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

I’ll be the first to admit it: I am horrible at displaying prints. I take and take and take photographs and then I take some more…and at the end of the day I don’t know what to do with so many photos. Album or scrapbook? Desk or wall frames? Which ones, in what order and on which wall? I can’t make up my mind so as a result, many of my photos either pile up in a shoebox or in a hard drive, so sad and all alone. If only I had a little direction to help me organize and display my photos so that they receive the respect they deserve! Because what is the point of taking all these photos when you’re not going to showcase them properly?

Enter The Back Bay Framery, Boston’s premier fine-art framer.

I love supporting local vendors and working with great people, so it is with great excitement and glee that I announce a Fat Orange Cat Studio promotion with The Back Bay Framery, to help you turn your important photos into beautifully framed works of art, ready to be showcased in your home!

When you book a session with me and order prints, bring those print in to The Back Bay Framery and receive 15% off all display products and services! This runs the gamut from desktop picture frames to handcrafted scrapbooks to leather albums – and even custom framing.

There are a lot of beautiful products to choose from, and Kerrie, the owner of The Back Bay Framery, is on hand to help. She has been serving Boston’s custom framing needs since 1998, and because of her wonderful service, hands-on approach, and solidly crafted products, her business has flourished, winning the venerable Best of Boston award several times. I am finally getting a few important pieces custom framed, and Kerrie has been wonderful to work with.

If you visit her store now, you’ll see a rather lavish display of my pet photos at the front of the store…

So giddy to see my photos so beautifully framed! No, these are not your IKEA or Crate + Barrel frames, for sure.

Kerrie runs The Back Bay Framery with the help of her lovely assistants, Sadie Lou and Spike (the Yorkie mix). All three may greet you at the door.

So! If (1) You’re in the Boston area, (2) have a dog or a cat / or want yourselves photographed, (3) contact me to schedule a shoot, (4) order prints, (5) head over to The Back Bay Framery, (6) consult with Kerrie to get them beautifully displayed and (7) receive 15% off your order. Now you have no reason not to have your photographs properly showcased.

The Back Bay Framery
227 Newbury Street in Boston
Between Fairfield and Exeter Street

And tell Kerrie that Fat Orange Cat Studio sent you!

I was going to let my short and sweet “Favorite Photos of 2009” be my year-end review but then I decided I was doing myself a big disservice by not documenting all that’s happened this year. Even though I have far to go, I did accomplish a lot in this my very first year of business.

I spent the last part of 2008 and the beginning of 2009 getting everything together for the launch of this business, and finally did so officially – by announcing it online – in Feb 2009. The rest of the month and March found us busy hitting the streets with some old-fashioned face-to-face marketing. We visited pet grooming salons, vets, pet boutiques and animal shelters. I say “we” because Dan had a huge hand in this. It was extremely hard for me to go about soliciting and making cold calls as I am normally extremely, very, painfully shy. There were a lot of nervous stammering and ineloquent pitches when talking to store owners about something as simple as leaving a stack of business cards! But was I in it to win it or not? It was time to work outside my comfort zone.

The first pet boutique I decided to was Pawsh in March, and this meeting proved very lucky as they were just organizing a second grand opening event in April, and invited me to photograph it. A TV camera came by and the back of my head made it onto the 10 o’clock news! The owners of Pawsh have continued to promote and to support my business and for that I am very thankful.

In March I also partnered up with the South End Buttery and photographed the owners’ dogs in exchange for some wall space in his cafe. I’ve had large-scale prints hanging there since April, including one round of updates. They have really really helped me drum up business. {By the way, there is a video review of the Buttery up on Boston.com, and some of my photos got the up-close camera treatment which I think is hilarious.}

Before I even had my first official client pet shoot, I was convinced to photograph a small wedding in March. I never gave weddings much thought – other than I didn’t want to pursue it! – so the fact that I nevertheless found myself building a small wedding portfolio alongside that of the pets was a huge surprise.

In April I started getting clients! My first client was the adorable 6 week-old puppy named Logan. Strangely enough even though it was the first “official” shoot as a launched business, it was also my most comfortable. All the practice the half year before on friends’ pets really paid off, and I thought it a sign that I really was meant to do this.

In May, I had a pet photography Q&A published in Gadgetwise, a personal technology blog of the New York Times. That was very. very. ex.ci.ting. And tangentially with that came a rather unenthusiastic mention on Gizmodo.com. My photos are deemed “OK.” Heh. My site hits go through the roof, I get tons of very nice and supportive emails…but no new client booking as a direct result. The NYTimes keep trying to sell me overpriced plaques of the article. I keep refusing but now I’m thinking, Why not?! I’m in the Times!

