The Floods came just as we were planning on being back in the office, instead we found ourselves out at the RSPCA Fairfield shelter helping in the post floods cleanup. The RSPCA used our photos of the devestation they suffered to help raise critical funds in getting their facilities up and running again, we were so pleased to help.

At the beginning of the year, we invested significantly in new studio equipment which has enabled us to offer much more action and play photography. Got a dog that just can’t sit still? A cat that likes to jump and twist and play? A bird that loves to stretch their wings and fly?

We can now capture these images  in the studio in pin shape details in a way we just couldn’t before.

The feedback from our clients and the joy and smiles on their faces from our action, playful photography has made it all worth it!

It was a big year for Zoo Studio with Award in 2011. We entered several competitions as we like to measure our progress as a photography studio against the very best photography in Australia and from around the world.

Our photos of birds in flight did very well, with a photo of Charlie the Eclectus Parrot winning us a Silver with Distinction medal at the Australian Professional Photography Awards.

As a result Ken was made an Associate of the Australian Institute of Professional Photography. This is a huge honour and one of which we were very proud.

We also entered the Photo District News ‘Faces’ Competition, which is the only noteworthy international photography competition with a specific section for Animal portraiture. When we found out we had won the Animal Portrait category, we were excited, but then finding out we had won the over all Grand Prize Winner of the entire competition — well that was huge and more than just the icing on the cake. Several thousand photographers from all over the world entered, and we had won the Grand Prize from all categories!

Our photos scored highly in the International Loupe Awards, getting into the top 50 and winning 2 Silver Award Medals and 5 Bronze Award medals.
We were also a finalist in the Canon Creative Asia competition.

In August we took our photography on the road for the first time, visiting Melbourne. We were delighted to book out our available sessions in just a couple of hours. This pattern was repeated in November too.

Beck and I both LOVE Melbourne, for the shopping, the eating and of course the lovely people and pets we met while we were there.

To round the year of nicely we were invited by the RSPCA to join Premier Anna Bligh and others on a train ride from their old shelter at Fairfield to their brand new state of the art facility at Wacol. If you are in Brisbane and haven’t yet seen it, you have to go for a look! Even if you aren’t looking for a new furry family member, they have a great store World for Pets where you can buy anything you need for your existing pets, with all money going to the RSPCA. It is the best animal shelter in the southern hemisphere and all Australia should be proud of it.

So what does 2012 have in store? Well as last year we have our plans, keep an eye on our blog and Facebook page to see how our plans unfold, but I am also sure something surprising will happen again. We will be back to Melbourne and this year we will also be going to Sydney, Canberra and Townsville. Do get in touch if you live there and are interested in a session.

Have a great year and hopefully see you in our studio somewhere in Australia!

HeARTs Speak is an international organization founded in the USA which promotes animal adoption by connecting artists with shelters and animal relief organizations. Through the services of it’s professional photographer members volunteering their time, HeARTs Speaks hopes to increase the number of animals adopted and reduce the numbers that are euthanized and ultimately, to save and better the lives of animals and people.

In early December 2011 Zoo Studio were super excited to become part of this growing international team of animal lovers and professional photographers. If you would like to find out more about HeARTs Speak visit their website here or join them on facebook here

We are the Grand Prize Winners for the PDN Faces 2011 International photography competition.

Photo District News, the largest professional photography magazine in the USA, recently held an international photography competition for portraiture, the PDN Faces competition. We entered, as it is really the only international photography competition of note that has a dedicated Animal Portraiture category. There were thousands of entries, including some of the very very best photographers anywhere, giving us the chance to see how we are staking up globally.

We won!! Not only did we win the animal portraiture category (the only Australian photographer to make the finals), but our photo was selected by the judges as the very best in the whole competition winning us the Grand Prize! All photos entered came from our standard client photography sessions, not from specially setup sessions with trained animals.
Here is the winning image of Cheeky the Eclectus Parrot, his Mum is very proud and so are we.

He scored 1 Silver with Distinction, and two Silver Medals. As a result, Ken has been made an Associate of the Australian Institute of Professional Photography (AIPP). This is a real honour!

