It all started with a Dog

I didn’t buy my first decent camera because I planned to become a photographer. I bought it because of Nellie.

Nellie was my German Shepherd, and at the time we lived at the beach. She was energetic, enthusiastic and always ready for whatever came next — but she was also deeply loyal and devoted to her people.

I wanted photographs that captured all of that. Not simply a nice photograph of a dog, but an image that somehow showed her.

So I bought “Little Red” and started trying. Little Red was a little red Pentax KR that I bought secondhand on Ebay. I loved that little camera, it wasn’t the next best thing, or up to date tech, it wasn’t so much that I wasn’t scared to take it to the beach or just give everything a go. Also being so RED it was a talking point that helped me meet so many new friends among fellow photographers. I lend that camera out to other people who just want to have a go.

Of course, getting the photograph you can see in your head is rarely quite as easy as you imagine! But somewhere in all that experimenting, I discovered something I hadn’t expected: I really loved photography.

I began to notice light differently. I started looking at backgrounds, expressions and little moments that I might previously have walked straight past. The camera gave me a reason to slow down and really look at what was around me. All those years with Nellie and the best image I took of her was standing in the kitchen looking up at the sky light with all the daylight falling over her. Her eyes match the floor in the background and have beautiful catch lights.

Years later, horses and dogs still seem to find their way in front of my camera rather frequently. And I’m still chasing essentially the same thing I was back then: a photograph that captures something more than simply what my subject looks like.

So, in a way, all of this really did start with a dog.