Li Ward photographer of pets and weddings. Fat Orange Cat Studio is a fresh and candid boutique photography service in Boston, Massachusetts.

…we are gathered here today…in the face of Underdog…to join this Baxter and this VanBuren…in unholy catrimony.

Bahaha.

Real wedding is tomorrow. I’m ready. I think.

One of the reasons I like photographing animals so much is that they are blissfully unaware of the camera (usually). They’re doing everything except worrying about a good side versus a bad side, or how much should I smile or does my hair look OK. So it was with some slight trepidation when I agreed to shoot a wedding for this weekend. It’s a rite of passage! Hold me! Lean in for a kiss!

Honestly, I don’t know the first thing about posing, unless it’s to dangle a toy mouse above your head so that you’ll raise your arm in that pretty, dainty way. So brides, if you respond well to high-pitched meows, and want photos of yourself and your party swiping at toys or looking longingly at dog treats, then I’m the girl for you. Otherwise, be prepared for some seriously weird poses.

The couple assured me they were all about the candids. So I breathed a small sigh of relief, agreed to do their wedding, and headed over to Calumet to rent a telephoto lens. To capture those non-posed moments from afar. I gave myself a week to practice with it.

This is a 80-200mm f/2.8 lens. I wanted the “legendary” 70-200mm lens which has vibration reduction, but it was out. Not that it matters anyway. They’re both the same size/weight. That of a MONSTER’s.

Shooting with this lens was like shooting with a bus. After 10 minutes I felt I had been run over by one. It was 7 lbs of top-heaviness. I extended my left arm out to support the lens at its end. The camera shake was insane. I planted my feet far apart to steady myself. I stopped breathing. It didn’t help. My core did get a nice workout though. I brought my elbows in to steady my arms against my body, which was a little better, until my neck, back, shoulders, forearms, wrists all threw up from the pain.

How do wedding photographers manage this thing? I’ve decided not to use it. I rented it to be able to capture more candid shots at the wedding, but if they’re all going to be blurry, then the point is nil.

So after 30 minutes of bodily pain and really horrid shots, the best I came up with were these of the boys while I was clear across the room. VanBuren wanna be starting something.

I’ve been meaning to post about Daisy the Golden Retriever for some time, but have been sitting on some of the photos, dissecting them for worthiness. This was the first time I burned through the first of two 4gig compact flash cards in less than 20 minutes. Smoke was coming out of the camera. So there were a ton of images, and I’ll admit, a ton of bad apples in the batch. I was doing some new things that day.

First up though, a quick headshot of Daisy indoors. She knows we’re about to go outdoors. Is that Mommy putting on her snow boots? She’s trying to contain herself. Because when we go outside…

…there is snow to eat!

And tennis balls to catch! And have bounce off your chest!

The new thing I was attempting that day were action shots. Admittedly, I need a lot of work in this area. The action shots above were taken at 50mm, f/5.6 and 1/800 to 1/600 seconds. Burst mode at 5 frames per second. Faster shutter speeds will allow you to freeze the action, but it also means less light gets in. The original photos are very underexposed. Very. Horrifyingly. You can tell the above photos are not at all sharp, and look overly “post-process-y.” I had to adjust the exposure and curves quite a bit. They’re much better than the originals, but they look washed out.

The shutter speed/aperture setting/ISO speed/lighting situation/distance between me and subject is a combination I need to figure out. A change in any one of those areas affects the others, and they must be adjusted accordingly (if you’re shooting in manual mode). Right now my brain is not computing this alogorithm fast enough.

Maybe 1/800 sec was faster than necessary? Maybe I should have stopped down and shot wide open? If I shot from a farther distance back, I could have slowed the shutter speed, still freezing the shot but letting more light in? Maybe I should have just shot in shutter priority mode?

MAYBE I should have shot in SUNNIER SIDE OF THE YARD?!

So yes, in the middle of all the technical melee that was going on inside my head, I failed to see the light, which all photographers in the known universe will place as the highest priority when taking stock of a shot.  Me knowing this and yet not doing it makes Me mad. The above were taken in the east-facing backyard during the late afternoon. The house was blocking the sun in the yard, except for a small portion which was still getting some tree-filtered light as the sun began to set. I did take stock of the area first, and did note this.

And yet somehow, here we are, on the other side, the darker side, the cold gray dreary side, shooting away. We had just migrated over there and by that time all the must-freeze-the-action! data crowded out the light data in my head. Such a shame.

Then again, when the dog is having all this fun noshing on her tennis ball in the snow, do you really want to ruin the moment by making her move? Such a dilemma.

And I haven’t even talked about how to get a moving dog in focus.

So Daisy, why don’t you take a breather, sit pretty and let me feel a little better about my photographic skills.

Ah. Thank you.

