What the Heck was I Thinking?? (Slightly R Rated)

[Laurie, Fudge, and Vern]

As most of you have heard by now, I have taken up Photography as a hobby.  As most of you also know, I consider myself to be an expert on most subjects regardless of my actual knowledge about the subject or any facts to back this up.  So, today, while I was out with my two Labradoodle assistants/models I came to the conclusion that no world-renowned photographer was ever able to get any of their famous photos while holding the leashes attached to two Doodles. Don’t bother telling me that Ansel Adams or Annie Leibovitz had Labradoodles or even try to back up your statement with photos of all, because I will just tell you a hired assistant followed behind on the photo shoot with dogs in hand.  I have had some incredible “almost” shots this week only to be thwarted by two nosy Doodles.  As we were walking back to the car the other day, there stood a squirrel in between two tree limbs, perfectly posed.  Before I could get my camera out of my bag and the lens cap off, the Doodles spied the squirrel and made a move in his direction and up the tree he went.  I swear this isn’t an “I caught a fish this big, but he got away,” story.  My squirrel photo could have been in National Geographic, if it were not for two dogs named Fudge and Vern. 

 

Same thing happened with a woodpecker that I saw circling around a tree.  My second chance at a cover shot for Birds and Blooms magazine was denied to me because one of the dogs chose that moment to shake his tags and scare off my subject. 

It is no wonder the only things left for me to shoot are boring bridges, dirty dogs, and dogs with balls in their mouths. At one time I had a squeaker toy in my camera bag to squeak to try and catch the catch lights in their eyes and one night after I had gone to bed, one of them (Fudge) got in my bag, pulled the toy out, and handed it to her brother (Vern), so he could get caught in the morning curled up to a disassembled squeaker toy surrounded by stuffing.  So, now my camera bag is missing an important tool and I have photo after photo of two dull-eyed dogs. What next?  They run off with my Speedlite External Flash and bury it in the woods.

 

On one of our latest assignments, we are supposed to shoot a subject at different angles, which when you are 55 years old can be harder than it sounds.  I was out trying to get a silhouette shot of Hayley against a birdhouse and John yelled for me to get down on the ground.  “Hayley is younger. Why doesn’t’ she get down on the ground?” I yelled back, but down on the ground I went. 

FYI: when you are down on the ground at a park, Doodles tend to think it means you want to be stood over and licked, which makes it hard to photograph anything, but a large tongue coming at you.  Also, getting down is much easier than getting up and make sure no one in your family is standing behind you during the process yelling, “Quick, someone hand me a camera. I see a full moon rising!”

Sometimes, it feels as if I am lugging behind two bored teenagers who start causing trouble just to pass the time.  Believe me, I am an expert on bored teenagers because due to poor family planning on our part, we had two in the household at the same time.  I can’t tell you how many times I heard, “mom, there is nothing to do,” and I used to answer that they could help me with the cleaning, vacuuming, or laundry.  Those kinds of retorts were always met with vacant stares as if I was speaking a foreign language and they had no idea what those words meant.  A couple of times the oldest one tried to while away the time by baking us all a treat.  Unfortunately, she was a firm believer that directions were for dummies and followed her own “wing it” plan in creating her specialty brownies/moon pies, which we privately referred to as her “moon craters.” Usually when she said she was in the mood to bake, I would suggest we all go to the movies. At least, Fudge and Vern don’t bake, but they can be equally annoying when they are bored.  The other day while I was setting up my shot of Fudge, Vern jumped in my van, got into my camera bag, and emerged victorious with a glove in his mouth. He then proceeded to run all about the yard, showing Fudge his treasure until she had to take a break and check it out. After I took the glove away, sticks, corncobs, and a sock he had saved from another day made an appearance.

 

The best example of the confusion shooting with two dogs can cause happened when I decided to set up a framing shot for our assignment and ended up with several shots that reminded me of Marie’s inappropriate sculpture on Everybody Loves Raymond. 

Keep in mind I worked hard to get these shots and it involved one ball, a dog’s face, sometimes a dog’s tongue, and two tree limbs that formed a V. 

I kneeled on the ground in ivy that could have been hiding any small creature, which was convenient, because as I was down there I prayed I would be able to get up later.  Vern was first up and I learned another valuable lesson that I would like to pass along to budding photographers. Choose your props wisely.  For some reason, I opted to use a ball that had a thing-a-ma-jig extending off of the ball and gave my shot a look altogether different than what I was going for and not in a good way. 

When it came time for Fudge’s turn, for the sake of propriety, I switched to a different ball.  Just in case you think this was some fly by night photo session and not well thought out or executed, I will have you know when Fudge showed no interest in the ball stuck in the tree, but opted to bring me another ball, I ran in the house to get peanut butter to slather on the stuck ball to make it more desirable for her to make the shot work.

That is how determined I was to get the shot.  Unfortunately, all my hard work did not pay off in the end, because when I looked through my images, I was horrified to see something akin to soft porn involving my sweet dogs staring back at me.  The only person interested in these shots might be Hugh Hefner if he ever decided to put out a magazine called Playdog. 

 

Later, when I showed John and Hayley the pictures, both of them could not stop laughing and Hayley asked the same old stupid question she always asks, “Mom, what exactly are you trying to say?” and John said, “from the looks of it, I am wondering if she should answer that question.”  “Ha, ha, ha,” I said, “it is supposed to be a fill the frame shot.” 

Well, that caused more laughter to erupt and as I walked back to our bedroom, John yelled out, “If Larry Flynt calls, should I take a message or put his call through to you?”  It is hard to be an artist when you have to keep explaining your vision.

[Adrianne Matzkin]

[Adrianne Matzkin]

I woke up 4 napping doodles literally LOL!!
A moon shot will never look the same anymore! Tell Larry you are too busy with your friends at DK to take his call.

[Donna K & Quincy]

Laurie, I admire your creativity! That second last shot of Fudge is really sweet and I just want to hug her. It's obvious your family doesn't recognize jenius.

I know at this age getting up is a challenge, I really don't do ups, sit ups, push ups, stand ups, I do downs, sit down, lay down and ocassionally even get down but I don't do ups.

Thanks to your slightly R- rated pictures I now have a not nice song running through my head. Are you familiar with the Rodeo Song?

[DJ & Chance]

ROFL and I am still laughing.  The Fudge and Vern "framed" by the tree shots are new classics, for sure :)

I experience everything you discussed with one small doodle--little Chance, all 18 lbs of him, has ruined more photos than I care to think about!

[Lonnie & Libby Lu]

First of all Laurie, I was laughing so hard my DH came out from the office to see what was going on!  One look at the computer and said, "Laurie"?   These assistants now days just are not what they use to be!  As for the birdhouse shot, I do really like it and I can relate to getting down on the ground:)   Watch out for those "moons" too!  The shots of Vern and Fudge are great and it seems they came through for their "boss".  Thanks Laurie for always bringing me to a smile/laughter!  

[Pat and Traveler]

Hilarious!  So much I relate to here, along with the humor.  I never really give up trying to take both Trav and a camera out at the same time, and he always jerks the leash just when I've got that perfect photo framed.  So I believe you!  And that advice about getting down to get the shot--that really would be great if there weren't any getting up to do afterwards!  Great shot of Haley, by the way--and the last shot of Fudge fills the frame.  Mission accomplished.  :) 

[Deanna & Desi & Cori]

"Laurie, Laurie, Laurie", said Deanna, shaking her head!!!