A goal reached.

This weekend, after a few years of hard work, I reached one of my goals and became an Accredited Professional of Animal Imagery. From now on, I am allowed to put APAI behind my name. A few years ago I was encouraged to become a member of an on line community called, No Bones About It - a constructive critique photo forum exclusively for pet, animal, & bird photographers. This forum is for the professional animal photographer who wants to grow and learn. The beginning was hard, but soon I started learning to look at my own photographs and see the flaws, but also the good points. Part of the learning was entering my photographs in Print Competition which allowed me to gather points for my accreditation.

While competition was a few weeks ago, this weekend at the AIM conference (Animal Image Makers) awards were handed out and I received my accreditation (not physically yet, I could not make it to Minneapolis). Not only that, one of my photographs ended up taking

a top 10 place for Dogs in Studio and… a Judges Choice.

I have a whole lot of people to thank for their encouragement to pursue this

and for believing that I could when I thought I could not. Next step will be hopefully Master, but that will be in a few years.

The time of year

You are right, I was missing in action on this spot. But that doesn't mean I wasn't doing anything. Actually, I've been rather busy, just not with my photography. Which, I hope next year will change and instead of being cooped up at my other job, I hope to be doing christmas shoots. But this year, it is my other job, working at a boarding kennel and fmy non profit www.sagehounds.com that kept me busy.

The boarding kennel is self explanatory, this time of year is busy, Thanksgiving, Christmas Year end. The rescue, not so much, since we fly dogs from Spain to the US, one would think it is more quiet, but not when you offer to fly within 72 hours from Harrisburg PA, to Philadelphia, to Madrid, from Madrid to Los Angeles to Baltimore, making sure 8 rescued Spanish galgos end up with your group in California. And then deciding that a transport needs to be arranged for at least 5 more to NYC the beginning of the year. But in between our new christmas tree arrived (fake, since I am allergic to whatever they treat the trees with here in the US) And before putting it in place, I just had to… Doc, a Spanish podenco who is our foster and still available for adoption through the rescue, was a willing model thanks to some yummy treats.

Cubila

Or rather, Cuby. A former foster and fun girl, so when Mom and Dad asked if she could come stay for a bit when they were traveling, I said yes please. And when they wanted to combine that with an outdoor shoot, I could not refuse. Fall colors were still at their peak and I took her to Gettysburg on a weekday, hoping to be able to get some good shots. From her time with us, I knew she was an awesome poser and so we had some fall photo fun. At this moment I am still editing the shoot, but I can show this. Taken not far from the Irish Brigade Monument and according to the people we met at that spot, riddled with the ghosts of soldiers from battles long ago. Luckily Cuby wasn't bothered by them .