Saturday afternoon visiting the adoption center at the Animal Rescue League of Boston. I was trying to see about volunteering my services, photographing their animals for Petfinder and/or for print. Remind me the next time I go to bring along a giant basket on wheels so I can cart them all home. Luckily, the place was absolutely PACKED with hopeful pet owners, so that was a great sign, considering the current economic conditions and how many of these pets were given up because of it.

I wonder how the boys would feel about a new dachshund friend…?

From Elinor:
How long have you had pets? Since you were a kid? Or did you get them when you lived on your own?
I’ve had pets all my life, mostly cats, and most of them were orange tabbies. My first was a humongous fat orange cat who eventually died of feline leukemia. I cried my eyes out. I had at least 4 orange tabbies in succession after that. Each of them were named “Meow” (I was so creative), all were outdoor cats and all ran away/got hit/whereabouts became unknown. Then I entered the what is known as The Snowball Era. I had two white cats in succession, named Snowball I and Snowball II. Both barely entered adulthood when they met their demise. One was hit by our neighbor’s car, the other just never came home. I cried for weeks and determined that from now on, no remaining pets shall roam out of doors. That proved difficult to enforce. During the era of Snowball II there were two other cats, a long-haired named Pepper who had poor eyesight and respiratory problems and loved everyone, and Tammy who was a gray short-hair and shy and loved only me. In the house, Pepper was only called “xiao mao” (Little Cat in Mandarin) and Tammy was “da mao” (Big Cat).

AND during this period we adopted an older Pomeranian named Beau. We had him for only several years. He enjoyed coming and going via the cat door in the basement, would roam indiscriminately, never looked both ways before crossing the street…you’re seeing a horrible pattern here. Poor Beau. Soon after, we got another puppy, a Poodle mix that I named Candi (haha what a terrible name). Pepper and Tammy were still around. By now they had moved with us 3 times, across 2 different states. In fact they were the only pets that managed to stay with us for more than 3 years, and who did not die from violent or unknown circumstances. Both passed away from old age while I was in college. Candi wasn’t the only pet for long: while I was back from summer break I got the cutest apricot Poodle, just 8 weeks old, and named her Mocha. When I returned to school she officially became my mother’s dog. Candi and Mocha were pals with a new scrawny cat named Mouse that my dad brought home, until Candi died of kidney failure at age 10.

The only quiet period in pet ownership was when I was in college. But as soon as I graduated and settled into my own place in Boston, the first thing I did was to visit shelters for my next pet. Eventually I took in two cats named Sam and Pumpkin.

Mocha is 12 now and currently in Beijing, where my parents are living these days. It’s so strange to think of her there. Mouse has gotten really fat and is still in Altanta, given to the neighbor next door. Sam and Pumpkin are Baxter and VanBuren, aka Bunny and Veebs, and both are doing very well. As 100% indoor cats, I’m hoping they’ll stay with me for quite awhile.

From Guin:
If you could photograph an animal in any setting, what would it be?
ABOARD AIR FORCE ONE.

From Cirilia:
When you meet new animals, what do you do? Kneel down to their level? Talk to them in high-pitched baby talk? Extend your hand for their sniffing purposes? Basically, how do you Dolittle it up?
Yes, all those things. Plus treats, if the owner has any on hand. I never attempt to pat a dog unless the owner tells me it’s OK, and then I don’t do it until the dog tells me it’s OK, through the ritual of kneeling down, letting them sniff my hand, talking to them in a high-pitched – but soft – baby voice. I’m not really sure if baby talk actually puts a dog at ease. I do it because hi! it’s impossible NOT to.

Sometimes the body language is very clear. Take this Bernese Mtn Dog (love!) for example:

Not the dog in the middle with the soft brown eyes, but her sibling in the back, looking as if she’s just seen a ghost.

She’s standing as far back as her leash would allow, with so much worry in her eyes. No amount of introductory baby talk or sniffing of hands was going to put her at ease.

I don’t baby talk to cats. No wait, that’s a lie. I make this “tseh-tseh-tseh” sound first to get their attention, and then I baby talk. And I just now spent 15 minutes trying to decide how to spell tseh-tseh-tseh. It’s a soft clicking sound, and all cats seem to respond in one way or another by either looking at or coming towards you. When I make that sound to Veebs from across the room, he comes flying over. It’s very cute.

From Amber:
If Veebs and Bunny had cameras (and opposable thumbs, AND the interest in photographing you) what aspect of your personality do you think that they would try to capture?
This isn’t so much as a personality rather than an event. I’d like them to capture the expression on our faces when we’re playing Mario Kart on the Wii. It gets very, very intense when the MK is fired up. They love our laps, and so it greatly disturbs them when they’re sitting there and suddenly they’re getting jostled about, or whacked in the head with controllers. And then there’s all the screaming, cursing, punching. I won’t lie. I hit Dan sometimes. I’d like to see what that whole scene looks like.