victoria beckham bad fashion
male speaker: it ismy sincere pleasure to introduce seth casteel. as i told him, i thinkhis title on the internet goes as award winningphotographer and new york times best selling author. so that's what i choseto introduce him as. but in all serious, seth'swork is extremely well-known. i think we've all seen it a lot,books, magazines, newspapers, everywhere.
and he's just coming out with anew book, "underwater puppies," so no better timeto hear from him. so without furtherado, i'm going to let him tell youguys about all of this. thank you. seth casteel: thankyou for the nice intro. well-- [applause] seth casteel:--thanks, everybody
for having me comeout here today. first time i've ever beento the google campus. i'm real excited about it. i had lunch over here,met some really cool dogs. i'm real happy to learnthat, obviously, lots of dog people here, and lotsof dogs on campus and coming to work. i mean, i had that kind ofjob too, so that's cool. but it's always nice tomeet other folks that
could bring dogs to work,so pretty cool deal. so my name's seth. this is my latest project,"underwater puppies." this is importantfor a lot of reasons. we're going to getinto that in a minute. but first i wantto talk about cats. so a little bit aboutme-- i'll probably speak for about-- i don'tknow-- i want to say 30 minutes. if i see people sneakingout or yawning or throwing
things at me, imight shorten it. but sometimes if you giveme a microphone, even this microphone,i'll have a tendency to ramble on a little bit. also, while i'mspeaking, if you guys have any questionsabout anything-- it could be relevant or not--feel free raise your hand and ask me. and i'll do my best toanswer your question.
how many dog peopleare out there? how many people like dogs? oh, good. because if you didn'traise your hand, i was going to ask you to leave. how many people have dogs? oh, quite a few-- terrific. any good swimmingdogs out there? who has swimming dogs?
cool, we'll talk later. so i'm originally fromthe state of illinois. i moved out to california togo to film school in 1999. i went to film school. i thought i was going to bea movie director or movie producer, that kind of thing. i got a job at sony picturesentertainment right out of film school workingas an assistant and then working in finance.
having no experience in finance,i found myself in a position with some responsibility. and then people always wonder,jeez, what happened to sony, you know? maybe they hired people. i can't believe that i'm sayingthis and we're taping this, but that's ok. i'll also try not toswear, because this is going to be on theinternet someplace.
but anyways, i worked in financeand somehow made the transition over to advertisingfor columbia pictures. so i was working on advertisingcampaigns for all columbia's big films, "spiderman," "angelsand demons," the da vinci code," two james bond films,"casino royale," "quantum of solace," and dozensof other movies-- really, really, fun job. and because i worked atsony, i met these baby cats. this is how it all beganfor me back in 2007.
i had a friend whowill remain anonymous, because maybe she'll see this. but she'll know who she is. her name is blank,a wonderful lady. and she is an animalwelfare person. she cares about animals morethan she cares about people. and she is theperson that you go to when you find a catthat needs some help. she won't tell you no.
her heart is definitely biggerthan the logic of her mind. and i applaud her forthat-- really sweet lady. and i'll give you an example. at one point when ifirst met-- she was also working at sony with me--she had about five cats. and then time went by. and then she had about 60 cats. and i said, you know, hey, idon't know a lot about cats. but i feel like that's atleast five too many cats.
so anyway, she andsome of her friends were taking care ofthis cat colony living on the sony pictures lot. and they basicallyjust lived on the lot. they would make sure thecats were fed, taken care of. i they had any newadditions to the cat colony, they would trap the cats. they would spay or neuter andput them back into the studio wild.
they had it prettygood, the cats did. i mean, i watched brad pittpet some cats out there at one point. and cats are justroaming around. and of course, it wasso good for the cats. life was good. the cats got on the phone,they called all their friends. and everybody wasjust coming in. so of course, what happens?
you get baby cats. so my friend found these cats. and she said, oh, no, seth. there's more cats. and i'm thinking, oh, my gosh. so i was getting intophotography a little bit at the time. i had just got a canon rebelxt and a sigma 24 to 70 lens. not knowing a whole lotabout photography or cats,
i just said, you know what? why don't we use this sony emailnetwork that we have set up. we can just blast out anemail to everybody at sony. we'll sneak these kittensin to an executive's office down the way. we'll take somepictures of them. and we'll put them out therein the sony email network. now, you're not reallysupposed to use the network for that kind of thing.
but i'm like, well, whatare they going to do? are they going tofire us for trying to help homeless kittens. i'm like, that's a greatpr line right there. sony fires employees forhelping homeless kittens. so anyways, that's what we did. we took these snapshots. my favorite is right here,a little claw on the couch, just leaving a little mark here.
but we took these shots,put them out on the network. and 24 hours later, allthe kittens were adopted. that's pretty cool. so then a couple weekslater, guess what? more baby cats, thefire engine kittens. we found these kittens in afire engine trying to stay warm. and they were literally in afire engine near the engine. and they were just tryingto stay warm in there. so we did it again,took some more pictures.
they all got adopted. and i'm like, wow,this is pretty cool. so i started volunteering atthe west la animal shelter. i said, do you guys needhelp with photography? you know, i've beenphotographing these little baby cats, and they got adopted. do you need any help? and they said, yeah, come on in. so i started volunteering totake better adoption photos
to help find specific homes fordogs and cats at the shelter. and that was back in 2007. so i'll do a slideshow,just kind of the process and how this all kindof came to be for me. and these are taken overthe last several years in different sheltersaround the country. but i'm going to show youtypical intake shots and then the more positiveadoption photo. so this is sort ofa typical intake
shot that you're going to find. as of a few years ago at ananimal shelter, not exactly a great marketing tool forlittle gloria here, you know? you see this andgenerally, you're going to be a littlebit terrified. some people would argue, oh,there's a sympathy card here. you're concerned, so you'regoing to go into the rescue and you're going to save gloria. and that's true a tiny bit.
but mostly what happensis people are afraid. people see this, and they think,i could never go in there. what am i going to see? what kind of experienceam i going to have? i could never bemy kids in there. and it turns people off. and i'm happy to say this eventhough it's being recorded. there's a campaign out thereyou may have seen on tv. and the shoutout'sto sarah mclachlan.