The APPAs is the most important Australian photography competition, and is the competition which every Australian professional photographer worth their salt enters. As we always do, these photos all came from our normal client photo sessions, not specially setup sessions with trained animals.

Here are the photos Ken entered and scored with.

This week, Zoo Studio signed a 3 year national alliance agreement with Greencross Vets extending our photography services to Greencross clinics and Greencross clients in NSW, VIC and the greater Queensland area.

Awesome news for us, Greencross Vets and Greencross clients we think! The national group have over 14 clinics located in VIC and NSW and have big plans to expand their network of hospitals significantly in 2011 and beyond.

We are doubly pleased given that our own pets are part of the Greencross family too! Thanks Michelle, thanks Josh and thanks Esther for your wonderful care of Bollo, Sophie, Clarence, Christian and William!

So you see, that’s why we are super excited and we hope you are too — stay tuned for further information and key dates for Zoo Studio visits to Sydney and Melbourne in the coming months.

Oh… and more news to follow on some exciting raffles and competitions we are about to launch soon! So join us on facebook for some of the very latest updates and announcements

We have had some big personalities in the studio before, every pet we photograph has something unique about them that I want to bring out in my photos. Not often though am I immediately reminded of both an historical figure and one of my own furry family. Meet Holly!

Straight off I could tell that we were going to get along, just as long as I played by Holly’s rules. These rules pretty much revolved around not stopping, whether it was giving belly rubs or treats — just keep ‘em coming! She has this ability to turn a huge smile into a disapproving frown with just the lift of an eyebrow, and I have to admit to teasing her just a bit to get this look for the camera. All this reminded me of our own best girl, Sophie, who runs our house with a paw of iron (especially keeping those pesky kittens under control). I felt so at home photographing Holly as a result.

Holly was by turn playful, smiley, bossy, hungry, inquisitive, impatient, serious, giving, demanding, did I mention bossy?  Just as all senior dogs should be. Puppies can be like a blank canvas, just waiting to gain life’s experiences to fill out their personalities. Old dogs are like an old master painting, maybe peeling a bit at the edges but they have survived the test of time, and their experience is written in their faces. I just love photographing old dogs.

My favourite photo is the first, with Holly staring domineeringly off into the distance over the top of the camera. I photographed her from a low position to emphasize the scale of her personality, and suddenly she reminded me of Maggie Thatcher, glaring down her critics at a political conference in the early 80s, giving her famous “The Lady is Not for Turning” speech. I asked her mum to stand behind me and call her, Holly gave that look, and its captured forever.

Old dogs are the best dogs.

When I was growing up, my Mum always had two dogs. I loved every single one of them, from the grumpy old Westie called Lassie, who would only put up with my toddler probings because she was too arthritic to move; Sherry the bossy Lhasa Apso who just knew she ran the house; Polly the Staffie cross who would wee when excited and would play ball with me for hours in the garden; but especially Heidi the Golden Retriever who we got as a puppy when I was 5, and was my constant companion when I was growing up. I don’t have a single photo of any of them.

How attitudes to animals are changing. As a kid I remember the first time I stood up to my Dad, we were going on holiday and Heidi and Sherry were due to go to the kennels. I thought this grossly unfair, and told him so. I saw them as members of our family who wanted to be with us, I clearly remember their agitation every time one of the family would walk off on their own. He, along with many adults of the time, saw them as just dogs who wouldn’t care where they were so long as they were fed. Was I being anthropomorphic and putting human emotions on to mere animals? Or was I recognising common emotions that we mammals share?

Whenever I photograph pets, its so plain to me that we do share many common emotions and characteristics. We are more to them than just a food source, and they are more to us than just beasts to keep out intruders. Dogs are unique in their ability to read human emotions, they are so in tune with us in a way that mere domesticated wolves can never be. Over the last 80,000 years we have evolved emotional bonds that amaze scientists, but just confirm what dog lovers have said and thought for decades.

Every time I pick up the camera I am looking to capture these common connections. I’m not sure if its the humanity in the animal I am trying to portray, or a reflection of the animal in us humans, but I do know we humans are closer to the animals than some of us like to think. Fear, happiness, greed, contentment, excitement, boredom, playfulness; we have these emotions in common, and these are the common threads that I pick at in my photography.

