Bushwah with Blue Marbles

I took this shot in April of 2000, before I even started shooting cats for a living -- I didn't have any prints for display at our first cat show, so we did a lot of light tests at home during the month before our first show in May, some of which turned out good enough to print. This was one we used for display.

This shot was taken with a 2MP Olympus. We didn't use a hairlight yet, nor did we have one. I liked the image so much because it was more about the cat's curiosity than the cat himself, and the blue glass marbles looked so cool. I had never seen any other photographer use a prop like this. The cat was our F1 Chausie (half Jungle Cat and half Abyssinian) who had more curiosity than was good for him. Ken named him Bushwah. He was so active and recalcitrant, he would have us at each other's throats -- trying to get the shot -- or ANY shot! We couldn't even use the sparkley end, or feather end, of a cat tease. He would go ballistic. Ken ended up using the handle of a cat tease just to keep him on the photo table.

In this shot, Ken stirred up the marbles and let a few drop back into the glass brick that held them. The sound was enough to get Bushwah's attention.