good?   What makes the duds uninteresting?  Good photographers don’t shoot great photos, they create them.  You need to learn how to  identify the things that will give you the best chance of getting a great photo – the setting, the light and weather, the best camera and lens to use, the handling of the dog – all the things that need to come together to give you the best chance of creating a great image.  You won’t get a beautifully lit photo if you go out at noon on a sunny day with no way to modify the light.  You won’t have a handsome-looking dog to photograph if it’s 87 degrees outside and the dog’s tongue is dangling from the corner of its mouth.

3)  Shoot a lot of different things.  A lot of what you will learn about photography you will stumble upon by accident.  If you only photograph dogs during nice light in the daytime, you’ll miss some really great lessons to be learned by shooting other types of things.  Shoot at a high school football game at night under lights.  Photograph flowers.  Shoot some cars.  Volunteer to do some shooting at a friend’s wedding.  These all require different skills, and you will find that you need to learn new stuff if you want to get the kinds of photos you want.  Spend time outside your familiar box.

4)  Look at your photos.  This seems obvious, but you’d be surprised how many people try to learn photography by shooting a bunch of photos that they never really look at.  Digital cameras allow you to get some idea of what you’re getting from the viewer on the camera, but you need to look carefully at what you’re producing.  Look at the meta data from the camera on the settings you were using while you study the images.  Figure out what you like and don’t like in the photos you create.  Look at composition.  Evaluate the quality of the digital file – the amount of luminance and color noise, whether you’ve lost image information due to under- or over-exposure, whether the image is focused and sharp (or not, if you’re trying to produce a creative effect), and so on.  Shooting 1,000 photos will take some time, but if you’re going to get anything out of your effort, you need to invest some serious time looking through them.

5)  Train your eye.  It took me a while to figure out that I needed to do this.  I would go out and shoot a bunch of photos, only to find that they didn’t look nearly as good as I thought they were going to be when I shot them.  I needed to learn that the camera doesn’t see the world the same way my eyes do.  Cameras see contrast very differently than the human eye.  What looked to me like a good photo through the viewfinder actually had ugly shadows, blown out highlights, and washed out colors when I looked at it on my computer.  Similarly, the lens you use will change the composition of the shot (e.g., wide-angle vs telephoto), the settings you choose will affect the appearance of the image (e.g., aperture affects depth of field, shutter speed affects freezing or blurring motion).  You will need to train your eye to see the way your camera does if you want to be able to create photos that look the way you want them to.

6)  Master your camera.  This also seems obvious, but you’d be surprised at the number of “professional” photographers who shoot in full program mode.  The “P” mode doesn’t stand for “professional”.  It means the camera is making all of what should be your decisions.  These “P” for professional photographers might be able to get by because the modern digital camera can do a decent job of controlling settings to produce a properly-exposed, in-focus, photo – most of the time – but these photographers will never be great because there is no craft in their work.  Go read my post SHOOT THE DOG: Fundamental tools, as well as the others in this series.  If you’re too lazy to read the manual and to invest the time learning the fundamentals, you will never be more than an average photographer.  Don’t try to convince yourself that natural talent will make up for not knowing how to use your tool.  I promise you, it won’t.  If this was so easy, everybody would be really good at it.

7)  Use technology to your advantage.  Cameras these days are amazing gadgets, a computer in a box actually.  They can do some wonderful things – predictive and tracking autofocus, evaluative and centered metering, ISO’s unimaginable in the film days, meta data storage, ETTL flash – so many really cool things!  Plus, most advanced hobby and professional cameras have a bunch of custom settings that allow you to control lots of very specific things to make your camera function exactly how you want.  If you don’t know about this stuff, you can’t use it to your advantage.  Take the time to really study these things in depth.

