A lesson in true loyalty........

Like many people who are on facebook, I sadly learnt of a story that broke  my heart about the true love and bond of a man and his dog.  It was about a homeless man names John who lives on the streets in Sydney with his little dog "Carrie".  John choses to not stay in a shelter as they dont take dogs so rather than leave carrie, he sleeps on the streets. you can see a video of them here

Unfortunately the story was not a nice one where one night some drunks picked on John and scared Carrie so much she ran away into the night and was missing for some time.  John was upset as he really has nothing in life - except Carrie.

The word went around facebook, some 170,000 his to find carrie for John and she was located in a home and was happily returned back to an elated John.

Carrie was returned on a Thursday and I was going up to Sydney for 2 days on the following Monday.  My boys and I were walking into the city, turned the corner into Pitt St and right in front of us were John and carrie - sitting on their milk crate.

I went up to him and asked him was this Carrie and out from under his arms pops this little dog.  I really was not prepared to bump into them and explained to my boys the story.  I introduced the boys to John and he shook each boys had with genuine respect which I didnt expect and the boys listen to John tell the story of Carrie.

When he was talking, tears came flowing down his face with each word so being the mum that cries at a drop of the hat I find myself crying along.  My 10 year old starts looking at me really weirdly as does my 8 year old.  By the end of the story I was like a waterfall as you could see how much she meant to him and vice versa.

Te entire time, carrie was snuggled into John and was not moving an inch.  Like she was finally home and no one was going to split them up again.  I asked if I could pat her and I have to say, I have never touched a more content or relaxed dog.  She was like a little marshmallow all soft and content.

I gave John $5 for Carrie and we parted ways only to have my 10 year old say to me "mum, you need to go to a toilet and clean yourself up - your a mess".  I guess I was walking through Pitt St at 9.30 with red eyes and tears flowing. After talking to the boys, they decided to give John another $10 as they thought if we could go to Luna park and Imax then we can afford $10 for Carrie.  We tracked them back down, I was much more composed and Jack gave John $10.  Then I saw that with the $5 I gave him earlier a nice can of Jim Beam was now emptied by his side.  I know I should have given him anything but cash, but we were not expecting to see him.  I am sure he enjoyed the Jim....lol

This story goes to show how non judgmental animals are.  They dont care if they have the nicest coats, the best food or the softest bed.  They care about being a part of something no matter what and Carrie is very much apart of John.

There is now a group of people helping homeless with pets.  To find out more about them you can go to this link and you dont have to live in Sydney to help.  Items and gift cards can be posted.  So you can do something to help people like John and Carrie.

oh - as a final note, as we were leaving after giving John the extra $10, another lady walked up behind me and gave him $10 - for "Carrie".

She is a remarkable dog that has created awareness of something people walk past every day - and never see.

The Digity Dog Photography Blog.....

Welcome to the new Digity Dog" Photography blog. What I hope for with this blog will be a few laughs, a bit of education on pet photography, so links to awesome site I learn from as well as other photographers who's work I admire and a way tell the story behind a lot of the animals I shoot ( and skin kids as well).  I so love that saying on the Bio channel "everyone has a story"

They say a picture tells a thousand words but in some cases they need a bit of human intervention to help them along the way so hopefully I can be their voice.

I get lots of messages asking me about my photography and for hints and help so much better to stick it on a blog as it may help someone else out there starting out with the same questions I had.  Got questions?  shoot me a message and Ill do my best to answer it.

Anyway, my "goal" ( like how I use inverted commas) is to do a post a week as like everyone else, I am very time poor.  However - I LOVE procrastination so would prefer to write a blog post rather than do bookwork or ironing so who knows where this will end up.

So many ideas floating around the old head - just hope it all comes out right!

So - onwards and upwards and I look forward to you hanging around.  You can subscribe to news feeds via facebook networked blog - just use that big button on the left.

Three Princeses and a pup

As you grow as a photographer you start to have visions of what you would love to do and how you would love to photograph scenes. As a mum of 2 boys, I do look at little girls thinking I would have so much fun photographing them this way and that way. Sadly my boys are not all to keen on looking like top models nor do they come off nice and sweet.

So when you get a call like the one I got from Kate saying that she had 3 little girls and a restored vintage cottage that she would love me to come and shot - well - you just ask "WHEN"!!!. To say this was a session that got changed a lot is an understatement as we were all patiently waiting on the Jacaranda tree bloom as we had an idea to have the girls catching the flowers. We changed the date probably 4 times then Kate got sick and ended up in hospital. But being a true mum, she was in hospital on a drip texting me for reschedule dates!

So we had a plan, the weather was not due to be overly co-operative that day so we kept in touch via text through out the day. Once I got there my mind went into overdrive and well, as you can see from the Gallery from the shoot we were all pretty pleased with the results. So much so that I had no choice but to make one of the shots my front page on the web page.

Thanks to Kate and her beautiful family for allowing me to play and live one of those dreams that has been going around in my head

Discs -v- Prints

This is a subject that I have struggled with as being someone who has always offered disc over prints, but I am afraid I have to agree with the masses that the damage done to images from these instant labs is quiet significant.

Let me explain. Places such as Harvey Norman, Kmart or any store that offer 1 hour processing ( yes, even the local camera store) distort the images that you upload to resemble nothing like the colour range that the photo was taken in. They are designed to override any settings and adjust all images using the basis that the photo was taken on a very cheap point and shoot camera in the Auto setting.

Now this is fine, if in deed you have taken the photo on a point and shoot on the auto setting, but for images that you have paid a few hundred dollars for, do you really want them to look like they came from a Point and shoot shot on Auto? Given that the equipment that I use is more expensive than the average car, I figure you would like above average photos for your investments.

For that reason we have switched to prints with digital Images, so you still get the digital images for each print you purchase that you can take to a photo lab to have printed, but you will also have a professionally printed one exactly the same to compare it to and I assure you they look nothing alike.

We dont print in house either and send our prints to a Laboratory in QLD that does not distort the colour range so what we show you, is what is printed. The quality of this lab, we feel is exceptional. So much so this is where I get my images printed for competitions and we can prints and Canvases from there as well.

Some people are digital people and have digital photo frames etc and we offer a solution for these families as well with our low resolution images. They are brilliant for any digital media you may wish to use them in. They just wont print very well or very big but to a lot of people thats okay.

So I hope this has helped explain about the Disc -v- print issue that many of us struggle with and let us know your thoughts.