Archive for the ‘Pets’ Category
Dog Days of August….2010
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Last Saturday, we headed out to Cantigny Park in Wheaton to meet up with a few members of the Chicagoland Digital Photography Meetup Group for Dog Days at Cantigny. We went last year and I made what I thought was my best picture of the year there. You can’t miss there. The park is filled with dogs of all shapes and sizes!
This years event was even better. The weather was great and the turnout was very good. We wandered around for a few hours watching the dogs as well as checking out the frisbee and agility demonstrations.
The highlight this year was meeting Sandy. Sandy it turns out, is the Queen of the Sled Team. She actually gets hooked in with the team and pulls! She even has a crown!
It was a fun day. I for one, am looking forward to the next one!
Baseball Beavers Boxes & Logan
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I didn’t plan on doing much on Sunday. I never do.
I did want to go to a local flea market to visit with my Uncle Jack and have a look around. Kieran and I showed up around 8:00 to find the place hoppin! We visited with Uncle Jack for a while and then took a walk around to see if there was anything interesting out there. I did end up finding an old Dads Root Beer crate. Perfect size for storing all my clamps, tape, and misc stuff.
We got home around 11:00 or so and chilled until the Sox game started. They have been on a tear for a month now with a 24-5 record since early June. No one is more surprised than me! Not only did they win Sundays game against KC, they thumped them 15-5! With Detroit losing to Minnesota, the Sox also go into the All Star break leading the AL Central!
After the game was over we met up with Wanetta and Logan for an afternoon walk at a nearby lake. Wanetta called me earlier in the day saying the she saw the beavers out swimming around and wanted to see if they would come out again. About 5 minutes after we arrived at the beaver lodge we heard a big splash and then a pretty big beaver appeared. Couldn’t tell if it was protecting its territory or if it thought Logan was a big black beaver. Logan was fetching sticks and the beaver kept patrolling. After about an hour, it started drizzling out and we headed home with plenty of time left to relax!
Spring Tease?
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You gotta love March! It’s that time of year when you know warmer weather is on its way but just aren’t quite sure when it will actually show up. Tuesday we got a taste of whats to come. Mid 50′s for the first time in a long long time! A little rain, but who cares? Mid 50′s!
While I am by no stretch of the imagination a bird watcher or photographer, I have always liked knowing what wildlife lives or visits my neck of the woods.
I stopped by my friend Wannetta yesterday to see how she was doing. Wannetta is a big time birder and loves to hike all over with her faithful companion Logan. She said that a couple hundred Sandhill Cranes were over at the wetlands Monday evening and that she was going to stop over there in the afternoon to see if they were still there. I told her I might stop by too and see what was happening. Before I left, I just had to make a picture of Logan. He was kind enough to hop up on the picnic table for a quicky portrait. I only had my camera with 1 sb600 but I think it worked ok. Logan is a great dog. He loves to fetch stuff and is always trying to drag huge branches around. Pretty funny to watch that! I think he would be a very good frisbee dog. Very agile and quick. Good lookin too!
Patience
I take a lot of animal photos. Take a look at my photoblog and you will see. I enjoy it. Very rarely will there be a time when I don’t have a good time, and that is more than likely due to a pet owner wanting to see their pet in a perfect pose.
One thing I can tell you for sure though, is that you may never see that perfect pose. It all depends on the animal. And your patience! Some pets, like my Moms’ dog Scarlet, want nothing to do with it and freak out. I have yet to get a decent photo of her. She sees my camera and goes nuts. It’s a shame too, as she is a good looking pooch. But alas, the world may never see her.
On the other end of the spectrum is my son Nicks’ dog, Bosco. Give him some time to sniff around and make himself comfortable and you got yourself a willing model! I have captured a few good photos of him. He is one of those dogs who sees no need to move fast. Unless, of course, there is a snack around! Great to photograph and always seems happy.
Nick and Bosco came over for a visit one night and I quickly set up my background stand and put a roll of seamless paper on it. Bosco was right there checking it out but seemed distracted and just kept turning around, sniffing, turning around. I got a few shots off and he wandered off. Not even remotely interested.
He wandered into the frontroom and looked out the window for a bit. We tried coaxing him back but he just didn’t feel like it for some reason. I could have given up right then and there. It wasn’t like I was never going to see him again. But I was determined to get a decent shot. I had to change the game plan a little.
I put a LumiQuest Softbox III
Bosco hasn’t been over to my place that many times so he would set for a bit and then get up and wander around a little. My plan was to catch him when he layed down. I took a few shots to make sure I had the lighting dialed in. Now it was time to try capturing him with a good expression. The keeper came when he settled in next to my Lazy Boy. I took 3 frames but the best one was when he looked up at Nick. The Lazy Boy is right behind him in this shot. My lighting choice paid off for this one.
The point I was trying to make in this little story was that you shouldn’t freak out or give up if you have a good subject that isn’t cooperating. Just be patient, change gears and try taking a different approach. I’m not saying it works all the time, but if I had put everything away when Bosco refused to pose I wouldn’t have gotten this shot.
I posted this one on Flickr and within a day, Bosco was on the Explore page. I entered this in Syl Arenas Exciting Light contest on Pixsylated and got an honorable mention. None of this would have happened if I wasn’t patient. Try it some time and I hope it works for you too!
Dog Day Afternoon
I know that I wrote earlier that I was going to try to photograph more people and less animals but how could I pass this up? The annual IKC Dog Show was held at McCormick Place in Chicago this weekend.
Talk about an event! If you like dogs, this was the place to be this weekend. 460,000 sq ft of all different kinds of dogs! To say this was a big show would be an understatement. There were so many vendors there we lost count. Anything from the latest in pooch fashion to the latest in dog treats. A whole lot of cool stuff to look at.
The main attraction though, was the dogs. We started the day with a lap through the grooming areas. This is the best place to see the dogs close up and get any questions you migh have answered. We met some great dogs, and some great owners and groomers. That is a fun area. You can see all the dogs getting their makeovers. Some of them are hilarious. A few times I thought I might have gotten lost and wandered into a beauty salon! There sure were a lot of curlers and the blow dryers were working overtime.
We checked out the action going on in the rings but I think the real fun here is all around the rings. There was a section on the floor dedicated to various rescue organizations and Kieran really liked that area. I had no idea that there were that many!
All in all, it was a really fun day. Dog lovers are cool people and everyone was friendly. The dogs were great and seemed to be having fun but you could tell by later in the day, they would rather be on the couch!
You can see more photos from the show Here!
Elaine
Elaine skated off into the sunset sometime overnight. To say that I feel pretty lousy right now would be an understatement. She was a cool frog as far as frogs go. I have no idea what happened. She was just sitting on the edge of her water dish in the morning like she always does but something didn’t look right. A little nudge and nothing….
Elaine, you will be missed.