8)  Become photography and computer literate.  Gone are the days when a photographer could shoot a bunch of rolls of film, drop them at the lab in the evening, and pick up the processed photos in the morning.  With digital photography, YOU are the lab.  You need Photoshop, a computer powerful enough to use it, and you need to learn how to use both.  You will never master Photoshop, not just because it’s a huge piece of software, but also because the technology for processing digital files is improving all the time.  Photoshop comes out in a new edition every couple of years, with amazing new abilities that can allow you do things that you never dreamed of (CS5′s content-aware fill is truly remarkable!).  Plus, there are dozens of companies producing third party plug-ins and stand-alone programs that provide even more tricks and functionalities.  You’re going to have to invest time learning and keeping up with this stuff.  The best way to do this is to follow the magazines and websites that keep up with the latest, and read their evaluations, watch their tutorial videos, read the user forums, and whatever else you feel provides you good value for time invested.  You will have to do this forever.  Likewise with cameras.  They get better and better, with amazing new capabilities.  If you’re going to make good use of the gear available, you need to know about it.  You will have to do this forever, too.

9)  Look at good photos and follow the work of the best photographers.   One thing I was surprised to discover is that the world of the professional photographer really isn’t all that big.  As I started digging around, the names of the same people kept coming up over and over.  There are millions of photographers out there, and when you’re just getting started in photography you can learn a lot from most of them.  But as you get better, they will have less and less to offer you, and following the work of the ones at the top will be what helps motivate you to stay on the learning curve.  I follow the websites of photojournalists, as well as photographers specializing in wedding, fashion, wildlife, sports, and studio photography.  Interestingly, the best of these know and follow the work of the others, creating a little community at the top of the pile that is a huge resource for the rest of us through their websites and blogs.  I want to be able to shoot like them.  I want to be able to create any image I can imagine.  I can’t do either right now, but I’m going to learn everything I can from these people.  Best part?  It’s free.

10)  Never stop learning.  Realize that you will never master photography.  You might view this as a source of frustration (“Damn, I’ll never figure out how to do this”).  Or, you can realize that you will never, ever get bored with photography, no matter how much you learn and how long you’ve been shooting.  There will always be more.  There will always be something that can be done that nobody has tried to do before.  If you love to learn, if you love to be mentally and creatively stimulated, there is no horizon.  What could be more fun than that?

Incoming search terms:

• poets and their dogs
• becoming a better dog photographer
• camera settings forphotographing dogs
• camera settings to photograph puppies
• all black french bulldog
• solid blackw english bull terrier
• puppy photography where to stand for lighting
• photographers who shoot a specific thing
• how to photograph dogs indoors
• how to be a better dog photographer

The difference between a good photograph and a great one is often the little “tricks” used in the setup and camera work.  I wanted to get a shot of Gavin (GCH CH Lakota’s Hitman Of Cantar) gaiting that would knock your socks off, and since we were near the beautiful beach in Ventura, CA I decided to head to the water to come up with something interesting.

We were shooting in the late afternoon, and the sun was dropping below the horizon, so it would be a sunset shot.  The tide was way out, leaving a large, nearly level beach of wet sand.  My instructions to handler JR Alcantara were to run the dog in a straight line just above the line of the tide.   I positioned myself far enough away up the beach to allow me to shoot with a telephoto.  I did this for two reasons.

- First, it would keep the dog in front of me and more or less perpendicular to the water line for a longer time; that is, the dog’s speed relative to the background would be slower.  This gives me more chances to catch the right part of the stride as the dog trots by in front of me.

- The other reason for a telephoto is that it would compress the background, and I wanted to use this to produce a special effect.  At the beach, this would cause the breaking waves in the background to appear closer to the dog than they really were.  Then, if shot with my camera as low to the ground as possible, the waves in the background would appear huge relative to the size of the dog.  (I was shooting with my Canon EOS 1D Mark III at ISO 200 and 1/200 sec, and my EF 70-200 mm f/2.8L IS USM at f/6.3.)

When everything was ready, I laid down flat on the beach with my camera just above the wet film on the sand.  JR gaited the dog perfectly in front of me, and we got this dramatic shot.  The dog stands out from the waves in the background that look both large and close, like they’re about to overwhelm him.  There’s enough light left from the sunset to provide a bit of backlighting that highlights the fur on his legs and tail and catches the bits of water and wet sand coming off the bottom of his feet.  The wet beach produces a shimmery reflection and mirrors the color of the sky into the foreground, so the dog stands out against the blue water behind him.

