8 minute read
Focus on… Gruffpawtraits
Rhian ap GRuffydd GRuffpawtRaits
For the love of dogs
Rhian Ap Gruffydd, founder of Gruffpawtraits talkes about how a chance event on a photo shoot led to her setting up a greeting card business
Tell us a little about your story. I am originally from Wales but moved to London aged 18 when I became a nanny. The family I worked for in St John’s Wood paid for me to go to The Camera Club in Covent Garden once a week (everyone else must have been in their seventies, but I loved that they all had so much knowledge to share). It really inspired me to follow this path, but I had very little money and no qualifications to get into college, so continued on my own.
The following year I went travelling on my own to Thailand in search of interesting projects to photograph – I worked with the street teacher at the main station in Bangkok teaching street kids, and then at the body collectors of Bangkok at the police morgue (all the while documenting it photographically).
I started working in kitchens in London as this was something I was good at, and I went to evening classes in photography. I worked as a location caterer for film and TV, taking pictures on set after I finished the lunch. The BBC saw them and I landed a job on EastEnders and Holby City as a stills photographer. I then became a photographer’s assistant as I wanted to do celeb photography - and off the back of this I worked for Comic Relief, in Africa, before becoming a portrait photographer.
Tell us a little about Gruff Pawtraits. I was on a shoot one day and the model I was photographing was still in hair and make up. I had set up my backdrop and lights and needed to test that they were all working well. There was only me and her dog that had followed me around all morning, So I looked at the dog and thought, well you’re just as good as the model! So I got the dog to sit in the model’s place so I could test my lights. Later that night when editing I came across the images I had taken of the dog and saw how my lights had really made the dog’s eyes sparkle and the flash had sharpened its fur.
I showed a few people and they really loved it, so I started photographing everyone’s dogs when I had commissions on human shoots, and they all came out with the same effect. I was working a lot with the comedian John Bishop at the time and ended up photographing just about all his animals as a test - and to my surprise I got the same beatiful result. So I put all my energy and free time into photographing animals and making homemade cards. They were such a hit that I decided to start my own range. How did Gruffpawtraits develop from there? I started producing the cards in black and white. Around the same time I had been working with an artist called Jack Vettriano; I showed him the cards and asked if he liked them? He said no… “I love them but do them in colour!”
I thought, well that’s not going to work! But I took his advice and he was right - they just came to life when I started doing them in colour.
I began with a small range and did my first trade show. I did a collaboration with Battersea Dogs’ Home where I put a set of my cards in luxury boxes and they were placed on every table at the charity’s annual ball. When I got my cards into Blue Diamond to supply all its garden centres I looked at my mum and thought what have I done! But it was such an achievement I was over the moon. I was such a small company. I remember me and my mum packed cards right through the night till the early hours for that order but the excitement of the cards getting on the shelves was just too great to worry over lost sleep.
That first trade show also gave me a three-year contract with Portico Design for calendars, which are now in John Lewis and soon to be in Waterstones and other independents.
I’m also proud of getting my cards into Harrods pet department. When my mum comes for a visit to London I often say shall we go to Harrods to look at the cards. Just seeing my cards in pretty much any shop
Rhian’s very first card
is the one thing that really drives me to continue creating beautiful images of dogs.
A particular highlight for me was when last year the Anya Hindmarch luxury bag company contacted me and we did a collaboration where I would photograph her clients’ dogs to go on her bags. It was such a success I retured again this year.
I am now also working for various TV shows as the dog photographer where my images promote the programme What was your very first card design? After photographing friends’ and family’s dogs I needed some models, so me and my mum went to Crufts and handed out leaflets to people explaining that I am a dog photographer and looking for dog models to photograph free of charge. People were very wary and we didn’t have a great response. We were on the bus back to the car park and while I sat there counting my remaining leaflets I could hear my mum chatting to someone (she talks to everyone). I could hear her ask, “Have you got a dog?’’. Then I heard “yes I have 25 - I rescue them’’.
The following week we were back on the road to Chester to photograph those 25 dogs!
I was well and truly thrown in at the deep end but created some great images, some of which are in today’s range. Talk us through how you create your images and how you get them to look like paintings/drawings. I use a white background and a few lights. I usually go to the dog’s home as here the dog is happiest. The pet owner will sit next to the dog so the dog feels happy that their owner is there - though at the same time the dog is looking right at me and not them.
I very rarely use treats as this makes the dog open its mouth and that’s something I never want in my images as it detracts the attention from the eyes; that is always my focus - great sparkling eyes.
I light them with a flash so this sharpens the fur, almost giving a painted quality – this was never intentional. I just had a lot of people asking if they are drawn - it was a real surprise when people asked this as I thought, no I actually get the dog to sit there – it can be quite an effort! But usually the dogs are great – I love what I do and I think the dogs pick up on this.
There is no secret to what I do, I just spend a bit of time with the dog and when the expression is right - that’s my picture! Have you ever branched out into other animals? Yes I worked with John Bishop a lot over the years. I did his Comic Relief challenge where I spent over a week on the road photographing it and he told me a lot about the animals his wife rescued. So when I started this project he was the first to get a call as they had such a variety. Their house is like a gallery of my work as they love their animals and I love photographing them - dogs, chickens, goats, sheep, horses, pigs - I photographed them all.
I actually particularly like photographing chickens;they really do make stunning images.
Where else might we see your work? As I’m branching out more now into TV work I have just done the images for a new Channel 4 TV show but I’m not allowed to say the name yet! Is there a famous dog or celebrity’s dog you would like to photograph - and why? I’m in talks to do something in LA with dogs as that’s somewhere I have just always wanted to go and photograph dogs.
They just take loving your dog to another level out there, so that’s my future plan, and then to sell my cards in America How many cards/ranges do you offer? I have 53 different breeds at the moment and seven waiting in the wings in production. I am always trying to grow my range so I can eventually cover most popular breeds – it would be a nice thing to be known as the go-to card range if you want a particular dog card. What are your bestselling cards? Spaniels and Cockerpoos sell really well, though if you go to the more rural areas in Wales and Yorkshire it’s always the sheepdog.
