Dog wash
Meet Max. You may recognise him. He’s the ongoing face of Barking Mad UK – a brilliant company which arranges holidays for dogs whilst their owners are on holiday themselves. I’m biased, as my wife runs the Northumberland franchise of the company, and has done for ten years now. Last year she was recognised as the HSBC UK Franchisee of the year – beating off tough competition from the likes of Vodafone, Dominos Pizza, and McDonalds etc.
I’ve worked with Barking Mad on many projects, and Tina gets her PR shots done for free (saving thousands over the years). The CEO – Lee Dancy, called me up one day and asked me to come up with an image which would be used to adorn the fleet of re-branded cars used to ferry dogs to and fro throughout the UK network. Not one to shy away from a challenge, I set about looking for a suitable dog which would do justice to the premium look of the company as a whole. Cue Max – a cocker spaniel with a cute smile, belonging to one of Tina’s regular customers. He was the perfect colour, had the perfect look, and seemed to have the perfect temperament. Tina was my unpaid assistant for the morning, and the brief involved getting ONE SHOT to be converted into decals for the cars. There was a specific position that we needed to adhere to, as the image was supposed to depict a dog with his paws up on the window frame looking out of the window. I set up a low tressle, and covered it in white seamless paper. The background was simply the studio wall. Lighting was very simple, with a 7ft parabolic umbrella on 2x 500w Bowens heads placed at a slight downward angle to replicate sunlight. Another head was bounced off the opposite studio wall to provide some fill light to the shadows. The rest would be a doddle. Or so we thought.
Dogs are notoriously difficult models, and in a studio full of stuff it proved to be a total nightmare. Every time Max was lifted onto the tressle, he was straight off again, sniffing and running around. We tried using a ball to get him to look to camera, but it just wound him up further. Many, many breaks were taken, many attempts were made, many types of sounds & treats were used to try and get him to freeze for just a second, but it looked like today just wasn’t going to be the day we got the shot. We reviewed everything, but Max was so jittery, that it was impossible to get him to stay still on the tressle, so every shot was basically an image of a blurred dog trying to get all four paws back on the deck. Poor Tina was not amused at the thought of having to schedule another day with a different dog. After a break, I suggested one last try before Max had to head back home.
Tina positioned him on the tressle, I was ready with the camera, Max froze for some reason, and I banged off a single frame before he legged it again. My eyes turned to the studio iMac – tethered to the camera, and a perfectly sharp, perfectly exposed, perfectly positioned image appeared on the screen. We did it, with the last shot of the day! Max was transported back, (after he reviewed his picture), and I collapsed on the studio floor, in the 40 degree heat. (no ventilation, and a corrugated steel roof acting as a radiator in the summer sunlight).
The post-prod was relatively simple – just a bit of curves, and colour adjustment. A retouching house created the cutout shot using a complex mask, and the image was converted to CMYK for the printing firm. The image is used on the BM website, on official correspondence, and on the firm’s livery nationwide. Max is also the face of the Barking Mad grooming division – but that’s a different story, and a different shoot. Look out for him!
