Photographing animals is absolutely my passion. One of my favorite things about capturing their characters is getting to work at their pace. I'm a high energy person who has worked very hard to quickly tone down my pace to whichever animal I'm working with, and this has been very intentional. I'm a natural extrovert who scored as an introvert on the Meyers Briggs test, so I guess I'm an introverted extrovert? Either way, somehow I'm both a dog and cat person, and this makes photographing both dogs and cats a lot of fun.

Sammie is a beautiful rag doll kitty who I photographed using natural light only. You may not guess this, but he is laying by a window in an apartment, and it only took me a few minutes to grab this shot. 

Shortly after this session, I attended a Florida Professional Photographers Gild seminar on how to achieve studio lighting patterns using natural light and specific post production techniques. After taking tedious notes and rushing home to work on this image, my initial edit looked like garbage compared to this final edit. Once I learned how to create this feel using natural light and photoshop, I've been duplicating it in every kitty photo session that I've done indoors. 

It's very important to me that the cat I'm photographing is relaxed and just doing their thing. I acquaint myself with the kitty I'm going to be working with for the number of minutes necessary for them to feel comfortable with me in their space. This can't be stressed enough. If a cat is stressed or feeling forced, it will be very obvious in their body language. Here, Sammie looks like he was just doing his thing, but what you don't see is his owners hands above him. She had encouraged him to lay down, and then he voluntarily stayed there, looked out the window like a prince, and gelled right in to his comfy spot. I depend heavily on the relationship that the pet owner has built with their pet in order to encourage the animal to be comfortable and compliant. 

While I allot ample time to acquaint myself with the cats and dogs I work with, I've learned how to be Speedy Gonzales with my camera, because I know that we only have so much time before the animal gets bored. This is where my extroverted "get things done" side comes in, and I work hard to be in and out. Sometimes it takes hours to make a magical shot, but once you've learned a system of how to duplicate that magic, it doesn't need to take hours, but can be obtained in a matter of minutes.