images, sarahmclachlan music-- has anybody seen the commercials? audience: i've seen the"south park" version. seth casteel: ok. [laughter] seth casteel: and how manypeople turn the channel, change the channelwhen they see that? it's negative, right? it's a negative thing.
and people just think, oh--they hear the music now. any time that song comes on,you're just like, oh, my god. now, in all fairness,it is the aspca. i'm happy to talk about them. their friends of mine. i love what they do. they're making a hugedifference overall. but i have to argue, is thatcampaign really effective? now, it's not anadoption campaign.
it's a fundraising campaign. it's been extremelysuccessful for the aspca. but i argue-- and i'm stilllooking for my meeting with the president of the aspca. so aspca, if you're outthere on camera, call me. let's have a meeting. and hopefully,it'll be productive and i can help you guys out. but i have toargue, at what cost
is that campaign causingthe entire effort? so yeah, they're raisingmoney, but they're scaring people away. so many people seethe commercials and they're terrified. they won't go into the shelter. and it's done a lotof damage, i think, for the image ofrescue and adoption. so the point ofdoing this is-- even
though this isstretched out, this is kind of againstthat campaign. so this is tryingto inspire people to be a part of the cause,inspire people to come in and say hello,embrace the animal shelter or your localrescue, and volunteer, adopt a new little friend, ratherthan change the channel. you know what i mean? so this is kind ofwhat we're doing?
and these are just-- i'll do alittle slideshow here and kind of show you what we're up to. olive. you know, when these dogsand cats come into the animal shelter-- i want youto look at chubbs. and they look sofunny because they're stressed out here a little bit. so when they comein, they're coming in at all hours of the day,all hours of the night,
from a variety of circumstances,most of which are not positive. and you can only imaginewhat ruben's thinking here. like, what isgoing on right now? so i do like the bandanna. i think that's aplus, but overall, just not a very productivemarketing shot for ruben here. and this is inchicago, taken in 2011. and this is probablysometime in the evening. you know, you have a lead, whichis a chain, which is terrible.
you have the ominous bootsand the legs over here. and this is just nota really good shot. but unfortunately, youknow, when ruben comes in, an id shot's taken. so it's basically justto keep track who's who. and the id shotsoftentimes are what is used to find ahome for that pet. it's just not thebest opportunity at that time to take a picture.
and it's of no faultof the shelter staff, most of these people. so public sheltershave really no money. they always struggleto find support. they have not enough staff. they have notenough of anything. so they're juststruggling to try to do the bestthey possibly can. they don't have properphotography equipment.
so this is kind of whatyou're going to get. so i can't reallyblame the people. it's just the situation. here we go. i think this is better. but what we're findingis people are actually printing these images out. they see them online. they bring them in.
and they want to meet ruben. or they want to meet thislittle min pin right here. he's kind of funny. it cracks me up thatit's stretched out. but it's funny baily-- this is also in chicago. and this is the realintake shot for bailey. this is probably sometime back in 2010 or '11. again, you wouldn'treally even know
what baily looks like here. and you have this. i think it looks alittle better anyways. wilma-- this is also in chicago. and when i started volunteeringin chicago-- so basically, i went from westla the south la. i started traveling aroundto different cities, just volunteering at animalshelters all over the place. and then i started my owncharity called second chance
photos, just teachingworkshops to people who were interested about howto take better adoption photos. so that's kind of whatyou're seeing here. these are taken in citiesall over the country. i then startedteaching workshops in other countries, ineurope and also in australia and learn a lot about whatis effective for these guys. wilma-- i mean, i think this isjust night and day right here. i mean, look at thedifference here.
all these dogs got adopted,which is pretty cool. and you wouldn'treally even know what black looks like here. there he is. seth casteel: now, this isa little smoke and mirrors, because one of mysecrets that i'll do is that if the dog isallowed to have treat, it is behaving alittle bit, then i'll let the dog chew a treatwhile i'm taking the picture.
and you're seeing that here. it also works good for people. this guy's having a snackback here right now. you can take a shot of him. it'd probably be pretty good. so then kind of fast forward--so i was working at sony. i went over to disney. oh, this is interesting,because this is going to be availablefor people to download.
i got fired from disney studios. i did get fired. i walked in, got firedfor no good reason. however, i still love disney. i love disney. i always have. i love the message. it was a dream to go workfor walt disney studios. walt disney has alwaysbeen one of my heroes.
and i still love the company. i came in one day. i'd been working 90, 100 hoursa week, working my tail off. i didn't get laid off. i got fired for reasonscompletely beyond my control that i didn't think were fair. but i decided that i wouldrather work with dogs and cats. so i walked in one dayand they said, you know, you're out of here.
and i didn't burn a bridge. but i decided to spend mytime with dogs and cats. i'd already been developingmy craft as a photographer. i'd been doing thevolunteer thing. i'd been doing a little bitof commissions on the weekend. people would say, can i hireyou to photograph my dog? so basically, when thatfateful day happened in 2009 at disney studios, it wasultimately a good day for me. i mean, that changed my life.
if that didn't happen,i would have never been doing any ofthese projects. and i would still-- i don'tknow what i would be doing. who knows? but so i really amglad that happened. at the time, it seemedkind of dramatic. but it did giveme the opportunity to go pursue what i really love. and that's working with animals.
so i went off, didthat full time. things weren't going that well. i was struggling to find enoughwork to really make ends meet, pay for my rent, pay for thecar, pay for health insurance now, pay for a hot dateevery once in awhile. that was adding up. so i couldn't really affordliving in los angeles. and i had kind ofa ticking clock. i mean, i was going to run out.
i had about $50,000 in debtalready on the credit card. my cash flow was very limited. my parents were like, oh,how's it going out there? i'm like, it's going great. they didn't know. so i struck a deal witha company called groupon. everybody know groupon? i struck a deal with groupon. i was pretty excited about that.
they approached me to do a dealfor a pet photography shoot. now, it seemed also atthe time that groupon was approachingeverybody to do anything. so if you would do adeal with groupon-- so i guess it wasn'tthat flattering. but i just thought,you know what? i got to stay busy. i got to find opportunities. i got to work.