To be fair, this isn’t a perfect shot.  The German Shepherd is known for its “flying trot”, with all four feet off the ground in the middle of the stride.  I wanted to catch the dog completely airborne, and I missed it by a few milliseconds.  But everything else about the shot is so dramatic that it was the easy winner among the other shots from the day.

Getting this great photo took some planning and an understanding of both optics and perspective.  Just knowing the body and lens I used wouldn’t be enough information to allow you to go out and create a similar image yourself.  The “tricks” are in how I used the gear and set up the shot.

You can read about how I got this shot, but if you really want to gain the skills to create images that will stand out from the rest, you need to experiment yourself.  Go out and shoot with long and short lenses, from a standing position to flat on the ground.  Study these shots and you will discover that you can produce very different looking images from some simple changes in how you shoot.

Knowing how to create the shot you envision in your mind is what will make you a photographer and not just somebody with a camera!

Incoming search terms:

• white german shepherd in slow shutter speed
• lighting setups for pet photography
• CANTAR german shepherd
• german shepherd head
• german shepherd in slow shutter speed
• the difference between an english mastiff and an Italian
• Lakotas Hitman Of Cantar
• german shepherd photo shoot
• german shepherd getting up off the ground
• gch lakota\s hitman of cantar

I was digging through old photos looking for a particular image and I came across this one, shot almost exactly a year ago.  This is Tawny (GCh Sporting Fields Bahama Sands) bred by Debbie Butt, and who was on the west coast for a show with her handler (and Debbie’s daughter) Amanda Giles.  I love photographing whippets and had never done a portrait of this dog, so I grabbed Tawny and Amanda and scouted the showgrounds for a place to shoot.  Tawny and Amanda were waiting to go into the ring, so we had perhaps only 10 minutes to get the shot.

We were at the Orange County Fairgrounds in Southern California, and like most fairgrounds it was a lovely place for a fair but didn’t provide any easy options for photographing a dog.  My options for backgrounds were handler RV’s and dog trucks, cars in a parking lot, the white walls of the various buildings, and some dark-colored buildings on a hillside surrounded by white fencing.  I always try to find a background that adds some subtle color to the photo without being distracting, so of the options available the buildings on the hillside seemed to be the best option.

I wanted a shot that would show off the classic curves of this breed, and that would also pull the viewer into Tawny’s dark, soft eyes and sweet expression.  To blur the background and manage depth of field (DOF), I put the background far in the distance and shot with a telephoto lens at a large aperture (Canon 5D II at ISO 400, and Canon EF 70-200mm, f/2.8 L IS USM, at 1/320 at f/4.5).  These settings allowed me a fast shutter speed to freeze any movement, and a shallow depth of field (DOF) that would leave the dog’s head in focus and everything else in soft focus or blurred.

With the focus point on the dog’s near eye, DOF was enough to keep both the far eye and the tip of the nose looking sharp, but the far ear a tiny bit soft.  Your eyes are drawn directly to her eyes, then explore her face – the nose, the ears – then take in the curves of her neck and the symmetrical curves of her topline and underline, then are drawn back to the whiteness and detail of her face.  You can see the tiny whiskers on her chin, the soft fur on the edges of her ears, and the soft dimples on the black of her nose.  It was late enough that the sun was behind the hillside, so we didn’t need to cope with inconvenient shadows and the background was mostly dark.  Some lighter, softly colored areas fell conveniently behind her head, and the white fence at the bottom of the frame isn’t distracting when the shot is cropped close.

When I photograph a dog, the features of the head are critical to get right.  A soft eye, blurry nose, or lack detail in the fur on the head will make an otherwise lovely photo uncompelling.  When you look at Tawny’s portrait, you want to know her, and you want to be moved by her beauty.  If the details aren’t there, this just can’t happen.

This year there have been two lovely whippets ranking among the best hounds in the country.  The other one is Chanel, GCh Starline’s Chanel, who is currently #1 hound, with Tawny right on her tail at #3.  (You can see one of my portraits of Chanel here.)  For whippet lovers it’s been a great year, and at the prestigious shows coming up in the next few months the whippet ring promises to provide a feast for the eyes.

