Black Cat Surprise Shot

As I have often mentioned, the most important thing is to capture the moment, even if the settings aren’t perfect. The essence of photography lies in capturing the magic, and that’s what really matters. How do I know? Let me tell you.

How I Got the Shot

Our neighbours have a little girl and they also have a cat. Their tabby and white boy cat featured here on the blog last week so the little girl is confident around cats. Dad sometimes brings her around for a visit, when she gets a bit restless and so, this time, I grabbed my camera.

I asked her dad to carry her over to the shady part of the garden where the ambient light reflected from the white wall nearby would light her face without bleaching the skin. Once there, I was able to take some lovely photos. Then we moved out into the sunshine again…

Curious at our visitors, Taz jumped up onto the wooden railing to watch. Her dad carried her over and Taz stretched out, very carefully, to sniff. I did not have time to adjust my settings from ISO 200 f2.8 1/1000 so I lifted my camera, and fired of a few shots.

This was the result. I know her pink onesie is overexposed but otherwise this is a totally unplanned moment. Not perfect but amazing, and a lovely memory

I have done some mild editing in Luminar Neo to lighten her face because everyone was backlit and shady (!) The focus is also centre-weighted*, so Taz and Dad are a tiny bit blurry.

I still love the photograph though!

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• * Centre-weighted metering evaluates the light in the middle of the frame and its surroundings and ignores the corners – Photography Life