i want to just work on my craft. and i thought, let's do it. for $59, you could hire me. i would come out to your homeor location of your choosing to do a 30-minute photo shoot. you also get two 8 by 10 prints. and i made about $29out of that deal. so i made about half, alittle less than half. so when i was-- it wassupposed to be a 10 mile
radius of my home is wherethe shots could take place. no, it was more like 150 miles. so people were bookingme in santa barbara. people were bookingme in san diego. so i was-- i don't know. i mean, i was like,well, i got to do it. so i was drivingall over the place. and i was doing the math,trying to be a business owner, looking at the math of it.
and i'm like, well,i'm definitely not making any money. how much am i loosing? because when you're driving tosanta barbara and back, i mean, just do the mathon the gas alone. i mean, you're notcoming out ahead for $29. that's for sure. a 30-minute shoot would extendto an hour, an hour and a half, two hours, sometimeseven longer,
and then all thetime i'm spending on editing and everything else. so it was really an epicfail for me to do the groupon shoot, except for thislittle character right here. he's the knightin shining armor. this is buster the cavalierking charles spaniel. i show up at his house in2010 at a groupon photo shoot. and he decided he would ratherbe in the pool than on land. this is a shot.
i did this interviewwith nbc nightly news with brian williamsa couple weeks ago. and they asked me, do youhave any original shots of buster from whenyou first met him? so i looked back atan old hard drive. i haven't seenthese in years now. i just haven't thought about it. and i came across these. this is now one of my favoriteshots i think i've ever taken.
because this is right beforeeverything began for me. i didn't know it at the time. you can alreadysee he's wet here. so he's already beenin probably once. and now he'slooking at us again, saying-- in thebackground, i have jane, who's buster's human. you'd better not do that. and he's thinking, oh,yeah, i'm going in.
so of course he wentin over and over again. she wasn't happyabout it, because she wanted some beautifuldry land shots of buster with this hairblowing in the breeze. and i said, wait a second. maybe there's something to this. i left, bought the little pointand shoot underwater camera. it was a sony, i think a tx5. i came back and starteddoing these kind of shots,
knowing really nothing aboutunderwater photography, nothing about this camera. i wasn't even sure ifi was taking pictures. it was kind of confusing. but you can see himin the background. and then you have-- thisis kind of the transition. he's going in. and then you have that. and so this is the veryfirst underwater dog shot
that i took. and this is back in 2010. i didn't know i had this. i got home and saw it wasjust like, wait a second. this is unbelievable. i was so excited about it. so of course, i sent thisto jane, my friend jane. i said, oh, my god, jane. you know, you have to see whatbuster looks like underwater.
and she said, yeah, yeah. but we didn't get thedry shots, you know. you've got to come backdown here and get this. so i went back down. i drove back down becausewe didn't get the dry shots, did the drive shots. audience: for $29. seth casteel: yeah,back and forth. who knows how much money ilost initially on that shoot.
but as it turns out, itwas a good idea anyway. so we went back, did this. and then i was justgetting really curious about the underwater thing. so i started doingmore shots of buster, playing around differenttypes of underwater camera gear, underwater camera bags. i tried out differenttypes of casings. i rented a dive housing onetime for $500 for the weekend,
and it broke. oh, it was tough. but i was interested in learningabout underwater photography and also just fascinated withdogs and their connection to the water. so i was just doing these,various types of lighting, really no idea what i'm doing. but buster here, he kind ofhelped me figured it all out. did this, which is now a tattooon my arm, which you see.
oh, there's me underwater here. but you have this picture now isactually right here on my arm. look how noblebuster looks here. seth casteel: he's justso proud, you know? but yeah, so thisshot is actually one of my favorite shots. and this is a picture i didwith an underwater camera bag, as it turns out. i put it on a hard drive.
i mean, i was taking all kindsof pictures, didn't really know what i was looking for. i put it on a hard drive,didn't even realize i had this shot untilabout a year later. i went back throughand found it. and now it's on my arm forever. people say, wow, you havesomebody else's dog tattooed on your arm. but this is the guy thatchanged my life forever.
and if i could buyhim a beer, i would. but he has unlimiteddog treats from me for the rest of eternity. but here's a littleselfie we did. i don't know who gotthe ball on this take. i look like i might have got. or i might have got part ofhis mouth in my foot too. it's hard to say. ok, there's us.
and then after workingwith buster, i was like, who else likes to swim? as it turns out, a lotof dogs like to swim. and they have aconnection with the water that goes backalmost 20,000 years. so i started working withall these guys, all kinds of different typesof dogs, and just doing fun photoshoots just for fun, not making any money on it.
| invested the lastfew thousand dollars i had available on a creditcard in a surf housing, which is an underwater housingdesigned for surf photographers and surfers. so i bought this. it's from spl water housings. and mostly i bought itbecause it was more affordable than a dive housing. and i liked that itwas bright yellow.
i thought that couldcome into play. and i like that i didn't haveto buy additional lighting. i could just put myflash on top of it. so i created the original serieswith this housing and a canon 70 with a tokina 10to 17 fisheye lens and made these shotsreally, just for fun. see all these clowns andall kinds of different dogs. this is a cocker spaniel here. this is a jack russell terrier.
and this shot ended up in"national geographic magazine," "visions of earth"back in august of 2012. that was a dream cometrue right there. this shot righthere, this was a shot that really took myphotography from nobody knew about me to everybodyknows about "underwater dogs." this happened onfebruary 9, of 2012. and i have a couplepeople to thank including reddit and google.
so thanks, google. a lot of people don't know that. but this image becamea top thread on reddit. and then it movedthrough google+. it moved through all kindsof different social media platforms. we tried to track exactlywhat all-- and it was just a frenzy of action. but it happened overnight.
and then no one exactly knowshow many tens of millions of people saw theshots overnight. but it was out of control. my website was crashed. my website was ona shared server with godaddy withlimited bandwidth. and it was just down. but i like to think what youcan't have, you want more. so people were tryingto get on my site.
oh, man, i can'tget on the site. so it's a funny little game. but yeah, so this was theshot that kind of went viral on february 9 of-- well,it didn't kind of go viral. it went viral. i had no idea thatcould even happen. and my life has neverbeen the same since then. so out of control-- here's thefirst book, "underwater dogs." so basically, when the imageswent viral, one went viral.
