To sit??? I could have put my lab mutt in a sit stay or had her lay down and all would have been fine. What about the ones who have no manners?? Or the ones like my whippet who just does not lay her delicate bones on hard floors(that includes sitting)

I am practicing this at the moment and sitting her in a chair for softness(and to get her off the ground which is just bare wood. As soon as I get up to take the photo, she leaves.

If it is this hard with my own, how hard is it with someone elses?? I know there has to be a way to do this, so, could those that are good at this tell me?

That is not a dumb question, but a very valid one. I make it a game with the dogs and reward them when they do what I want. I have camera in hand, ready to shoot so when they co-operate, I get the photo. For other people's dogs, I have the owner/handler stand just to my side as they give the commands. If you want a difficult pose, try this one.

That is a great shot! Love it! Looks like the papillon is posing pretty for the camera and the Rottie annoyed that the shepard is having all the fun.

Was it a trick to get the two in a sit stay while the other was jumping??

This is all I could get today with my silly whippet. I don't have any studio lights or a backdrop, so, this was just posing practice.





One with the kids, which is much easier as they hold her still

Actually, the Rottie doesn't like strangers, so he was eyeballing the judge as the judge was nervously watching the Rottie. All those ribbons was won by these three dogs that weekend. It took about a dozen tries to get this photo. And this photo proves that Alaska is NOT all ice, snow and cold. LOL

Wow, and I thought that must be a summer photo!!! That looks more green than here in east TN!

Uh, I would be a bit nervous if a rottie that didn't like strangers was eyeballing me!

It is a great photo. Very original!

It was a summer photo taken in June. Right now we had 13 inches of snow fall since last night. Made my son happy as he is out snowmobiling today.

Hey,

Getting the pet to pose I leave up to the owner. I am there to take the pictures, LOL. Having said that, I find that all of the pet shoots I do requires a minimum of 15 or 20 minutes for the pet to get their energy out so that we can start shooting in earnest.

-JM

Julie,
that's another advantage of working with show animals -- they generally know how to pose for photos and how to react to toys, food, the word "cookie" etc.

James is right in saying it's the owner's job to pose/bait the animal, however, baiting is difficult and most owners -- even of show animals -- have no clue how to do it. When possible, I ask other handlers to help me bait the dogs I shoot. They are experts at getting a dog to focus on whatever they have in their hands.

As an exhibitor of dogs as well as a photographer of dogs, I train all my show dogs to pose for photographs. I start at the same time I train them to show since I assume they will win and will therefore have to get on a podium and look good for a photograph. My Rottie boy, Rowdy (A/C CH Loral's Der Terminator CGC, TT, HIC, RTD) has been trained to pose without a handler and to bait for food or bisquits that I toss without moving until he's told to. So I use him as my demo dog when I'm shooting Specialties. I set him up on the podium, go back to the camera position, toss food and take my test shots. You should see the look on the exhibitors faces when they see a 120 lb Rottie posed without a handler and not moving a foot until he's told to. Really works great when the Specialty is Papillons or MinPins : )

One additional comment: you need to learn how to use a squeeker and how to toss toys/bait to get expression and head position. And you thought it was all about taking pictures!!!

Jim

I absolutely love ths shots of them on the chair, btw - very artistic with teh shallow DOF, and I love the colors, too. Did yo utry printing those?