This morning I set out to practice my cat photography skills on a friends pair of stunning feline models.  This particular friend’s house is a dream for an indoor shoot like this… light, bright and brimming with lots of fun, interesting objects and unique furniture pieces.

I arrived with plans to capture beautiful portraits of Simba & Sheba posing serenely in Anna’s awesome light-filled, astro turfed front room…or perhaps lounging majestically against the white walls and polished wooden floorboards of the lounge room that so perfectly complimented their white & ginger coats.

What I forgot to take into account was that the thing I’ve always loved most about cats – their unpredictability and wonderful independence – could also be the thing that made my plans go out the window in an instant!   In typical feline fashion, Sheba & Simba had zero interest in being in the rooms I loved, let alone posing for portrait shots.  Instead, what they wanted most on this warm summer’s day, was to laze around on the cool concrete under the house.  So that’s what we did.

I ditched my plans to capture what I thought would be beautiful portraits in perfect locations, and instead just played with them where they were…snapping the odd shot as I went, but honestly not thinking any of them would ever see the light of day.    Out of habit, I downloaded the images as soon as I got home, not expecting to find anything I loved.

When I let go of the notion of having “failed” at the original task I had set myself and just looked at the images in front of me for what they were…this is what I found.  Quite possibly some of my favourite cat images ever.  Lesson learnt.