then people started pickingup the rest of them. and it just made a whole round. and i'm talkingabout a global round. i mean, everywhere,all over the place. the inquiries iwas getting-- i was getting 10,000 emails a day. i don't know how that happened. i mean, i was tracking trafficon my website at 150,000. and my website was crashedmost the time, you know?
and i was still gettingthat many emails. i didn't have an assistant. i was trying to figure outwhich emails were important. the next morning, i was on thephone with cnn world report. on the other line wasgood morning america. and i was trying to figureout who was more important. seth casteel: so i could getinto this for a little while. but basically, asa photographer, you always hope to make aliving maybe as a photographer.
i mean, i certainly wastrying to make a living. that was my career. and i'm like, wow, i'vebeen handed an opportunity. i've got to seizethe moment here. you know, i foundmy underwater dog. now i've had this opportunity. seize the moment. make the most of it. and so i just went after it.
i did all kinds of interviews. i fielded inquiriesfrom literary agents, knowing nothingabout publishing. i selected a book agent namedmichelle tessler based out of new york. i didn't know if thatwas the right choice. she liked dogs. i like dogs. so we teamed up,made a book proposal.
the book went to auction. all the major publishers anda bunch of other publishers bid on the rightsto sell the book. i'm on the phone oneday with random house and simon schuster andharpercollins a chronicle. and i really don't evenknow what was going on. it was a really goodproblem to have. but everybody bid on the book. it went to three rounds.
little brown, randomhouse, and simon schuster were the final three bidders. and i ended upchoosing little brown and turning down random house. i'm sorry, random house. i like you. but it just didn't work out. little brown's been wonderful. i'm really happyto work with them.
they're also big dog people. so we went out, shotthe book in 60 days all around the country, 300dogs, published the book october, 2012. the initial print runwas extremely limited. the book was sold out for almosta month around the holidays. even though it was one ofa oprah's favorite books of the year, you couldn'tbuy it almost anywhere. but it was still a "newyork times" best seller
for 11 weeks, thebestselling photographer book of the year, one of thebestselling books ever made with over a half a millioncopies in print right now, 13 editions around the world. and it's just dogs jumpinginto swimming pools. seth casteel: pretty crazy. but anyways, it wasjust phenomenal for me. you know, i have topinch myself every day because of what's happened.
so we made a kids book too. some of the adults thought theimages were too primal or too scary for the kids, which wasweird, because all the kids i was hanging outwith, they thought the shots were hilarious. or we made a kidsbook for adults and included a freeposter for them. seth casteel: there'ssome fun rhymes in here. i'm not much of a writer.
i'm technically an author. but i'm not much of a writer. i wouldn't considermyself a very good writer. but i did get to writesome fun rhymes in here. little brown said,hey, you know, we're going to hiresomeone to write your book. i'm like, what? i can't do it? so i wrote some fun rhymes.
i don't know if they're good. but i think they're appropriate. and that was a lot of fun. also, some of thekids were ripping the pages out of the books,they were so excited, apparently, orthey're just kids. so we made board books. those were publisheda few months back. and so we havecolors and numbers.
if you're learningto count to 10, i recommend thebook on the right. seth casteel: puppies-- after"underwater dogs" happened, we thought, all right,what's going to happen next? underwater cats-- the natural-- seth casteel: thenatural choice. seth casteel: i bought thewebsite, underwatercats.com. if you go there, you will findapproximately zero pictures. but i thought one day, ifthe world's upside down,
dogs are cats and catsare dogs, at least i'll be ready for that. i have been swimmingwith some cats. they choose to get in. turkish vans, mainecoons, bangles, some other exotic mixesdo you have a history with the water andappreciation for the water. and they get in and swim. now, it's not every catwithin those breeds.
but certainly you will findsome swimming cats out there, but not diving in andnot the same relationship that we find with dogs. so that book's onhold indefinitely. now, i have been swimmingwith some exotic cats. i've been in the water withtigers as well as bobcats. and you could make a series. and i've done some shots. you could make aseries about that.
i don't think youcould do a full book. and it's also not domestic cats. so most of us wouldn'thave a relationship with a tiger or a bobcat. but many of us, of course,do have relationships with domestic cats,so maybe one day. puppies-- in "underwaterdogs," you'll find a couple of puppies,one of which is 12 weeks. the other is six months.
i thought, well, could i makea whole book with puppies? it would be fun. but i don't know if i can. so i started justexploring the idea of working with puppies to findout if it was even possible and how i felt about it. and what i found was notonly could i make it, but it needed to be made fortwo very important reasons. and the first is themost critical reason.
it's water safety for pets. so every year, it's estimatedbetween 7 and 10,000 dogs drown in swimming poolsin the united states. that's a lot of dogs. now, there's millions of dogs. but 7 to 10,000,that's a lot of dogs. it's a shocking number. and i hate to say that. this is a very joyful project.
but the sense of urgencyabout water safety is very, very high. and it's not because peopledon't like their dogs. you know, peoplejust don't understand the dangers of aswimming pool, especially in states like california,arizona, texas, florida. i mean, in neighborhoods,you'll find pools at every single home. and pools are on the rise,more and more pools every year.
the weather seems to begetting hotter everywhere. more and more poolsare happening, more and more danger. now, pools can be a lotof fun for all of us. but they're also amajor, major danger for pets and humanchildren as well. but people don'tthink about that. i ask folks. i'm like, would you leaveyour 18-month-old human baby
unattended in yourbackyard next to your pool while your away at work? no, i would never do that. but the same people wouldpotentially leave their dog there, who's neverbeen in the pool before and has no proper experiencein understanding what it is or how to get out. so all puppies knowhow to swim when they're three or four weeks old.
you put them into the water,or even above the water, and they start tocheck things out. it's an instinct. it's hardwired in. they know how to do it. it's the doggy paddle. and they start off slow. and then they'll go faster. and you put them in.
