Sunny

Dog Blog Post #437: An easy Daily Shoot that really was easy...

Sunday: "What's it like outside where you are today? Make a photograph that shows the world.

Really - hard to go wrong on this one. Go outside, snap a picture.

Done!

... and that's pretty much exactly what I did.

On a training note, now that school has started up and things are falling into some semblance of a routine, it's time to call an end to Canine Modeling 101 and return to more traditional education.

I think we've had a lot of fun this summer, but we've also learned a lot.

I've learned it's important (to me) to find purpose for what the boys are learning. Just because a skill is on someones list of "things to learn" doesn't mean it should be on mine. Maybe it should be. Maybe it shouldn't. Maybe I'll regret either teaching it, or not, but I now believe the decision should be a conscious one.

The lost of Beau, just over a year ago, really drove home the importance of finding purpose in how you spend what precious time you have with your dogs. And whether your purpose is to see the joy in your dog's eyes as they race after a ball, or to expand their minds with tricks, or teach them skills useful to you... these decisions should be made consciously, so that when the time finally comes when you lose your friend, you can look back on the time you spent together and say, "it was well spent."

I have no idea what Zachary learned - I think he was pretty much spent the summer obsessing about his Lacrosse Ball, but Henry learned how to wear a hat!

How 'bout a few Scavenger  Challenge items...

"9) Have you lost your marbles? One or many, prove you have at least one!"

... man, was that hard to capture. Trying to drop the marbles, then focus the camera, and snap the picture as they rolled past... it was sooooo much harder than I thought it would be!

Speaking of learning, this was taken at the near glacial exposure time of 1/15s. Hand held. No flash. Why so slow? Because the shots I took that froze the action where, well, boring. They looked like I had glued a marble to the tracks. (yawn)

That said, I must admit to being surprised this came out so crisp. At 1/15s and 130mm, I would have sworn there would have been blur due to hand shake.

(I've read that the exposure time should be one over the focal length to avoid such blur. That is, at 130mm focal length, I should have set the exposure to 1/125s or faster. Alas, I did not have enough light to do so, and the flash pictures weren't looking good either.)

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