For a dog, nothing beats a day (or a few hours) at the dog park.  Abby, our young black lab/hound mix, is no exception to this rule.  She loves the little kiddie pool (to her, it's a dog pool - so I don't spoil that for her).  I find it amusing that several of us dog parents take our dogs to the dog park at the same time several days (some every day) of the week - not unlike what we do for our children.  Dogs enjoy meeting old friends and making new friends as they play and run around free from the confines of a leash.

Now that we are having the afternoon rains on a regular basis, the dog park grass is very green, lush and thick.  It makes for a nice area for the dogs to run without getting to dirty.  Course, there are mud puddles too.  As the hot summer days have started, Abby heads to the pool after greeting everyone at the dog park.  Her favorite thing is to find one of the balls in the park and then carry it around in her mouth at the park.

If you have a furry family member, remember to get photographs of your dog being a dog, or action shots of them running around having fun.  These are moment you'll want to remember as your dog gets older and perhaps no longer partakes in these activities.

Hanging out in the kiddie pool with a tennis ball that she punctured to make it easier to hang onto.

If you're photographing a dog that is running, it is important to decide whether you want to stop the action of the dog running and keep everything sharp or you want to show motion in the dog's movements.  In these photographs, since Abby is running towards the camera at a slow speed it is easier to stop the motion.  Even in this case, the shutter speeds are 1/500 and 1/250 of a second to stop the action and keep Abby sharp.  If Abby, was running across the camera frame, then depending on the speed of her running, a faster shutter speed is needed to stop motion.

And sometimes it is with her tennis ball....

If you're interested in having some action photographs of your dog, please let us know!  We photograph dogs at play whether it is running, jumping, or playing catch (ball or frisbee).  Another fun place to photograph your dog is at a dog friendly beach, perhaps that's a future blog post.

Until next time...