most of them arebuoyant little things. and they'll just--and they're terrific. but they need to practice. they need to practice. they need to build confidence. and most importantly,they need to understand how to get out ofa swimming pool. and that's the number one thing. that's the numberone thing that we
have to make sure we get across. because you're dogfalls into the pool. they're going to makean effort to swim. they're going to make aneffort to try to get out. but it's not a natural body ofwater, so there's a disconnect. if you're at a lake, ifyou're in a stream, a river, the ocean, anythingthat's natural, chances are you're going tohave multiple options of how to get out, becausethere's going
to be some kind of a naturalgradient or natural way to find yourself out. a lot of pools thesedays still just have ladders or will just haveone exit, which is stairs. and it may not beaccommodating at all for a dog. most dogs that drown drowntwo feet away from the exit. they just swim aroundcircles and they don't know. it's terrible. they're not great climbers.
so they can't pullthemselves out. it happens all the time. it's not because people are--they're not deliberately trying to set theirpet up for disaster. but it's happening. so there's a lot ofother things going on with swimming poolsin terms of safety, limiting access, fences,alarms, a lot of things that should be happening.
but also, preparingyour pet to be safe is the number one thing. that number should notbe between 7 and 10,000. i mean, that's justridiculous, if you ask me. so that's whatthis book promotes. it's promoting watersafety for pets. you know, if i can improvethat number even just a little bit and i sell nobooks, that's fine with me, i just want to getthe message out there.
so that's the number one thing. the number two thingis rescue and adoption. that's how i got started. most of the puppies you'llfind in here are rescue puppies and have since been adopted. i finished the bookabout a year ago. and just as a reminderto folks that you can find wonderful pets atyour local animal shelter. and i think so many peoplejust don't realize that.
i was talking to a friendof mine pretty recently. and he has a puppy enrolledin a puppy training class. and it's the only rescue puppyout of 12 or 13 in there. and you're thinking,why is that? you know, why is it happening? i don't criticizepeople for buying dogs, but i do suggest to peopleto consider rescuing a pet because i think it'sa terrific option. most people justdon't understand
you can get a great,great dog, a great cat. they're not broken, you know? they're not having problems. they are terrific pets. you just got to go and do it. that's it. and you could findpure bred dogs. you can find mixed breed dogs. you can find puppies.
i mean, i've seen it all. and i will tell you, nomatter what you want to find, you can find it througha shelter or rescue. it might take you a couple extraminutes to do the research, but you can find it. so i thought it wascool to kind of feature some of these guys as my littlerescue puppy ambassadors. seth casteel: thisis in chicago. so i worked withabout 1,500 puppies
on this project, mostlyjust as a swim teacher, and occasionallyas a photographer. most the poppies came out. they got initial lessons tounderstand their physicality in the water,buoyancy, and start to condition themto look for the exit and find their way out. out of 1,500, you'll find just72 in the book, 105 pictures. most of the puppies didn'tget pictures at all.
they just swim a to b acouple times and they go home. some of the puppiesobviously decided that they do enjoythemselves here. and they were verycurious and became playful and would jump in, either atme, with me, or chase toys. so those are the puppiesyou'll find in the book. and it was kind of my jobonce i figured out, ok, who's dominating right now? who's ready to play?
and then i'd just grabmy camera do some shots. but there were somephoto shoot events. in chicago, i had one. we had 30 puppies come out. zero pictures in thebook out of 30 puppies. i spent all day, flew in. my gear didn't arrive. i had to have my backup gearflown in overnight for $400. weeks of planning, nota single book shot.
everybody got a lesson. but then this particular day,i mean, we had this shot. we had this shot. we probably had 15 book shots. and so you never really knowwhen it's going to happen. so it's kind of cool. but this was maybe goingto be the book cover. but we thought maybeit's a little too sassy to be the book cover.
this is ginger,all grown up now. i saw her the other day. she's a wonderfulswimmer, and looks almost the same--same markings-- just a little bit older. this is raleigh. this is in tucson, arizona. quick note about this-- sothis is an outdoor pool. i work with outdoor poolsand indoor pools for this.
water temperaturewas very important. between 80 and 92degrees is where i like to have the water forthe puppies and for myself, but mostly for the puppies. we wouldn't teachour human children to swim in 40 degree water. i hope not. so these guys, you want tomake them feel comfortable. you don't want to shockthem by putting them
in water that's too cold. this water actuallyis in tucson. and i knew it was coldat night in tucson. so i called the pool owner. and i'm like, hey, man. it's been gettingkind of cold there. how's the water? he's like, it's kind of cold. do you have a heater?
yeah. turn it on. ok. he turns on the heater. i arrive the next day. it's 100 degrees out. the heaters still on and thebubble tarp is on top of it. we peel it back-- 107 degrees. i know.
so we went to the refrigerator. we got a bunch ice cubes,we're throwing them in. you got to try something. so we got it down to 102 bythe time the puppies arrived. and we had the opposite problem. the puppied could only bein for a couple minutes, because it's justtoo hot for them. but we were able to get acouple of really cool shots. these are my little terriers.
this kind of thingdoesn't happen very often. when they jump in, some of thepuppies are getting playful. and learn about it. they jump in. and when they jumpin together, i mean, that's the kind of thingthat doesn't happen often. so i'm really happy thatthese two little chicago puppies are in the book. they're little terriersnamed pringles and pickme.
you'll also notice thelights behind here. you can see these lights. these are not pool lights. these are what's calledoff-board strobes. any photographers in here? i'm the only guy. well, it's not super exciting. but i'll just kind oftell you how it goes down. so i'm using a dive housing nowby ikelite, ikelite underwater
systems. so it's basicallya case designed for going reallydeep, 200 feet deep. i'm only underwater hereabout two feet or so. and i'm using two strobes. they're called ds161's. one here, one here-- andi can move them around. i can change theintensity of the strobe. i'm also dropping in what'scalled off-board strobes.
they're not connectedto the camera. they have a funny little deviceon them called an ev manual controller. it's like an eyeball. what happens is it looks fora change in ambient light. so when i drop this downat the bottom of the pool, when i fire off my flashes,this flash goes off. i can drop one ofthose, two of those. it also createslittle catch lights
in the top right of the image. that's caused bythe off-bard strobe. it just improves the images,i think, technically. and we can see the dogsa little bit better. but it's fun. sometimes i drop none in. sometimes i drop 1, 10. it's about $1,700 apiece. so sometimes you're in the pool.
