Darwin

Gordon: This is beautifully made! Regards, Joe

Alberta had left a comment on the bottom of my portfolio page asking if I do requests as she is presently without a dog and wanted to see more dog photos. Darwin and I went out in the snow yesterday and this is what we came up with. I hope Alberta likes it and gets her doggy fix when she drops by :) Darwin is a complete ham so it is not too hard to get a good pose out of him.

Darwin, doing his best to imagine the possibility of lurking

predators. Thanks for your time and comments.

you have such a beautiful dog!!!and he surely knows how to pose!!:)

Thanks, he is a good friend and he is a legend in his own mind for sure :)

This is a seriously gorgeous photo of a fantastic animal. The photo is magnificent not only because Darwin's face and coat are so photogenic, but because of the way you handled the whites and off-whites - no easy feat. Then there's the terrific DOF behind his head revealing what must be a nightmare of a coat to keep untangled. Darwin's on my desktop and getting printed and framed for the Florida Room (room with the water-facing windows) so he can look at lizards all day. What a treat! Thank you SOoooo much :) I'm sending you an e-greeting - no viruses, not a hoax. It's for Darwin.

My Gosh, what a gorgeous animal. Those eyes are just amazing. Now, how many of us have the photographic skill to capture a white dog against a snowy background and do it well. An absolute bulls-eye of a photo. Scratch your model heartily behind his ears on behalf of all of us admirers.

You are welcome, I am glad to oblige you. I'm positive Darwin feels the same. His sister Maggie is quite jealous so I tried catching her today. I have not had a chance to dump the card yet so I do not know if I got anything worthwhile. She flies around like a bullet so they are all action shots. So stay tuned :) These two are not all that much work in terms of grooming, there coats stay unmatted. That big French Pompadour of a tail of his, which you can see curled up over his back in this shot, can get tangled fairly good. The biggest challenge with this guy is cleaning his ears. He doesn't care for that much and even with me sitting on him, at 150lbs of dog, he can stand up and walk away with me on his back without much trouble. Darwin has never seen a lizard but he does find the local snakes , toad and frog interesting.

 

Thanks for the card. It is adorable and a white dog to boot. A warm wish to you and yours for the season, from the lot of us up here in the winter wonderland.

Thanks, when you live at a latitude such as this, you get used to exposure compensation for snow. You learn to ignore the light meter ( nobody likes 17% grey snow ) and keep the histogram as far to the right as you can without clipping.

I will pass along that ear rub, he never grows tired of those.

I also like the white on white Gord, it accentuates his dark details( eyes, nose, mouth , ear). Beautiful feeling of his fur, FG. and BG.I like the way it is a bit darker on the BG as well as a bit higher which is a nice effect. very beautiful face of Darwin, and a "honorable" significant name....;-))

I was captivated by its sweet & doleful eyes. Very well exposed, the white very natural, not overblowing the fur details. Lovely dog.

I like to photographs my two Pyrs. in the winter they look so much nicer against a white back drop and they stay cleaner when the ground is buried and frozen. My wife Vida suggested the name. I liked it too but said it sounds like a name for a Beagle :) One of our other Pyrs. was named Bartok after Bela who is one of my favourite composers.

Thanks for stopping by I appreciate your commenting on this photo. Darwin knows how to use those sweet and doleful eyes of his to great advantage, particularly when he wants something.

It' s incredible how people around us inspire us...Alberta, thank you for the request and Gordon thank you for honoring it. What a great result. Amazing detail and expression here! Good Puppy!

Thanks so much for the kind words. Yes it is nice to have others help to kick start our creativity. In the absence of Alberta's request it is unlikely I would have grabbed the camera and headed out to take this shot. I love my Canon 70-200mm 2.8 IS USM zoom. It is an absolute joy to shot with.

I don't know if Bela Bartok would have agreed to his name given to a dog, probably yes ;-)) but he for sure would have agreed to be your prefered composer....

 

Vida has a good sense of choosing names ;-))

LOL... yeah I'm not sure about that either, but I think he would have approved. When Bartok ( the Dog ) was born there were complications and he ended up deaf and a bit retarded so the breeder could not sell him and did not want him. After being given away and returned twice we ended up adopting him. He was a wonderful dog and a great friend. So I guess both Bartoks had lives with more than a bit of hardship. A French dog named after a Hungarian composer :)

What a nice story of the poor dog adoption, I felt it and wrote you in my "late watchers" photo... ;-))

Gord, I want your dog :)) Man, Darwin is gorgeous - this is one hell of a fantastic Christmas card.

 

You must have some real patience, or at least really patient dogs, to get such great relaxed looking pictures. Cool work.

What a good idea, He would make a fine Xmas card. If this process involves any patience it must be mine because Darwin sure doesn't have any. It is pretty easy to just walk around and follow him with the camera, he doesn't much care. As lord and master of all that he surveys, he is usually pretty relaxed and takes little notice of the idiot walking around the yard with that silly thing stuck in front of his face :) Thanks for dropping by, always good to hear from you. Must be getting pretty nippy for you working outside these day.Vida and I just got back in from a snow shoe walk in the bush and we got well bundled up in clothes to go out -- minus 12 C for the high today.

I did read your comment and I have always felt this is something we have in common.

Really nice shot of Darwin looking as healthy as ever, nice to see. :)

Darwin is a DARling. I like the high key rendition. His eyes, nose and 1 ear peeping out. cheers Jana

Thanks-- yeah he is a sweetheart.