I just got some studio lights and boy is there a learning curve with them. Of course, it doesn't help that I'm shooting deep black dogs. Had more go into the trash bin than keepers, but here are some of my first ever studio light shots. I'm going to be doing some more shots this weekend and playing with some strobist setups. Any advice on using studio lights/umbrellas/soft boxes/setup would be warmly and greatly appreciated.

Cleo (CH. Ebon's Jewel of T'Nile) - age 7+ years, mother of Lily. I'm very happy with this one. I love doing black on black with dark dogs, but usually I do a lot of manipulation in PS. All the adjustments on these were done in Lightroom only.



Lily (Ebon's The Black Dahlia) - age 2 years. Lily looked directly up at the lights, so it started out very flashy before my pp. Had trouble focusing with the dark dogs on dark background, and it looks like I missed Lily's eyes and focused on her nose.