you're thinking, i've gotabout $32,000 in here. i didn't haveinsurance on the gear. but everything's fine. but this is littleeva the beagle. here's what she looks like now. fun, huh? all grown up, same markings. audience: [inaudible]. seth casteel: yeah, i justsaw this dog the other day.
and i was like, wow. so i just had thisin here today, because they sentme these pictures. and it's crazy. i mean, here, she'sabout six weeks. and here, she's abouta year and six weeks. kind of fun, huh? this is corey. this is also in tucson inwater that's about 80 degrees.
i just really like howvivid this shot is. and in the moment, helooks pretty happy. there were six of theselittle cattle dog mix puppies, all rescues in tucson. this is another one, zelda. this is my favorite shot in thebook-- and i'll tell you why-- not because it's thebest technically. it's not even underwater. it's an over-under shot.
the reason why i like it--so zelda and corey, brother and sister. zelda's a special needs puppy,needs some additional tlc. the people that we're lookingafter zelda were saying, she's not ready forswimming, you know? she's not ready. and i was thinking,wait a minute. zelda's allowed to bearound swimming pools. she's going to be adoptedby someone here in arizona
and probably live at a placewhere there's a swimming pool. she needs a lesson. they said, no, no, no, no. that's not going to work. so little zelda here watchedme, corey, and the other four do the swim lessonsfor about a half hour. all of a sudden, i hear splash. zelda jumped in on herown, jumped on her own. and she swam right to the exit.
and it's a big pool. she swam right to the exit. i wasn't even over there. but she had watched us. and she had watched allof her little friends learn how to get out. and she learned how to get out. and that was my proudestmoment during the whole book. and that's what it's all about.
so this little puppyis safer for that. so i had to put her in there. i mean, she didn'tjump in 100 times. but she watched and she learned. she did it on her own. and i'm like, that'swhat i'm talking about. i was just so proud. this is kind of anothersassy shot, monte. this is in new york.
city there's a poolfor dogs in the city of new york in manhattancalled water for dogs. and it's mostly ahydrotherapy pool. so they're rehabilitatingdogs from injury or as a sort ofrecovery from surgery. hydrotherapy is anincredible thing that is improving the qualityof life for thousands of dogs here in the states andall around the world. and it's wonderful that moreand more pools are popping up.
and dogs can have a muchhigher quality of life and can extend their livesby years because of it. so that's what thispool was designed for. also, apparently, it's designedfor underwater puppy photo shoots. so i went in here tohave a few new york dogs. i thought this kind oflooks like the movie "the ring" a little bit. but just real sassy.
i mean, i love--with underwater dog, you see such arange of emotions. this dog is sleeping right here. i got to be more entertaining. [laughing] seth casteel: you seesuch a range of emotions. i feel like dogs havea very similar range of emotions to human beings. and that's why we connectwith them so much.
and that's why we can alsoappreciate these images. because maybe in each picturewe see a little bit of too. so i like to put that in there. also, point it out-- this is ahairy hairless chinese crested. and i think it was 10 weeksor 11 weeks, named scooter. it also goes toshow you not just the labs and goldenretrievers like to swim. so many people say that to me. oh, it's just labs agolden retrievers, right?
i meet labs andgolden retrievers all the time that don't like toswim or are not good swimmers. and it's because ofwhatever their history is. now, labs andgoldens, they might have more of a history ingeneral with the water. but you'll still find labsand goldens that or not into it or that arenot great swimmers because they haven't hadthe right experience. and then you meetthese little clowns.
and they're just dominating. i mean, you got to remember too,most dog breeds, pretty much all dog breeds,they're almost exactly identical with they're genetics. it's almost exact,with minor differences. the history's the same. they're all coming from wolves. and obviously, there's alot of different things that have happened alongthe way over 20,000 years.
but most dog breedsare fairly new. and they're all pretty muchrelated, very closely related. so the history'salmost the same. so even thoughsome of these dogs may have forgotten theirconnection with the water, they can remember it. and it comes back to them. all the time, i meet dogswho have never been around water or just have a fear of it.
but with the rightexperience, and once they can turn a curiosity intoconfidence, they can dominate. i've met dogs who havenever been swimming. and they come withme in the pool and they dive down sixfeet and they have a blast. so that happens. but i do have a poodle of myown, a little poodle mix named nala who you willnot find in the book, except for in my author photo.
she's a great swimmer. she'll get in the creek andlook around a little bit. but she doesn't havea retrieve drive. and it's just hernumber one hobby. so my next book is actuallycalled, "nala on the couch." and it's going to be 2000 pages. seth casteel: here'smy little boxer. this is prince, eight weeks old,looks like an olympic swimmer, i think-- excellent form.
this is in portland, maine. these are my labs. these guys are my stars. they started swimmingat six weeks of age. and these guys are being kindof prepped to be dockdogs. anybody familiar with dockdogs? so dockdogs is a competitionfor dogs and their humans. it's all aboutjumping off a platform to see how far theycan go into the pool
and how high they can go. and it's a lot of fun. the dogs go crazy for it. i mean, it's a blast. some of the people are kindof interesting, you know? you get the stage momsthat are like it's like they're littleballerinas or something like that or little actresses. but the dogs do love it.
they think it's hilarious. and it's a very positive thing. so these guys aregoing to be dockdogs. at six weeks theystarted swimming. by nine weeks, they gowould show at the pool and whine at the gate,because they wanted to get in. that's how much they liked it. i met them at 10weeks, 10 and 1/2. it was a no-brainer.
they hadn't reallybeen underwater yet. but you know,everything was in line. so i got to work withall three of them, reese and grits and jack. you'll find allthree in the book. there they are withthe puppy teeth. but even at 11 weeks, they startto look a little bit older. but the puppy teethtell it all for sure. here's these two.
i wanted to work withall three underwater. i thought, wouldn't that besomething if we could do that? but even though they livewith different people-- they all live infort myers, florida. they each live intheir respective home. but they spend a lotof time together. when that happens,they're going to come across a hierarchy, who's theboss and who's not the boss. it's going to happen.
