Last weekend I had a brilliant time photographing Minni, she is a lovely dog and clearly loved having her picture taken!

She's got a few tricks and even has a bit of a name for herself as a skateboarding dog so we brought along a few props to show some of what she can do. The weather was absolutely perfect and the shoot couldn't have gone better.

The owner ended up with a strong selection of colour photos and as always I converted them to black and white so they had the option to print those as well.

We had a lot of fun with all of the props and Minni's getting prepped for dog shows so she is very well trained and was very happy to run about on demand. It took a couple of runs to get the running shots right but I'm happy with how they turned out.

We changed location half way through to bring a bit of variety and although the bluebells have gone, we found a little patch of blue flowers and some buttercups.

I think that I would have liked a denser patch of buttercups but they turned out well, and at the end of this shoot I was really happy with almost every photo taken!

We wandered to the woods near West Stoke last weekend and had a great time taking a few shots of the wee ones. The old adage about not working with children or animals rang true once or twice but they were (mostly) fantastic and we managed some good shots.

 I didn't take much equipment beyond the camera and a few spare lenses, I really couldn't see the camera staying on a tripod! Some extra light could have helped and I'll think about an wireless flash next time. It'd help fill the shadows a little.

 It's true, actual sun in the uk! We did take a few props such as the balloons and chair etc.

 These two turned out really well :) Just having a few clicks after we thought we'd finished and they turned out to be really nice shots.

 The Sony alpha 77 and tamron 17-50 are turning out to be a solid partnership, I don't think that lens has left the camera in a long time now. Fast autofocus, very reliable and great IQ at all f-stops.

As always, I'm finishing with a personal favourite!

Who'd believe that it's already March! It's been so busy with house moves, Christmas and all sorts going on that the blog's been somewhat neglected. But anyway, here are a few pictures of two lovely (and pretty lively) Labradoodles shot a short while ago.

It was a busy shoot as they were very enthusiastic dogs, but we found a dark bit of curtain to shoot against and lots of doggy treats to distract them. Getting the lighting right was the hard bit as they were so mobile but with the flash on remote and off to the side pointing at the ceiling it worked fairly well.

As always, I was using the Sony Alpha 77 matched with a Tamron 17-50 and it's performed a sterling job, you need a fast and reliable auto-focus with animals and I have to say that it performed very well!

These last few images are my favourites, the lighter wall works really well with the dogs and gives them a great colour.

On a freezing day in October we all went for a play in Hillsborough Park in Sheffield, the weather was perfect for a good stomp through the leaves and once the wee man had chosen a few good leaves to march about with we took the chance to get a few Autumnal pictures.

 The Sony A77 proved itself again and we even managed to get a half decent video of him walking about in the leaves. I've invested in a new lens excitingly; the Tamron 17-50 f2.8 which is turning out to be brilliant, and here it is on Amazon...
http://www.amazon.com/Tamron-17-50mm-Vibration-Compensation-Digital/dp/B002LVUIXA
It's sharp right from the get-go and the 17mm wide end is more than enough for a good landscape when it's called for, I find 50mm isn't quite enough length at times but the quality more than makes up for it.

 I was keen to capture the colours of Autumn in the leaves and the dry weather helped a great deal.  Wet or mouldy leaves would have been a bit sad looking and a lot less fun for him.  We could have put him in brighter colours to contrast against the leaves; and next time, or if I shoot this with other children then that would be a proper consideration.

 On the whole, I'm really happy with these.  He was beginning to get a little tired (might be better to do this on the way to the swings next time!) and didn't want to walk about very much but he pulled out some lovely smiles for us.

After getting a bike fixed I decided to take the camera on a short pedal along Salterns Way..

http://www.conservancy.co.uk/page/cycling/346/

... which is a pleasant and flatish route from Chichester to the Witterings.  It's a decent length at about 18km and ends up on West Wittering beach so perfect for a summer pedal and picnic. (It's where I proposed a few years back :).  It's in no way a demanding ride (I took a road bike on it once) but very pleasant.

Blogger seems to have changed how images are displayed, so if you're keen to see the pictures larger than they are here just click on one and you'll get a nice slide-show to click through.

I didn't get as far as West Wittering on this pedal, it was beginning to get a bit dark by the time I got to Itchenor so that was as far as I went.  

The crows obviously knew what to do when someone pointed a black tubular thing in their direction, I wanted a shot closer to them but they all flew away almost the second I stopped.

 The house boats by the sailing club are always lovely, and I realised that the last time I was here it was hours prior to Milo being born and we were on a medically-advised stroll to ease the contractions.  This trip was a little less tense and I was glad I didn't bump into the petrified biker who offered to help last time.

 It was pretty windy so there were a few people out sailing the clouds scudded past quickly which led to rapidly changing light and what I thought were good conditions to use the Sony A77 with the Tamron 70-300.  I took a Sigma 10-20 with me as well but found that I didn't really use it on this trip.

 I quite like the yellow tint that the camera has given these pictures, I was shooting straight into the sun and I think it upset the auto-white balance.  This is never a problem anyway as I shoot in RAW but when I fixed them to have a more 'natural' colour I found that I preferred the originals.

 I hoped for a dramatic sunset but unfortunately this is as good as it got, clouds obscured the sun shortly after this shot and it clearly wasn't going to happen.  On the upside, I made it back from Itchenor in half an hour. That's nine miles on a mountain bike at an average speed of 18 mph, not shabby!

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