In May, June and July I started photographing more weddings as a second shooter for Lisa Rigby, and find myself enjoying it much more than I thought I would! So it’s really her doing that I’m getting into weddings.

In August I attended Cowbelly’s workshop on pet photography. Cowbelly is based in Seattle had has been in business for 6 years already. Keep up, Boston!

September to December turned out to be my busiest months. Along with an influx of pet shoots, I donated my pet session in a silent auction at the Urban Barn Dance and Harvest Supper, organized by the Massachusetts Farmers Market federation. I donated a session at another silent auction hosted by Pop’s Restaurant with proceeds going to the Animal Rescue League of Boston. There were events at Bark Place Spa and SOWA Open Studios both in the South End.

There was a NEW CAMERA.

There was also a lovely wedding, which was recently featured in IntimateWeddings.com, my first wedding feature ever! And of course I had a great time with my first engagement shoot.

The year has also been about meeting with fellow aspiring pet photographers in person: pet photographer April Ziegler of Philly, who also atttended Cowbelly’s workshop and stayed at our place, Alexis of Alexis Hall Photo, Maria Andrews of White Whiskers Photography, Abby Christensen of Lorenz Photography, and portrait photog Grace Benson.

It was also about collaborating with other artistic professionals in the wedding industry: Lisa Rigby of Lisa Rigby Photography, Jennifer Cox of Esq.Events wedding coordination services, Sarah Parrott of Parrott Design Studio paper goods, and Bryn Chernoff of Paperfinger calligraphy. She will be designing a wedding-ized version of the Fat Orange Cat logo, incorporating both calligraphy and hand-drawn elements. So excited for this!

So yes, I am officially getting into the wedding biz! I’ve just joined the My Kate Parker Wedding family as a vendor. Before you think I’m starting to become an all-purpose shooter, I plan on keeping my focus narrow.

One of my very favorite photographers is San Francisco’s Anna Kuperberg, who specializes in weddings and candid pet portraiture. In fact, I initially discovered her as a pet photographer, and it wasn’t until a friend attended a wedding photographed by Anna that I realized she was a pretty hot-shot wedding photog too! I’ve even seen some of her work on greeting cards. Ann Hamilton is another fantastic West Coaster who has made a name for herself as a wedding and pet photographer (isn’t her icon cute?).

So I think it’s high time Boston got a pet+wedding photographer as well!

And that, at long last, is the end of the 2009 year-end review. As always, thank you so very much to all the wonderful fellow pet lovers, and you the readers, for making 2009 successful beyond my wildest expectations! With the confidence and valuable experience I’ve gained over the last year, I dare to dream bigger and reach for higher goals in the new.

Fat Orange Cat Studio says hello to 2010!

xo,
Li, Dan, Bunny & Veebs

photos by Lisa Rigby

I had more big orders recently that warranted Extra Special Pretty Packaging. My first attempt at DIY packaging was pretty good I thought, and until I become world-famous enough to commission a whole suite of branded products, I will continue to get my crafty mojo on and package items myself.

This time I kicked it up a notch. I punched circles out of pretty Japanese paper (I have a collection of them, love paper) using my handy circle puncher. Glued a strip of navy blue satin ribbon around the outside of the box, and then glued a trio of the paper on top.

Everything is from Paper Source – the circle puncher, the ribbons, the Japanese paper, the petal envelopes, the A9 and presentation envelopes (for 5×7’s and 8×10’s respectively), the portfolio box thingy…I have no idea what they’re called officially, but they’re like stiff cardboard boxes covered in book cloth, and there is a little pocket inside.

The boxes come in a variety of sizes and colors. I saw these smaller ones and thought they would be perfect for one-off items such as a CD/DVD. The box above is for the couple whose wedding I photographed at the beginning of the month. It contains the DVD, a print release letter and a thank you card. And biz card of course.

The box below is for Clive the Springer Spaniel. I check in regularly to Paper Source for new ideas/inspiration and was excited to see a small stack (2 only!) of ORANGE portfolio boxes. I quickly snatched them up. The ribbon color for this is teal, and I used a different sheet of Japanese paper to go with it. It has bits of teal and navy in it as well. Excuse the horrible lighting. It’s been dismal around these parts.

The stack of Clive notecards didn’t fit in the slot, so I placed it above and secured the stack in place with a rubberband, which I then concealed with satin ribbon, tied in a bow.

Clive is also getting 3 huge Mounted Prints which I can’t wait for them to see. I usually find that my favorites are not at all aligned with the clients’ favorites. But here, Clive’s owners picked 3 of my favorite images to blow up – all of which I consider a little “artsy” and unconventional.

In fact, a rep from the pro print lab called me to make sure that bike image selected was in fact correctly cropped — why yes most of Clive’s head is cut off. That’s straight out of the camera, so hit the presses!