Incoming search terms:

• chanel whippet
• tawny whippet
• whippet photography
• whippet chanel
• sporting field whippets
• tawny sporting fields
• elegant whippet images
• sporting fields bahama sands
• whippet head shot
• whippet tawny

Sally, my English Springer Spaniel (12.5 yrs), with a new friend (3 yrs?) she met at the local dog park.

Incoming search terms:

• english people dogs

I’ve been away from my blog for awhile.  Blogging takes creative energy, focus, and steady commitment, and I’ve been lacking all three.  In my last post, I was so excited to announce what I thought would be the appearance of my first book of photographs, in the form of an eBook.  Then my computer died, and so did the momentum.  At the same time, my recovery from shoulder replacement surgery last July took a turn, the result of getting decked by a bulldog at the local dog park (how ironic!).  The metal implant fractured my upper arm bone and yanked my still-healing shoulder muscles, and I’ve been in pain ever since.  It’s been a real bummer.

I finally have my new computer.  And this Saturday I will have a second operation to get my shoulder back on track.  My rehab starts over from the beginning, so 6 weeks in a sling, 6 weeks out of sling but no lifting anything heavier than a coffee cup, then physical therapy starting with a one pound weight.  I won’t be at the AKC/Eukanuba show, and if I’m at Westminster it will be without a camera.  Bummer, bummer.

But I will be back to blogging, because it’s one of the few things I can do with both hands that doesn’t entail lifting anything.  Once I’m past the week or so of post-surgery pain, I’ll be able to type.  So I’ll be focused like a laser on doing this book, and it will be a real, printed-on-paper book, with a version also available as an eBook that anybody can afford.  ($0.99! No shipping!).  I’ll also get back to my Shoot The Dog posts for those interested in the “how-to” behind getting great photographs of dogs.

I won’t be taking any photographs for a few months, and since that’s how I make my living, I’m going to have to come up with some new, creative ways to make a living from the thousands of photographs I’ve already taken.  Necessity is the mother of invention, and in addition to a book or two I have a few other ideas that I’ll explore.  And I welcome your ideas, too – ordinary, wacky, outlandish, whatever.  I’m all ears.

Today, I am so grateful for my wonderful friends, who have enriched my life in so many ways.  I wish all of you the happiest Thanksgiving holiday and a wonderful feast with your friends and family.

Incoming search terms:

• wild turkey photography

I’m so excited to announce my first eBook of photography, DOGPLAY: The Amazing Ways Dogs Play, which will become available on 1 November on Amazon for (only!) $0.99.

These are astonishing images – of teeth, tugs, nips, and bulging eyeballs (but especially TEETH!) – of dogs in their own world playing as dogs do, in the rough and tumble of mock battle and having more fun than pigs in a mud wallow.

I’ve photographed thousands of dogs over the years, and I’ve seen lots of photos of dogs, but these are the most extraordinary images I’ve ever taken, and the most amazing photos of dogs I’ve ever seen.   If you’re a regular follower of my blog, you’ve seen a few of these in my HOW DOGS PLAY posts.

For DOGPLAY, I’ve compiled a collection of about 30 of my favorite photos as an eBook that you can view in stunning color on your iPad, iPhone, Android, Amazon’s new color KindleFire, or any other devices running the iBook or Kindle apps or Adobe Acrobat (pdf).

DOGPLAY will be available on Amazon on 1 November for only $0.99.  Why am I selling it for only $0.99?  Because I want it to be affordable to anybody who loves dogs, anywhere in the world.

If you don’t want to wait until November to order, you can preorder a copy now from my website and DOGPLAY will be sent to you automatically the instant it becomes available.

PREORDER NOW!

Incoming search terms:

• beuchat book
• dogsplay book

Beware the heel nippers.

Somehow, this doesn’t seem fair.

Incoming search terms:

• dogs with loose skin
• loose skin dog
• skin dog
• dog breeds with flabby skin
• why is a dogs skin loose
• why are dogs skin loose
• slack skin on young dogs
• pointing dogs
• Pointing Dog Breeds -> Weimaraner
• pictures of loose skin dogs

Know when to say Uncle.