Traditionally, pets have been portrayed in art as either soft and cuddly, or hard working and loyal. Think of the cutesy pastel puppies in baskets, or the loyal gun dog standing erect with bird in mouth. This doesn’t represent my pets, how I interact with them or how I see them behave from day to day. For most of us our pets are key family members, our best mates, and this is how I aim to photograph them. I use human photography techniques more in line with human portraiture and fashion photography to emphasise our commonality.

In the studio, my first job is to create an environment where your pet can relax. These days I spend more time reading about animal behaviour than photography; the better I am at interacting with my subjects on their terms, the better a photographer I become. Whilst unveiling their characters, I sculpt with my lights to emphasise their unique attributes. An ear here, a quiff there, noses, paws, tails, brightly coloured feathers and leathery scales, we build up the portrait one exposure at a time. As we play, my camera ready, I wait for the moment I feel the character and pose are ideal; I press the shutter as the final portrait is revealed before my lens.

Many people ask why I photograph in a studio rather than outside in a  park or beach, or in someone’s home. I prefer the freedom of the studio; my subjects have no distraction other than me and their family, and are free to behave as they wish. No strangers getting in the way, no other animals disturbing our connection, no leash to constrain them, no bad weather to spoil the light. The light, my main tool, is always perfect in the studio. Of course special moments happen in their own home, but people have their own cameras these days for those types of photos. What we strive to create is unique and special and can only happen in the right conditions. Our portraits sit on the walls and coffee tables, beside your own personal photos.

Photographing pets in a studio, with human lighting techniques and human emotions; that’s what I love.

Cadbury came bouncing into the studio in June, with her older sister Elly. She immediately settled in, checking it all out and getting her nose into everything (including my bag of treats!). Its always great to get a bit of puppy love in the studio! These are my favourite photos from the session, I hope you like them.

Although she loved the liver treats, she responded especially well to noises and a squeeky toy got us the lovely head tilt in the first photo. The other inquisitive expressions followed as I went through my farm yard repetoire, but I definately think the cat noises were her favourite. They learn so young…!

Thanks to Cadbury’s Mum and Dad for bringing Cadbury and Elly in, we will have to do a special on Elly to!

It was a few days of ‘firsts’, especially for our new boy Bollo. First time camping for Bollo, first time sitting around a camp fire for Bollo,  first time swimming for Bollo, first time pulling Beck headfirst into the water for Bollo. Yes he had lots of fun Sophie also enjoyed herself, getting in the water and rolling in mud, as well as seeing off a wandering Staffie (she looked so tough in her pink pyjamas!). We decided that she was finding her ‘inner dog’ (too much time spent sleeping on the sofa, sometimes she forgets she isn’t human!).

Bollo has also just completed his Urban Basics training course with our friends Danielle and Paul at Urban Dog Training. When he arrived a couple of months ago from the RSPCA he didn’t even know sit, now he can walk on a loose lead, sit, stay, and my favourite of all ‘leave-it’. I dropped some chicken on the floor yesterday RIGHT under his nose, and before he could wolf it down I said ‘leave it’ and he just sat and looked at me. Such a proud dad! Had to give him the chicken anyway of course, plus a bit extra for being a good boy. He still can’t fetch beer though so more work to be done.

If you get a chance, please vote for us in the Paws and Claws Awards for best pet photographer! We are running a competition as a way of saying thankyou for your vote, more details here, you could win a fantastic Canon DSLR camera, with a lens, and a lesson on how to use it from yours truly. Fantastic!

To celebrate we thought it would be a great idea to run a fabulous competition in conjunction with these Awards. That way all our clients and supporters get a chance to win something too, when you vote for Zoo Studio as First Class Pet Photographer! 

It’s the Peoples Choice Awards and EVERY Vote counts. So, if you love what we do and would like to be in with a chance to win one of two great prizes, please get your vote in now. Oh and don’t forget to tell your friends and family to vote too! Voting is online, fill out the Paws and Claws voting form here    Voting closes on 26th August 2010.

See Terms and Conditions on this Competition for further information