All packaging materials from Paper Source, except
:: my business cards – moo.com “green” business cards
:: Letterpress notecards – Parrott Design Studio
:: CD/DVD label – designed and printed by me on Avery CD labels

Ooooo. Where did this box come from? Tiffany? Hermes?

No, better! Fat Orange Cat Studio!

Last week I packaged up an order for Anya the English pointer, whose session took place at her summer home on Cape Cod. She actually lives not far from us here in the South End, so I was able to hand-deliver the prints myself. Usually when I am able to hand-deliver, I will write up a little thank you note, package up the prints in a nice envelope like this, add a biz card and call it a day. But since Anya’s order was so large – because her parents are so rad – I decided that her packaging needed to be a little more special. I couldn’t just hand them a bulging envelope. I needed to hand them a box. So I headed to Paper Source to see what I could use, and found these great portfolio folders wrapped in book cloth. I snagged a few in blue, got a spool of orange ribbon, glued a strand once around the cover for some extra spice, tucked all the envelopes and CD and whatnot into the slot, and voila.

Here are the contents deconstructed:

I had: thank you note written on my letterpress cards (yay!), biz cards, an envelope of 8×10s, a smaller envelope of 5×7s, package of magnets, CD of the photo session, and two mini accordions.

The mini accordions are a new addition to the FOCStudio product line, and they are so cool:

Mini accordions are 3×3 with 6 images on the front, 4 on the back. The front and back are covered in book cloth in the FOCStudio colors of navy blue, light blue and orange.
As a promotion, I am offering 2 mini accordions for $18.00 to all clients who book between now and the end of the year. They make great gifts!

I’ve been offering magnets for awhile, after receiving some samples from the printer’s. I really loved them. They are so fun and come in 4×5 with beveled edges.

Magnets come in sets of 4 (can all be unique) for $35.00

Now we come to my favorite product – Mounted Prints! They are prints adhered directly to a thick fiber board with black beveled edge and are ready to hang. I have had 6 hanging in The Buttery Cafe & Bistro since May, and am really happy that clients have been noticing them and ordering them.

Anya has two of herself as Mounted Prints, both in sizes 24×30. Art for your walls!

Here is another Mounted Print with Bunny for scale, and displayed on my walls. You can see the keyhole in the back. This one of Balki the Boston is 20×30.

I had a promotion running in July and August, with all Mounted Prints having a 3/8″ beveled edge. All the ones above are 3/8″ thick.

Starting now they will now have a 3/4″ edge. See below:

It’s Kitty’s magnificent rump as Mounted Print, sized 11×14 with the 3/4″ beveled edge.

Mounted Prints are my absolute favorite way to display prints – eye-catching but minimalist. Sizes are available from 11×14 to 30×40, and prices start at $110.00

To see more info, visit my Products & Pricing page!

Thank you to Kathi of Bark Place and Washington Gateway for having me participate in the “It’s a Dog’s Life” event at SOWA Open Studios this past Sunday! It was a lot of fun and a pleasure meeting fellow dog-lovers and residents of the South End. I love living here! (Sick of hearing me say that, are you?)

VanBuren, the fat orange cat himself, will draw the an entry from the raffle bowl tomorrow and the winner of a photo session with Fat Orange Cat Studio will be announced on Thursday!

In the meantime, here are some scenes from Sunday. See the full gallery of dogs here.

I have so much to talk about, including some of the products displayed on the counter. I don’t think I’ve ever described them much on this blog. So in addition to the usual framed and matted 8×10s and 5×7s, I displayed 11×14 examples of Mounted Prints – prints adhered to thick fiber board and ready to hang – and cool mini accordions. The Mounted Prints I have been offering for some time now, and am pleased that clients have been going for them. If you’ve ever been to the South End Buttery, all the large prints you see there are Mounted Prints. I’ll be showing more examples of those and some other products in an up-coming post. It’s been on my to-do list for some time!

And as an aside for fellow camera-lovers out there, will someone tell me how I ever manged to shoot for so long without a full frame digital camera?! I’ve been using the Nikon D700 exclusively since I got it just several days ago — for this event, for a dog client shoot and a human being shoot (gah!). The 50mm has not come off the camera and I am flabbergobstunned by the vibrance and sharpness of the images. And I like the way it CLICKS when I press the shutter. Such a satisfying, crisp little click.

See below Before & Afters. I shot in JPEG and Vibrance mode, manual settings and manual WB. The images on the left are SOOC. The photos of the right have had blacks and fill light increased a TEENY TINY bit. The second B&A had a little bit of color correction as well to remove the greenish tinge. Overall, in the right light or no, shots have been afreakinmazing straight out of the camera.

Nuts, right?! Can’t wait to share more!