At the start of February, Seth Casteel was an obscure pet photographer who was making ends meet.
By March, his website had crashed under the weight of curiosity, the phone was running hot, his inbox was full to overflowing and a posse of publishers waving book deals was in hot pursuit.
If there is such a thing as a celebrity pet photographer, then the 31-year-old from Los Angeles is it.
A decade-long passion for animals and photography, that began during a seven-month-long sojourn in Townsville in 2002, has blossomed almost overnight into a viral success story.
Today he is more commonly known as the “underwater dog guy”, the man who managed to turn pictures of submerged pets into a striking art form that left many scratching their heads and muttering “why didn’t I think of that”?
And as with many eureka moments, it began by happenstance.
After returning to the US from Australia, where he studied at James Cook University for a semester and took in the local wildlife, Casteel began offering his services as a volunteer photographer in animal shelters.
Just as a good real estate photographer can improve a home’s prospects for sale, so too, a well-framed portrait of an abandoned pet can make a difference.
“These photographs of homeless pets are such a key factor in finding them new homes and saving their lives,” said Casteel in a phone interview.
Today, he also runs a non-profit called Second Chance Photos,which aims to teach animal shelter staff and other volunteers how to take photographs of the shelter pets that give them the best possible chance of being re-homed.
Casteel’s professional work became a natural extension of that volunteer work.
The first underwater shot came about when a Cavalier King Charles Spaniel named Buster refused to stay on land and instead kept jumping into the pool.
One thing led to another and eventually, Casteel bought the gear and refined his methods and found that, with a bit of coaxing, many dogs were happy to chase a ball underwater.
“It is about my relationship with the dogs, too,” he said during a break in a tour to round up more subjects for a book that is due out later this year. “They can trust me and know that we're having a good time.”
The cost of an underwater photo shoot starts at $US1000, a price Casteel says, many dog owners are willing to pay, even in these economically challenged times.
“Our pets are our friends and our pets are our family and when they’re gone all we have left are memories and photographs.”
Read more:
http://www.smh.com.au/environment/anima ... z1pcLZbIkE 
