Behind the Scenes: Our Model Beagles

Anyone who has ever owned a beagle is well aware of the independent mindedness of the breed. That makes it hard to reconcile the many photos of the serene beagles that have been featured in this blog. So it probably comes as no surprise when I tell you that getting pictures of the dogs is not quite as easy as it looks.  Not every picture Joan takes looks like our holiday card from two years ago.

What you never see, however, are the outtakes.


 

Because Joan is a professional photographer, she knows that every subject requires a different approach. Children tend to tense up when given direction, especially from their parents. So when photographing kids, Joan tries to keep the parents out of the process. Here's a picture of Joan photographing a child. Note there's no parent. In fact, the parent actually took the picture below. And, no, the child is not crying, rather he is laughing hysterically. 

Photographing dogs is different, however. Here, you can't underestimate the value of a great assistant.  When Joan photographs pets as part of her business, the owner usually helps out. When she photographs dogs at the Washington Animal Rescue League, one of the volunteers works with her.

But when shooting pictures of Fred and Hank, Joan keeps running into one major problem: I am a lousy assistant. When Joan is trying to take photos of the dogs, my presence tends to make them less focused. So Joan has skillfully found ways to get rid of me when photographing the dogs. While most of the techniques she uses are good, I didn't appreciate the time she told me to get out of the car to check a back tire and then took off. I thought that was uncalled for. Normally, Joan just waits until I've wandered off to go buy a Diet Pepsi, gone to take some pictures or decided to read up on the historical site that has just been desecrated by beagle markings.

Now keep in mind, Fred cut his teeth as a beagle model during our 2003 trip, where he learned that if he sat until he heard the click of the camera, a treat would soon follow. Back in those days, Joan was using a point-and-shoot camera and had to deal with the shutter delay, which forced Fred to learn to be even more disciplined. Since the Fred Takes America tour, he has been photographed regularly and with increasingly better equipment. But because he still seems to think there's a shutter delay, he tends to sit long enough for Joan to get additional shots.

Despite being a newcomer, it didn't take Hank long to catch on. But while he also generally sits and waits until Joan gets her shot, he's not as consistent. Fred is the go-to dog when it comes to posing. Joan usually gets him in place first with a sit-and-treat, and once Fred is in place, she physically plops Hank exactly where she wants him. The closer together, the better. They then get another treat when they are in place and obey the command to wait. Joan then backs up, and lets their leashes hang slack so she can Photoshop them out later, then takes as many photos she can get before one of the ADD-afflicted beagles wanders off to investigate a scent or roll in something dead.

Joan commands Hank to sit at the New Mexico Museum of Space in Alamogordo, N.M. Not surprisingly, he did not try that one small sit for mankind.

Joan's tools of the trade are small treats that fit in her pocket. She strongly prefers dry treats since she tends to forget to remove them from the pocket of her jeans before washing them. Or maybe she just has the laundry version of Munchhausen by Proxy syndrome, and intentionally leaves things in her pockets so she can do more laundry; it's hard to know. Joan also carries a small squeaky toy that fits in her pocket, so that when all else fails -- as it often does -- she can squeeze the toy to make the kind of noise that always can get a hound's attention and often results in the titly-head.   If that doesn't work, Joan has her own high-pitched noise she sometimes employs, one that sounds disturbingly like the sound of a modem connecting. Joan's stomping, clapping and snapping of fingers are often ignored by the beagles, but always worth the price of admission to watch. The bottom line: Treats are gold; everything else is tin.

One tool for good photos: exhaustion. Here, two worn-beagles pose flawlessly for Joan at White Sands National Monument.

The dogs are also better behaved at home than they are on the road. Seeing new places means new areas to explore and new scents to seek out. This makes certain photo opps impossible, and Joan's philosophy is to quickly acknowledge the hopelessness of those situations, and move on. This is also how she handles photographing kids, since any distraction or agitation will impact the quality of the expressions, and by extension, the photos. There's no point making everyone crazy for crappy pictures.  

When it comes to getting photographs of dogs, Fred and Hank have the benefit of a lot of experience and training, But when Joan photographs the dogs at the Washington Animal Rescue league, she has literally two minutes to photograph each dog. Most of these dogs have had awful lives, having been rescued from abusive owners and puppy mills, or found wandering the streets, as Hank once was. So these dogs are not only often afraid of people and loud noises, but -- because the puppy-mill dogs have often been kept in small cages their whole lives -- they're often afraid to walk on terra firma. Sometimes, 90 seconds of Joan's two minutes with a dog is spent sitting with the pup and offering comfort.

Joan didn't bring any of these shelter pictures with her on this trip, but if want to see some, you can friend her on Facebook and check out her dog rescue photo galleries.

Joan also photographs dogs as part of her client work, and has a full array of ways to get those dogs in the proper spirit. She even uses some of the same toys she does with kids: Bubbles (although, dogs tend to prefer liver-scented bubbles), balloons that make a loud noise when released and are fun to chase, squeaky toys, balls and with dogs, treats. The owner usually works with Joan -- blowing bubbles, throwing the ball, etc. To see some of those pictures, you can check Joan's website and look under "Four-Legged Family Members."

If you want to know about photographing cats, Joan finds them to be a completely different animal from a photography perspective. And don't even ask her what it's like to photograph me. Joan's tried-and-true method is to have me lean toward the camera, because she tells me it makes me look thinner. Strangely, it seems that I'm leaning forward more and more as the trip progresses. By the time we get to San Francisco, I'm going to have to be doubled over.

Comments

[Cathy Moscatelli]

Maybe Joan should try using treats with you, as well. I'm sure that you'd be much more cooperative.

[Joan Brady]

LOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOL

[Royelen]

I wonder where you could get an invisible leash. Or is Photoshop something you'll do to the picture anyway so no worries about deleting the leash.

[Joan Brady]

That's an interesting idea - if no one make them.. someone should... like those invisible bra straps.

[RC Lehmann]

Fred sure can make some faces. He's hilarious!

[DENISE V.]

I constantly get amazed comments when I show people the photo of my four dogs, sitting attentively in a row on the back deck (you can see the photo at my blog http://dogdazeetc.blogspot.com/

What people don't know about this photo is that there is a series of 4 or 5 other shots where the dogs are looking every which way. We didn't think about the treats thing until that frustrating 5th attempt. Duh. But we always have them handy now after this great success.

[REBECCA]

call me crazy, but I prefer the "outtake" from last year's Christmas card.

[Tamara & John and their beagles, Elvis and Abbey, from Michigan]

I was thinking the same thing. I LOVE the outtake. That is totally BEAGLE.

Sunday, I talked to my friend, Jana, at Gone2theDogs (http://www.gone2thedogs.biz/) about that dog beer; she says it's liver-flavored water, basically. Interesting that Fred and Hank turned their beagle nosed up at it!