I thought I would keep the dog theme going in today’s post and share with you my behind the scenes experiences in photographing dogs. I know most of you are thinking, “What a fun job! How hard can it be to get a few shots of cute, lovable puppies.” Well read on…

Our assignment seemed simple enough – photograph four of the cutest pitbull mix puppies we had ever seen.

I was under the extreme delusion that I was actually going to get all of them in one shot. You know the one I’m referring to – the perennial favorite of holiday calendars, where a group of downy puppies is cuddled up next to each other with giant warm eyes looking into the camera lovingly, maybe they would even doze off in an adorable puppy pile eliciting a collective “Awww” from viewers everywhere. What actually happened was an attack on our equipment, a defilement of the backdrop and a near need for stitches on Larry’s hand.

Not only did these little rascals poop and pee all over the backdrop, one of
them decided he was going to rappel himself up the back of it. Keep in mind
that this is simply a piece of cloth suspended between two light stands. He
actually managed to get half way up it before the whole thing nearly came
crashing down. Thankfully everything was anchored down with heavy sandbags.

While this was going on, his brother set his sights on our reflector.
Apparently foam core is like a steak dinner to a puppy because he was going
to town taking huge chunks out of it with his tiny and super sharp teeth.

We spent nearly two hours just trying to corral them into something vaguely
resembling a composition. When we weren’t stepping in their poop, we were
guarding our faces and crotches from their scratches and bites. I’m still
not sure how this happened, but do you see the one who appears to be just hanging out on my lap? He somehow chewed a hole through the zipper on my fly.

Larry and I left there stunned, filthy and a little bloody. If you had seen us
stumble back to our car, you would have thought we had just done a tour of duty in Fallujah.

Now I will admit, these little guys were extra rambunctious, but be warned…working with animals takes a lot of patience and steely determination. Oh yeah, a Hazmat suit might be a good thing to bring along too!