anybody out therehave two dogs or more? yeah, i mean, if you have twodogs spending time together, you'll figure outwho is the boss. and this guy right herecan tell you that too. but that's how it goes down. and even if dogs are spendinga lot of time together, they will establish a hierarchy. these puppies started toestablish a hierarchy. jack, who you don'tsee in this picture,
is somewhere in the background,looking for another toy. but he would notcompete with these two. he would not go under with them. these two were stilltrying to duke it out. who is the boss, you know? so they would competewith each other. and i don't knowwho the boss is. i'm going to see them in acouple weeks down in florida. and i'm excited to figure outwho turned out as the champ.
but they're really funny,diving down five feet to the bottom of apool at 11 weeks. i mean, that's ashocking thing to see. and it's just like, i can'tbelieve this is happening. but i'm really happythey're in there. here's a behind the scenesshot taken with a gopro, i think a hero3 black edition. and you'll just seethe quality, which i think you see the details.
but you're kind of missingsome the illumination. a lot of peoplethink i would shoot-- even all these instagramgopro accounts, they always tag my pictures, gopro, gopro. and i'm like, ididn't use a gopro. stop doing that. seth casteel: but thisis taken with a gopro. you can kind of see theprocess of me underwater. i'm in a wetsuit just becausei'm in the water so much.
and if you're in--anybody a diver out there? yeah, andy, you're a diver. so i mean, if you'rein water for-- say, if you're in 80 degreewater for 10 hours, you know, we're 98.6 degrees,unless you've got a fever or you're an alien. but generally, you'regoing to be 98.6 degrees. and if you're in the waterfor a long period of time, your core temperaturewill drop over time
and you will get hypothermia. and it affects everything. so sometimes i'm inthe pool for 14 hours. even if it's 85degrees, you'd be surprised how chilly youget without a wetsuit. so i wear a wetsuit. and i'm also working with thedogs at such close proximity where you're going to getscratched up because they're trying to say hello to you.
so i do wear that. but you'll see meunderwater here. i'm just goingunder with a ball. and then here's thesame moment, almost. some of the shots withunderwater puppies you'll see tennis balls or toys,some of which you won't. sometimes the tennisball falls out of frame. like here it's in the frameand then it's drifting down. it's sinking down below.
and here's a shot. the illumination, i think,really comes into play here. you know, you couldn't have--if all the shots in the book were like this, i think itwould be a little boring. the moment's cool. but it's nice to be able to seethe details and the puppy teeth and everything like that. this is one of myfavorite shots though. this is not a dog.
seth casteel: thisis a baby, actually. and i'm more of a dog guy,and then cats, and then like 100 other creatures,and then maybe babies. and my publisherright now is going to watch this and get mad at me. but i've been working withbabies for the last four or five months. i've photographed 750human babies underwater in all kinds of states andespecially the big four,
which are california,arizona, texas, and florida. i did an assignment for"new york times magazine" called "littlenemos, highlighting the importance of watersafety for children." drowning is the number one causeof accidental death in children under five in the united states. between 500 and 700children under five drown, mostly in swimmingpools, mostly because there hasn't been propersafety measures.
and also, the children arenot prepared for the water. again, it's another seriousissue that can be prevented. i thought, you know what? if i can bring my camera intothis and try to tell a story and highlight some awarenessabout the importance of water safety for children, i'm ok. i'm not doing abook tour for this. i have no idea if anybooks are going to sell. but if we can improvethe awareness,
i think it's terrific,even though i'm not a dad. i don't know ifi'll ever be a dad. but i did have anamazing time working with these littlecreatures all around. but i'll tell you, at theend of each photo shoot, i wasn't trying to bringone of them home with me. i'm happy to gohome and see my dog. but it was very inspiringto watch these babies learn such important lifesurvival lessons.
and a range of intensity--some of the programs were more basic. some of them were very intense. but either way, it wasvery, very productive and very important. we have a lot ofmedia lined up that's going to promotethis next spring. the book will be out inapril of 2015, more or less. so that's what i've been doing.
that's bubbles and paws. what is that? anybody know? who can tell me? where's a guess? anybody know what that is? audience: a tiger. seth casteel: it's a tiger. so i have worked withsome exotic creatures.
this guy's pretty fun. seth casteel: so i'mworking on a project called underwater creatures. i may or may not makea book out of it. i'm interested inphotographing types of animals you wouldn'tnecessarily see underwater but still have aconnection with the water. whether or not icould make a book, that's yet to be seenwith my publisher.
so i'd like to. little brown, hey. let's get a book dealon the horizon, huh? but i'm reallyfascinated with bringing the message of helpingother types of animals through photography. it's funny andshocking just what a photograph can dothese days, especially because of the internet.
you know, can bring amessage with a photograph and you can touch a millionpeople or 100 million people. or now something likeover a billion people have seen the"underwater puppies" pictures in thelast three weeks. that's a lot of people. but when you canattach something that's positive aboutit and important, i think it goes further.
i mean, i love the thatthe images are joyful and they make people smile. but it's cool to bringa message to it also. so i'd like to be able tohighlight all kinds of animals other than dogs and cats andfigure out how we can help them too by creating some reallyinteresting images of them underwater. we'll find out. working with wild animals orin captivity or in the wild
is always a hot topic. i've done it on both sides. i've work withanimals in sanctuaries to help raise moneyfor those animals. i've also done it in the wild. i've been criticized for both. so it's a tricky world. you know, when i'mphotographing dogs at the pool, nobody really questions it.
but if you're in alaskaphotographing a bear that happens to come upon you, anddon't see him and you take a picture, some people aregoing to not like that. so it's tough. but my intentions are good. i would like to make the book. i think it can make somekind of a difference for a lot of othertypes of animals too. anybody have any questions?
audience: i have adog that likes water. but he keeps hishead above water. how do you get them todive down like that? sure. so it's all based on theclassic game of fetch. so i basically start. i show up at the photo shoot. i meet the dog. we become pals.
and they have to know thati'm the cool dude that's at the pool. they get familiar with the pool. it's all about them beingcomfortable and trusting. we start to play fetch. we move it into the pool. i have three gamesi've designed based on the game offetch for the pool. one's called bobbing for apples.
