Today, I want to talk a little about how dogs live and their attitude towards life.
Having done quite a bit of dog photography in Singapore, whenever I travel, I always take the chance to meet overseas professional dog photographers to talk shop as well as try to make arrangements for shoots.
I was in Bangkok last month and was hired to do some portraits. I did portraits of rescued dogs, stray dogs and even human portraits too. I went to this lady’s house which was the home of 4 rescued dogs and they were so cute!
The first to greet me was a blind Shitzhu. This little fellow is totally blind and yet is able to move about in the house. She knows where her owner is and has to walk on the left side of her owner. She knows if there are other dogs nearby. Once she knows that the neighbor’s dog is nearby, she will start barking away. Here’s a pic of her
Her disability of sight did not stop her from doing what she wants, this is something we humans should learn from them.
Let me show you another photo of another rescued dog in this household and will tell you more about her.
Meet Ellie. She is the main reason I was hired to do the portrait. Ellie was recently diagnosed with leukemia so her owner wanted to take a few photos of her.
Ellie has quite a bit of history. She was adopted in February 2011 in Qatar. She was found dumped in a well with 16 broken hip/bones and an embedded collar. Despite the serious injury, she was adopted and slowly recovered. After her recovery, she was diagnosed with stomach cancer in 2012 but recovered after surgery. Since day 1, she didn’t like strangers, her owner is the only person she never ever tried to bite. She moved with her owner and another dog in 2013 to Cyprus and spent 2 yrs there where her owner helped and adopted 2 more dogs. The 4 of them and the owner then moved to Bangkok 2015. Ellie loves water is a true stubborn loud Cocker Spaniel. She loves running and playing. She is funny but also very loving.
In 2019 then she was diagnosed with leukemia, had surgery where her spleen with a big tumor was removed. As chemotherapy for dogs doesn’t do much, her owner decided against it. She is now 11 yrs old and her owner will make the rest of her life as amazing as possible.
In the photo, Ellie seems to be happy and jumping around, enjoying life. She IS happy and enjoying life, another point we should learn from dogs.
It was quite an experience for me to be shooting this family. They have so much love for each other and you can really tell from their interactions with one another.
Let me end this post with a photo of the 4 of them.
And yeah, they may not be the most cooperative dogs when it comes to posing. Till the next post…….
