Saturday, April 14, 2012

Behold the grace and beauty that is the Greyhound

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So there.

(Shot with the Nikon D300 using the 70-200mm VR zoom; shutter-priority, with shutter set to 1/3200 second; camera set aperture to f/3.5 at ISO 400; auto white balance; matrix-metered; normal JPG.) 

Monday, April 9, 2012

Romeo and Tadeo

Romeo and Tadeo are two galgos that I did a photo shoot with in Solvang. That Saturday morning it had remained overcast, the night before having been foggy. So with all that cloud cover the light was very diffuse and wonderful.

They live with two greyhounds. One day, soon I hope, I'll get to go photograph all four of them together.

Tadeo

Romeo

I was really pleased with how their pictures came out (despite the white of Romeo's face getting blown out). It was probably the best light I had during the two days of shooting I did.

If you're not familiar with galgos, they come from Spain, are in the sighthound family (which includes greyhounds), and come in two varieties: smooth- and rough-coat. They are used for hunting game. It is because of what befalls to too many of them when they are no longer wanted for hunting that prompted a number of people to form adoption groups to get them out of Spain. Many galgos are adopted in Europe and in the US.

(Shot with the Nikon D300 using the 50mm f/1.8 lens; aperture-priority, with aperture set to f/2.8; top picture: camera chose shutter speed of 1/500 second at ISO 800; bottom picture: camera chose shutter speed of 1/2000 second at ISO 400; cloudy white balance; matrix-metered; normal JPG.)

Friday, April 6, 2012

Belle at Solvang

I was lucky enough to have several sessions to do during the Solvang Greyhound Fest at the end of February. One of those sessions was with a veteran of several Solvang events, Belle. If I remember correctly, she's 13(!).

She is a beautiful fawn. She was very patient with me as I tried to get different perspectives of her. I ended up pretty much repeating the same kind of head shot. The problem with using the garden at the hotel we stayed was that you didn't want to see the second story of the hotel building that surrounds the garden on two sides, or the wooden fence that encloses it. So you ended up standing and pointing the camera down at your subject. Belle was not interested in lying down so that I could get a different kind of photo. But that's okay -- I want my subject to be comfortable more than anything else while I photograph.

One picture of Belle in particular reminded me very much of a photo I took of our second greyhound, Nikki. In both pictures the girls are bright-eyed, and have big smiles. This is Belle's picture:

Belle 

I ended up cropping the original frame after I had removed a number of spots, played with the tone curves a bit, and added a vignette.

She is a sweetheart; I'm glad I finally got to do a session after all these years.

(Shot with the Nikon D300 using the 50mm f//1.8 lens; aperture-priority, with aperture set at f/2.8; camera chose shutter speed of 1/2500 second at ISO 400; center-weighted metered; auto white balance; shot in RAW.)

Wednesday, April 4, 2012

Payton and Cezanne

Rest well, you two. I didn't get to know you as well as I would've liked.

Payton (from Rhode Island, at Dewey Beach):

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Cezanne (from Nevada, running in the Solvang Streak last month):

Cezanne

Sunday, April 1, 2012

Our cat trap is working

Indy

Actually, this is what happens when basement cat meets a small-dog carrier.

(Shot with the Nikon D300 using the 50mm lens; aperture-priority, with aperture set to f/2.8; camera chose shutter speed of 1/8 second at ISO 800; auto white balance; matrix-metered with +0.7 exposure compensation; converted to black-and-white using Lightroom; normal JPG.)