If our ball pythons were Pokémon ...

[RedRabbit]

"I choose you, Iggy! Use Fire Blast, now!"





"Let's go, Rae! Charge up that Thunderbolt!"





Let the championship battle begin!





And as a bonus, here's a sneak peek behind the scenes!

Gym/stadium rock wall - that styrofoam background we took out of our beardie's terrarium
Partition walls for the red and blue competitors - lids from large toy storage tubs
Ravus's "electricity" - sparkly Easter grass

Neither of my BPs have much of the "pet rock" disposition, so it can take a lot of time just to get them to cooperate for the right shot. They get understandably restless if they're out for too long, so to be efficient with time and to keep them happy, I set up all props in advance and take some test photos first to figure out framing and lighting. In the test photos, I sometimes use "body doubles" for the snakes - in this case, these two toy dinosaurs:



I also bring along two of their hides and place them nearby, out of frame from the camera. If the snakes are getting too wiggly and need a break, they can retire to their "trailers" for a few minutes before returning for the next take.

If your snakes were Pokemon, what type(s) would they be?

[Repstyle]

Oh my God, it's very funny !!!

[royalreilly]

So cute so cute so cute!! You sound experienced in this... do you take more pics like this? I'd love to see a little series. You should make your snakes an instagram account or something. I'm sure they'd be stars, haha.

I'd say my bp would either be a grass type, because he loves to pull down all his plants every night, or a ground type, because he pushes all the coconut fiber around and burrows sometimes.

[richardhind1972]

Really great photos

Sent from my CLT-L09 using Tapatalk

[Valyndris]

That's really awesome, my ball python Crowley would be a dragon type pokemon as I always call him my little dragon or even Crowlron (named after Shenron from DBZ). He also climbs a lot for a ball python and likes to be up in the "trees" (his gyms and branches) like I'd assume little dragons would like to perch up in the trees like he does.

Here is a picture of Shenron I drew with Crowleys pattern:

[RedRabbit]

So cute so cute so cute!! You sound experienced in this... do you take more pics like this? I'd love to see a little series. You should make your snakes an instagram account or something. I'm sure they'd be stars, haha.

I'd say my bp would either be a grass type, because he loves to pull down all his plants every night, or a ground type, because he pushes all the coconut fiber around and burrows sometimes.

Thank you, guys! To answer your question, royalreilly, I actually do have an Instagram account for my snakes!: https://www.instagram.com/iggy_and_rae/
However, it's a fairly new account (only just made it last month, at the suggestion of some friends), so I'm still in the slow process of cropping/resizing and watermarking my older photos to post onto the account. The Instagram will probably be all caught up within the next couple of weeks, but in the meantime, I always post our newest adventures here first anyway, because I love it here and it's thanks to the advice from this forum that my snakes are currently happy, healthy, and willing to put up with my silly photo ideas.

Your BP sounds like an adorable little troublemaker, and he could totally be a combo type, Grass and Ground - like Torterra, another reptile-inspired Pokémon!

[RedRabbit]

That's really awesome, my ball python Crowley would be a dragon type pokemon as I always call him my little dragon or even Crowlron (named after Shenron from DBZ). He also climbs a lot for a ball python and likes to be up in the "trees" (his gyms and branches) like I'd assume little dragons would like to perch up in the trees like he does.

Here is a picture of Shenron I drew with Crowleys pattern:

Oh man Valyndris, can Crowlron grant wishes?! Do we need to assemble seven marble-sized Dragon Balls first?

I love the picture, and I think it'd be awesome if more artists used natural patterns found on different snake and lizard species when drawing Eastern and Western style dragons. Your Shenron also looks like he could be a Coral Glow/Banana or a Lavender Albino!

[Bogertophis]

OMG! (I missed this thread yesterday) Awesome photos, Iggy & Rae actually look like they're really "into it" too! So creative & such good snake "PR"!

BTW, did you feel the Ridgecrest earthquake where you are? I'm a former So Cal resident of many years & many quakes- and while I'm digressing, a good way
to keep your cages -or many other things- from sliding around in an earthquake is to install "peel & stick" weatherstripping on the undersides...the weight of
the cage (or other object) pushes down on the rubber stripping, keeping it from sliding. Lost NO cages in the Landers quake and I lived mighty close to the
epicenter.

[RedRabbit]

OMG! (I missed this thread yesterday) Awesome photos, Iggy & Rae actually look like they're really "into it" too! So creative & such good snake "PR"!

BTW, did you feel the Ridgecrest earthquake where you are? I'm a former So Cal resident of many years & many quakes- and while I'm digressing, a good way
to keep your cages -or many other things- from sliding around in an earthquake is to install "peel & stick" weatherstripping on the undersides...the weight of
the cage (or other object) pushes down on the rubber stripping, keeping it from sliding. Lost NO cages in the Landers quake and I lived mighty close to the
epicenter.

Haha, Iggy was a little too "into" it, he kept making a beeline for Rae's side of the playing field!

As for the Ridgecrest earthquake, fortunately I'm located farther south, closer to the Los Angeles area, so we didn't get hit with anything serious; the house creaked and the shower doors rattled a little, but that was about it. Definitely not the intensity of the Landers earthquake! Good tip about the rubber strips, though. I actually already use the peel-and-stick rubber pads on the bottoms of my snake tubs, since the ones I use have enough thickness to also prop up some space for cords/probes and for the UTH to safely ventilate. Our minds think alike.

[Luvyna]

I missed this when it first came out but I'm super glad to have seen it now! I love how Iggy and Ravus seem to have different personalities in these photos matching the type you gave them—Iggy looks all fired up and ready to go, while Ravus looks cool and unruffled like he's already seen plenty of Pokemon battles haha. You have such creative ideas for all these photoshoots, can't wait to see what you come up with next.

Based on Noodle's colours he seems like he'd be a fire or electric type, but his personality is so docile, shy, and gentle that I don't think he'd be much of a fighter.