Practice Makes Almost Perfect

Practice is how you master new skills. I've spent a lot of time in the past year learning to capture reasonably sharp photos of my dogs running at full speed. I've improved although it still requires my full concentration to click the shutter at the right instant.

The next photo is a different picture taken a few minutes later. Notice Shyla's absolutely identical body position as she leaped. Look at the position of her front paws. Look at her head angle. I actually had to check twice to make sure I hadn't uploaded the same photo multiple times.

Obviously, Shyla has perfected her running leap in the past year while I've been working on the timing of my camera's shutter.

As I've been practicing my photography, I've also been training Shyla to cooperate. She's become a superstar model for me, most of the time (except when she smells mountain lions). In fact, this photo is a product of me learning to focus very precisely on one of Shyla's eyes while having the shallowest possible depth of field - which Shyla made much easier by staying perfectly still for me.

This is her contemplative look, with her chin resting on a paw. She loves to lie in this position in the sunshine.

I've recently taught R to rest his chin on the ground or on his front paws like Shyla is doing in the photo above. I think it makes him look even cuter than usual. I trained him to do this using a clicker, and he learned at lightning speed. It is incredible how much R loves clicker training and tries so hard to earn his click/treat.

Happy Saturday! I'm enjoying my Saturday, sitting on my deck for only the second time this year. Of course, the forecast calls for snow tonight but I'm not thinking about that right now.