Mary Ann's Book Shoot

Mary Ann Nester has written a HTM/Canine Freestyle book and she invited me and the rowdy rabble to the photo shoot. Diz was up first and was a star as usual, did some paw over nose and chin on ground/chair work etc. she was thrilled to be in front of the camera again - such a show off! Then up was Ember who was doing jumping into my arms which she thoroughly enjoyed and was generally accompanied by noise! Rum up next who did heel position and round the handler and finally paw over nose in a down - he has always been really nervous at a photo shoot and I was so pleased today as he started off quite wary off the flash sound but really relaxed towards the end - good lad. Finally Cas who did all sorts of moves and she would not shut up she was soooo wound up - doesn't bode well for the Crufts Semis.



Anyway a good day and thanks to Mary Ann who invited us!

ITV??

Today I had a researcher from ITV come over and interview me and film the dogs doing freestyle and tricks. Then we went over to Lees and she filmed a bit of them doing some agility but couldn't get much footage as it was a bit wet and windy! They are looking to commission a documentary on people and their dogs which sounds like a really good idea but they're still in the research stages and compiling footage of different 'doggie' people. Fingers crossed it gets the go ahead and they like the dogs' tricks :-)

Animals At Work

I performed a display with Cas at The Wag & Bone Show and held a freestyle masterclass. We had arranged to meet up with someone from the BBC as they were interested in the dogs' tricks.

At the end of a long day Cas was asked to play basketball again and again, bless her she worked so hard and I could see her age showing - she tires much quicker these days.

Then Rum was asked to skip and he was a star, still a bit distracted but we performed some good skips - I normally trip over the rope lol!!

The show will be shown on CBBC I believe and is a series of programmes on clever animals.

Diz - Dogs Trust

Diz was supposed to be the main story telling dog but it was so hot she was panting and they didn't like the panting so they decided to use a different dog for the main dog which I thought was a little daft but hey!

So all we did on day one is eat from the nicest catering van ever! Then at the end of the day they filmed Diz and I playing frisbee and her running through a tunnel. Mary Ann was filming too with Frostie and we were at the same hotel so had a late dinner and turned in as we were late getting back.

Somehow we managed to wind our way into central London the next day and neither of us had sat nav so resorted to the good old fashioned map! It was another blazing hot day and Dizzy's scene was in a high rise block of apartments. She had to cower under a table and walk back under a blanket, really short shot but it seemed to take ages as they were changing the position of the table and the table cloth so many times. But Diz was perfect and we got it done.

Cas - Goldfrapp

Cas was used on Goldfrapp's music video for their new song - Happiness. The whole video is themed around people being happy and bouncing round the streets. They wanted a dog on it's back legs doing the same, that's where Cas came in!

They started by having Cas on her back legs by my side at the front of a crowd of people bouncing along, but Cas wasn't fast enough on her back legs, getting mown down by everyone else going quickly! So they then had her ahead of everyone else and joining in once the crowd had stopped. Trouble was it was difficult to get across the road as they were all dancing. So they did some filming of her crossing the road on her back legs by herself at the end which was better as there was nobody to bump into hee hee!

UPDATE:
http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=xmtM3aI1M-Q