Studio 13 has gone to the dogs. And I mean that in the nicest way possible.
This week, the Studio got to combine product photography and location photography to create some amazing images. That plus the experience of working with dogs and puppies added up to be a pretty incredible day.
Our client for this job was Binatone, the northwest distributer for Motorola. Yes Motorola makes phones and you might be wondering what that has to do with dogs, but they also make dog collars. Some of these collars have cameras so you can see what your dog sees or a tracking device in case your dog becomes lost.
One of the great people we met on this shoot was Julie Davidson, the art director for Binatone. She had the job of creating concepts for the shoot, aligning that concept with corporate’s overall vision for the company, and lining up dog models. Oh, she arranged for the people models too, but they were just backup for the real stars.
The dogs were all freelance, found in dog parks, pet stores, and other such doggie places, but the people were booked through Helen Wells Modeling Agency. We had a male model, Ben, all day and a girl, Kylie for the morning session.
Because dogs have limited attention spans, someone was needed to stand in when Lesle was testing out the lighting. And being the intern, of course the responsibility fell to me. Don’t get me wrong, I was a pretty spectacular dog, but somehow I don’t think I was ever on par with the real deal.
Only a few people in the whole world know this, but I was once a model for Helen Wells. It was when I was younger, maybe 10 years old, and I drifted away as I grew older and became more interested in other things, but I revisited that time and got to model the second half of this shoot. Since I had some experience with modeling and want to be an actress, and I had proven myself as a dog model, Julie thought it would be a good opportunity for me and allowed me a promotion to human.
Our first location was a house’s back yard where we set up our base camp. Luckily we had a beautiful day and were able to use a combination of daylight and strobes to give the images a natural look but also highlight the dog and make sure that he and the collar are the stars of the show.
At this location we attained action shots of dogs playing, searching, and interacting with humans. We even had one dog who was trained for shows and jumped off a table and over the camera before landing on the ground!
We also visited the Flowing Well park in the City of Carmel to show dogs walking with owners in nature and getting lost in the woods. But no worries, the dogs were never actually lost. Their owners were always right behind the camera, assuring the dogs and getting their attention toward the camera.
Naturally, the best part of the day was playing with the dogs before and after their modeling time. There were all kinds of dogs from an older golden retriever to a young, hyperactive vizsla puppy, who would hardly stay still to put a collar on. She was my personal favorite.
Who knew going to the dogs would be so much fun?
