Can you train a dog to 'smile'?

Emily_Babbelhund

Emily_Babbelhund

Mama Red HOT Pepper
Location
Regensburg, Germany
I'm not putting this is Carbon's thread because, frankly, he'd be embarrassed. You see, when photographed, he suffers from a horrible condition known as 'constipation face' aka 'Señor Grumpypantalones face'. It struck suddenly last October during out travels, somewhere between Venice and Nice. He had a lovely soft-eyed, open-mouthed smile...and then suddenly he didn't, and it's never come back. The question is, can he get his modelling mojo back through the miracle of clicker training?

I love taking dog travel photos and for the last few months, taking a photo of Carbon is about as heart-warming as photographing a dead fish. If he doesn't know I'm taking the photo (while he's playing for example) I still get happy dog photos, but if he's aware the camera is out...bring on the grump.

He has always gotten a treat after I take his photo and recently I've tried treating prior as well. I've also kept the sessions much shorter so he doesn't get bored. But no matter. He can be happy and wagging one second, but if he thinks the lens is on him, his expression goes to 'up yours, lady' real quick. As soon as I put the camera down, happy dog comes back immediately. Because of this, I've taken very few photos of him for the last couple months.

I thought the break would help, but yesterday we had a beautiful walk on the coast here in Cornwall and I couldn't help myself. I mainly tried to stay with scenery shots without Carbon (which I find kind of boring honestly). For the few shots where I included him, Carbon once again looks like just I spent four hours reading the full text of Theresa May's Brexit deal to him - i.e. simultaneously profoundly bored and displeased. (As a Spaniard, Carbon has quite strong views on Europe ;)).

This is my challenge to you trainers on the forum: is it possible to teach a dog to smile in photos with positive training? Ideally alert eyes looking at me (we're working on eye contact already) and a happy, relaxed mouth/jaw, preferably open to make a 'doggie smile'. I know that there are a lot of criteria there, so it would a multi-stage process, most importantly getting him to feel good again about a camera stuck to my face.

All ideas...even wacky ones...welcome! :D
 
Natalie

Natalie

Well I only need to do a silly, high pitch voice and maybe waggle a treat around... I have noticed though that maybe Monty gets annoyed with the amount of time I spend in front of screens, especially my mobile, a couple of times he's definitely tried to bat it out of my hand. Sorry, not much help from me but a gratuitous laughing dog shot:
20170502_144743-1.jpg
 
HAH

HAH

Moderator
Location
Devon, UK
I’m slightly embarrassed that Kipper is like a lot of small children these days (including my nieces and nephew), in that if a camera phone is pointed at them they do a ‘nice photo face/pose’ - his default is a smart sit and ears forward. So I’d say yes, it’s possible to teach this although I don’t know how I have... I suppose the approach would be to break it down into constituent behaviours then link it together, maybe using shaping? (I mean, so easy :rolleyes:)
 
snowbunny

snowbunny

Location
Andorra and Spain
Totally possible, if you have the skillz 😁

The challenge is identifying what the thing looks like, breaking apart the constituent parts and setting up an environment where you’re likely to get those criteria met.

I’m not saying it’s easy to clicker-train it, but it’s definitely possible.
 
Emily_Babbelhund

Emily_Babbelhund

Mama Red HOT Pepper
Location
Regensburg, Germany
Natalie said:
a gratuitous laughing dog shot
Click to expand...
I'll take that! Great photo of Monty. :sun:

Boogie said:
The pant is the smile.
Click to expand...
See, that's what I was wondering if I could click train by capturing. Might have to wait for warmer weather, though!

HAH said:
I’m slightly embarrassed that Kipper is like a lot of small children these days (including my nieces and nephew), in that if a camera phone is pointed at them they do a ‘nice photo face/pose’ - his default is a smart sit and ears forward.
Click to expand...
That's not embarrassing, that's what I want! If you see my avatar, that was Brogan's modelling pose, and he knew when the camera came out that we weren't moving until he put on a show. It was his default. Now, there's a physical difference between Rotties and Labs - much wider jaws and shorter noses in Rotties - that means they naturally 'smile' more than narrow-headed Labs like Carbon. But still, I know he can do it...

IMG_2820.JPG
 
Selina27

Selina27

Location
Herefordshire, UK
Cassie does the same as Carbon as soon as the mobile is pointing in her direction, I don't know whether she had too much of it when a puppy, or if maybe I have used the flash and she doesn't like it. It seems to be mostly me though, my son and daughter get better pics than me, as do the SW pack members!
 
Emily_Babbelhund

Emily_Babbelhund

Mama Red HOT Pepper
Location
Regensburg, Germany
OK, so we started Carbon's 'smile' training today. I actually have a good excuse as my newest class assignment is to pick a behaviour to capture and then work up to doing on cue. Not sure I got the lingo right there but hopefully that makes sense.

My criteria was anything but a tightly closed mouth, so even the slightest dropping of his jaw was to be clicked.

There was a lot of waiting. Carbon just doesn't open his mouth much! Carbon just stared and stared at me. Then he laid down. And stared at me some more. We've been working a lot on Watch Me and clearly this is becoming his default along with a down. Also I discovered that if I don't click him for Watch Me after a couple seconds, he flicks his eyes back and forth like he's looking at my hand with a treat to the side of my face. Apparently I've trained him to be goggle-eyed due to my poor clicker timing. Argh! But I digress...

With no open mouth on offer, I decided to use his stuffed pheasant (thanks @Boogie!) to help. I waved it gently in front of his face until he opened his mouth to take it, then clicked and treated. He enjoyed that as we like to play with the pheasant, so he thought we were just playing. I clicked for an open mouth about 10 times. Then put the pheasant behind my back and waited. NOTHING. Right back to staring at me with goggle eyes and doing a down over and over. I brought the pheasant back, clicked for open mouth about five times, then put it behind my back again. NOTHING. So I took my hand and jiggled my fist in front of him (same motion as before but without the pheasant). That worked and I clicked him a few more times.

One of the reasons for this exercise is to learn to capture and the difference between capture/lure/bait in training. Essentially I think that I've turned this into a 'lure' exercise. He's not getting what I want and I've lured him instead of waiting to capture the behaviour.

So should I have just stood there staring at him until he opened his mouth instead of using the pheasant? When do you give up? How do you keep your dog from getting frustrated?

All questions I'll ask our trainer tomorrow, but if anyone has ideas, bring them on!
 
snowbunny

snowbunny

Location
Andorra and Spain
So what you’re doing is shaping, which is different to capturing. Capturing is more like reinforcing your dog when they do something naturally about the course of their day, whereas shaping is where you click for successive approximations of a behaviour.
The mistakes most people make when shaping are: waiting too long for something to happen, and raising criteria too soon.
If you are waiting for more than a couple of seconds, you need to rethink what you’re doing. You need to set up the situation so that the dog will perform an approximation of the behaviour by default, or else make your criteria far smaller so that you can click very regularly - preferably aiming for a click every couple of seconds.
Otherwise, you risk creating frustration, and you can also build that pause into your behaviour.

In your case, I’d start clicking for breathing. Any slight twitch of the nostrils. If you’re not sure if you saw it, click it. And build from there. If you raise your criteria and you find yourself waiting for more than a couple of seconds, go back and get lots of clicks in for the behaviour you’re doing. You want to see the dog start to understand that he is controlling the click. And split into even smaller pieces if you can’t make the leap to your next criteria point.
 
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