Dudley the "Aviator." Now I put "aviator" in quotes because one of Dudley's dads decided to get the D-dog a $7 aviator outfit for Dudley's Halloween costume. It just wasn't good. File that under the old adage, "Ya get what you ya pay for." For starters, the scarf was about three sheets of toilet paper long. Dudley, a pit bull, has a bigger neck than about four toddlers put together and this wasn't big enough for one small child. Dudley's other dad went on a mission to replace the scarf and came back with granny's pashmina.

And a dog's head, in particular a pit bull, is pretty darn big and let's face it... not human shaped. My suggestion was to take the aviator's helmet and cut a semi-circle in the back but we didn't go that route and the hat never worked. Not saying my suggestion would have worked... but nothing worked. The goggles worked, surprisingly well.

The dad present at the photo shoot (these guys are my neighbors so everything was just for fun and experimental) wanted to use a leather club chair for him to sit in, which I thought was very dignified. And we used sort of a paper bag-colored backdrop (technically, Savage's mocha seamless paper).

It took forever to get the lighting just so. I wanted a spotlight on the paper and had to keep moving the light quarter inch by quarter inch. And the main light kept throwing a reflection on the club chair, which I finally solved with a grid on it. The result is a little "meh" but I find something to love in this image.

I captioned it, "Dudley immediately raced to the Old Explorer and Adventurers Club when he heard a piece of Amelia Earhart's plane had been found. He wishes he had not mistaken his grandmother's pashmina for his scarf before heading out the door."

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