the dog comes onto thestairs or the ramp. i take the tennisball two inches under, three inchesunder, five inches under. and they start to put their nosein. and then up to their eyes, and then deeper. once they figure that gameout, we play swim and bob. they basically swim with me. and i do the same thing. they're swimming around with me.
and i have the ball. we're all swimming out there. and then i let the ball go. as a ball starts to sink,they go under and i dive in. and i'm taking theshots with them. and then of coursethe diving game-- one of my most outstandingunderwater dogs is dog named rex, a boxer. i'll dive down to the bottomof the pool, nine feet.
i'll hold his rockettoy up like this. i'll wave it at him. and i'm down there. he'll see it. and he'll do a full swandive, dive all the way down, swim down at me. and i'm taking the picturesas he's coming down. i hand him the rocket. he grabs the rocket.
now we're both on thefloor of the pool, right? and i've got my weight belton to hold myself down there. he doesn't have a weight belt. he just dived own. this dog is like a mermaid. i mean, it's crazy. so he's looking at me now. he's got the rocket. and he's just thinking, whatare you doing down here, guy?
so then he looks up. and we're deep. he looks up like this. and then he uses his hind legsand he shoots off the bottom back up to the top again. it's the craziest thingi think i've ever seen. but the picturesare pretty cool. yeah, i was so excitedto meet this dog, i get two speeding ticketsin 40 minutes driving out
to lake havasu city. i would have went to jail. the second cop waslike-- i was like, i just got-- you know, how isthis happening again? and i'm like, officer,is there a problem? this is the second cop. is there a problem? and he's like, oh,yeah, you were speeding. i'm like, no, theremust be a mistake.
i just got pulledover for speeding. seth casteel: i didn't say that. he didn't know aboutthe first ticket. i would have goneto jail for that. i mean, i'm like, listen man. i just-- there's this dogthat i'm supposed to meet. he's really cool. and i was just excited about it. and he's like, what?
what? there's somethingwrong with you, man. get out of here. but it was worth it, i think. i got out there finallyand did the shots. audience: thanks. you seem to keeprevisiting dogs. is that because you'rere-shooting, or just because you're checkingin, hanging out with them?
seth casteel: well, dogsare my number one, yeah. you mean, why do i keep workingwith dogs over and over again? audience: yeah. seth casteel: that's my-- audience: yeah, like you seemto go back to the same dogs. seth casteel: oh,visit the same dogs? like you've seen them whenthey're a year and a half. seth casteel: ihave my favorites. audience: ok.
i mean, i always meet dogs too. but there's somedogs like buster i like to see from time totime, lulu the jack russell and nevada the border collie. i mean, i have someof my favorites, rhoda the diving dachshund. these dogs have been sucha big part of my life because they've changed my life. so when i have an opportunityto go back and see them again,
it's like the favorite thingi could ever do, you know? i mean, they're like my family. so i like to go backand swim with them and take some more pictures. and it's kind of fun. audience: so what's themechanics of the actual shoot? do you hold yourbreath for a long time? how do you deal withyour hands holding the camera, yourstrobes, so forth?
seth casteel: sure. audience: how does at work out? seth casteel: soi'm in a wetsuit. i'm holding my breath only. a lot of people wouldthink that i'm a diver. i've actually never been diving. i'm not even certified todive, which is embarrassing considering how much money ihave in underwater camera gear. and i love the ocean andi love sea creatures,
so i do plan to get certified. but yeah, i'venever been diving. actually, if i wasusing dive gear, it would get in the wayof what i'm trying to do. some of the photoshoots, it's more simple. i don't have tomove a whole lot. some of the photo shoots,i mean, if you're there, i'm zipping all over the place. so i'm diving down.
i'm bouncing from side to side. i'm swimming prettyfast through the water. and that wouldjust weigh me down. i mean, some ofthese dogs are fast. i've got the ball. they want it, you know? and i need to move prettyquickly so i can set up the right opportunityto take the picture. so i'm in a wetsuit.
i'm just holding my breath. i go under. sometimes i wear amask, but most the time, i just open my eyesand that's about it. i have my ikelite underwaterhousing set up with a 5d mark iii, a cannon 8 to15 fisheye, the l lens. and i had two ds161 strobes. i hold my camera usuallywith my right hand. and i have the tennisball with my left hand.
so i'm just shootingthrough the water. and i'll move it forward. it weighs about40 pounds on land. underwater, it's not goingto weigh quite as much. but i shoot through the water. and i always use this hand forthe tennis ball or the toy. and i use this handto hold onto that. and i just kind ofhad to practice. but i'm moving fast, you know?
most of the images that you'regoing to see in both books are taken within about12 inches of the camera. and some of the dogsare diving in fast. so i got to be very carefulwith how i'm moving that gear. but if you photograph severalthousand dogs and log thousands of hours in the pool, youget the hang of it though. audience: have any of the dogsever broken any of your gear, being that close? seth casteel: you knowthe answer to that.
yeah, i've lost a fewcameras over the years . it's all part of the fun though. it's all part of the fun. yeah, i've had a dog actuallysmash through my port, my lens port, this do named cowboy. and yeah, what a rascal. but he was totally fine. he just wanted the ball andhe just went for it too far and just punched right through,totally fine, the camera
not so much. it's amazing how fast-- ifyou take a glass that's empty and you put it inthe water, watch how fast it fills with water. so he punched a clearhole in this thing, and it's blub, blub,blub, blub, blub. i had another dog in--where was i? --san diego. and i was just not payingattention that close. and i'm supposed to lock onthe port onto my housing.
you can put theseport locks on there. but sometimes it's a hassle. so i basically just put it on. you twist it on. now, if you twist itoff, it'll pop off and your whole thing will flood. so this dog was reachingacross with his little paw. and he grabbed the port andhe pulled it 90 degrees, just ripped the whole thing off.
and that was a 5dmark iii in there. that's not a fun bill. i'm supposed to get insurance,but i haven't done that yet. i don't think anybody wouldactually insure me anyway. they're all like, no, forget it. cool. male speaker: alll right,well, if we could all please thank sethfor talking to us.
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