We first met when I was walking to my car and this strange black ball of fury shot out, from under a hedge, to ferociously attack me. That's how the MagRat decided to "introduce" herself. As a 'first date', it didn't look too promising.
Eventually, some months later, she decided she was adopting me, and she timed this just like a magical Disney story, at 8pm on Christmas Eve 2019.
I've since begun writing a book about the very humorous adventures we've both shared in transforming our relationship from predator and prey, to becoming the very best of friends (or should that be her deciding I'd be a perfect human servant?).
The book is called: A Street Cat we call MagRat, which borrows from the humour of Terry Pratchett and another famous cat relationship story, A Street Cat Named Bob, by James Bowen.
The photograph I need editing was my first ever picture of Maggie "The MagRat", and was also the first ever photograph I took with my new Olympus 300mm f4 PRO super-telephoto lens. As such, it was only a test shot, yet it has enormous historical importance in our story. It shows the, then very wild, MagRat sitting watching me on a rather damp November day, as she's considering whether I need another beating or, maybe, that I might have some cat treats in my pocket.
As it was only intended as a test shot -- and our relationship was yet to develop -- I didn't bother to save the RAW image file. All I have is a couple of jpeg files that I'd shared with friends. And, as the lens was new, it's not technically that accomplished; especially for a professional photographer.
My intention is to use a version of this image as either the front or the back cover of our book. It'll need to be a portrait orientation image (obviously) and will need space for the title on the front cover or a summary of our story printed on the back cover. It also needs to encapsulate the emotive idea of a stray cat looking from her cold and wet world towards someone who will, perhaps, eventually become her friend. It needs to have the viewer ask, "what is going on in her mind?" It also has to "tell her story" of survival. So, that's your and Rob's task for the Sunday livestream.
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- The infamous Street Cat we call MagRat
- The infamous Maggie The MagRat.jpg (2.59 MiB) Viewed 2864 times
Perhaps, later, I'll submit what I did when I edited this image. But, first, I'd like to hear your thoughts and suggestions. Maybe you'd like to download the image and submit your edited version in reply.
Or you can just join in with the editing comments on Sunday's livestream. This is a far from perfect image, but as it's the first picture, it's irreplaceably important in our story.
Thank you,
Rick Bear