Susan Schmitz – Owner/Lead Photographer

I've always had a love for animals and art. It wasn't until I hit my mid-life crisis (Well, maybe it was a 1/3 life crisis... I'm still young... most days) and I moved to Sedona that I was actually moved to explore my artistic side.

I just started taking photos as a reference for my drawings & paintings. Then I started to appreciate the instant gratification of a photo. Once I learned Photoshop, the geeky-techy side of me was completely hooked! I found the perfect blend of personal interests; dogs, photography and technology. And from this merger, A Dog's Life Photography was born... and so was I.

Laura Sand – Photographer/Account Executive

For as long as I can remember, I’ve had three loves in my life… music, animals and photography. The first memory I have of taking pictures was when I was about six years old. I would run around my house and back yard taking pictures of all the things that I loved…my parents, my brother, my cat… well mostly my cat. The first memory I have of listening to music was the same year, although there is photographic evidence of me grooving to tunes through headphones before the age of two.

I’ve learned that life is very short and you only get one shot at it. I’ve followed my dream to a place that I never knew was possible. I met Susan in prison! Ok, let me clarify… it was the greyhound prison program’s graduation day and we were both there for the celebration. We clicked immediately and she began teaching me the ropes from the very first moment. The rest… as they say… is history.

Fix Your Photo Friday Winner For May 21st

Tuesday, May 25, 2010

The winner of the Fix Your Photo Facebook Friday Contest for May 21st is Tonya Barker with her photo of Peanut.

Tonya says, “This is Peanut! My adoption day failure. I volunteer at our no kill shelter and I signed up to help at Petsmart. I knew I was in trouble when this one walked in. I made it safely from the parking lot to the stoplight about 100 feet before turning around and adopting her. She is a great little dog and gives good hugs:)”

Here is the photo as submitted on our Facebook page.

Here is the photo after some Photoshop fixing:

Tips on taking this type of photo:

When you are taking photos indoors with minimal lighting, your photos are most likely going to be dark. If you pull out your camera’s manual, you should find a topic on how to change the ISO. This is a setting that changes the camera’s image sensors sensitivity to light. The higher the number, the more light the sensor will let in. So, when you are indoors in low light, crank this setting up as high as it will go. There is a downfall to doing this though… You will have more “noise” in your photos. This means that they won’t be as clear as they would be at a lower ISO setting.
Turn all of the lights on in the room and open the curtains. You want to make the room as bright as possible so that the camera doesn’t need to compensate as much. the more light you have around your subject, the better the overall quality of the photo will be.

Editing tips for beginners:

If you have a basic photo editing program, just increase the exposure, brightness quite a bit then bump up the saturation a little.

Editing tips for advanced photographers:

In Photoshop, I used the Topaz Labs Adjust 4 filter. I first used the Exposure Correction filter and increased the exposure a little more than the default value. then I ran the filter again using the Photo Pop setting and played with the sliders a little.
Then I cleaned up the background by using the clone stamp tool. I sampled some of the clean areas of the carpet and cloned them over the areas that were cluttered.
The photo was still looking a little dark so I added a Curves adjustment layer and increased the exposure. This made the dog look too bright, so I added a layer mask to bring back the darker image from the layer below for just the dog.
Then I sharpened the image up by using the Topaz Labs Detail filter. I used the Bold Detail filter but reduced the strength a little.
The photo was still looking a little drab so I added a quick vibrance adjustment layer to bump up the color.

If you have a photo that you want fixed, please visit our Photo Correction Services page for details. You can also enter our Fix Your Photo Facebook First Friday contest on the first Friday of each month. Click here for details.