Incoming search terms:

• great dane mastiff mix
• weimaraner mastiff mix
• mastiff great dane mix
• great dane mix
• Dogs teamwork
• great dane whippet mix
• weimaraner and jack russell mix puppies
• irish terrier mastiff mix
• great dane mix with mastiff
• great dane mix dogs

Incoming search terms:

• weimaraner husky mix
• dogs play
• frisby dog
• german shorthaired pointer dog photographer
• weimaraner and pointer mix
• springer spaniel german shorthair mix
• springer spaniel and german shorthair mix
• Pictures Mastiff playing frisbee
• hound pointer mix
• german shorthaired pointer weimaraner mix

…ever so gently.

Incoming search terms:

• dog submitting
• biting dogs
• dog biting leg
• dog play biting images
• dogs play biting

Go ahead.  Just try to take it.

Incoming search terms:

• play with bulldog
• bull dog balls
• dogs and ball
• balls bulldog
• bulldog balls
• play on sharing and caring
• scaring bulldog
• sharing is caring images

Take advantage of your opponent’s weaknesses.

Incoming search terms:

• human dog play
• why dog pulls other dogs ears at play?
• puppy play ear biting
• english bull terrier with other dogs
• dogs playing at the dog park
• bull terrier bitting on another dogs ear
• dog ear nibbling
• spaniels ears
• spaniel ears
• puppy play ears

Some of the many things dogs love to do.

Incoming search terms:

• happy dogs play

I love photographing dogs outdoors in beautiful settings, but there are some great shots to be had indoors as well.

I got this terrific shot of a Basset Hound at an indoor dog show last year.  There were lots of spectators and I couldn’t find an open spot next to the ring where I could see the action.   I finally squeezed under a table at the far end of the ring, and after deciding it was too uncomfortable to shoot all scrunched over, I finally gave up and lay down flat on the floor (in the dog hair and various unidentified liquids).

The dogs were first examined by the judge at the far end of the ring, then they did a lap around the ring so the judge could watch them in action.  From where I was, the dogs would be trotting towards me on my left, then turn in front of me and trot away from me down the other side of the ring on my right.

I consider capturing great action shots a sport, so I’m always game to try but this time I had my work cut out for me.  Photographing a dog moving towards the camera is always tricky because the focus point is continuously changing and the shutter speed has to be fast enough to minimize motion blur.  Indoors, the relativeley low light levels – even in a well-lit room – make it even harder.  Plus, I wanted to catch the dog at the perfect spot in his stride to make a great picture, when his diagonal front and hind legs are maximally extended and the other two legs just meeting underneath.

Imagine my surprise when I saw this shot of the Basset Hound we call The Professor (GCh Splash’s The Professor) on the LCD of my camera.  Not only was it relatively sharp, but I had caught him completely off the floor at the perfect moment in his stride.  There’s a lot of  loose skin on a Basset Hound, and in most of my photos there are huge lips and ears flying all over the place, but in this shot everything was hanging down as pretty as can be, with just enough motion in his ears to show the strength and speed of his gait.  It was my prone position on the floor that allowed me to see all that air under the dog that looks like the dog, and from that angle it looks like the dog is coming straight at me (he was, but he was still about 35 feet away)

This is such a great shot of the dog, but what makes this photo special for me are the boy and his mother watching ringside.  Their eyes are following the dog and their enjoyment is captured in the wonderful expressions on their faces.  The little boy’s face is priceless.

—-

For those that are interested, here are the photography details:

I shot this with my Canon 5D II (great for photography indoors) and a 100-400 mm 5.6 IS lens (not so good for indoors because it’s slow, but I needed the zoom).  Even using a relatively high ISO 1600, the best shutter speed I could get was a relatively slow 1/100 sec with a wide open shutter (f/5.6).  I could have upped the ISO on this body without too much loss in image quality, but 1600 produced a nice file with plenty of detail in the subject.

Incoming search terms:

• flying basset hounds
• the professsor basset hound
• splashs the professor
• the flying hound
• basset hound photography
• basset hound photography Professor
• hounds that fly
• open carol for dogs
• photographing a basset hound
• flying basset hound