I’VE promised not to call him the Dog Whisperer.

He has his head in his hands when I mention the phrase. “Please don’t lumber me with that,” he asks.

But just what is Lee Fretter’s secret with our four-legged friends?

He makes his living from taking photographs of pets and very relaxed they look too in what he produces.

Anyone who has worked with animals or had them roaming about the house knows they can make some unpredictable turns that can leave you very surprised.

But Lee has somehow mastered a technique of getting them fairly relaxed and pliable as they go in front of the camera.

One look at his shots and it is apparent that the pets are comfortable and even enthusiastic about posing under the studio lights which Lee carts around from home to home.

“I don’t know how I do it. But I’d say that I probably have just one or two failures a year and even then they still make a good photograph,” says the 34-year-old.

A past life as a veterinary nurse might also have helped him with his understanding of animal behaviour. He did the job for 13 years in and around Huddersfield before taking up photography full time.

It’s been a move which has paid off and Lee is now one of the most sought-after pet photographers around, a reputation which was sealed by a recent spread in Practical Photography magazine.

Lee travels to homes around the country, including places like Birmingham, Milton Keynes and Warwick to take portraits of dogs and cats.

Increasingly, customers are asking for photos of other pets such as horses, rabbits and parrots.

Horses can be the biggest problem, he reckons, but even then he is proud of what he produces. “They’re their own animal,” he says.

Photography started as a hobby for Lee during his years as a veterinary nurse and at that time he concentrated on landscape and botanical views.

But when he put some of them in display in a pub near his home in Almondbury, he got a request to photograph a customer’s Yorkshire terrier puppies.

He’s not looked back since and turned professional two years ago.

Pet owners don’t get your standard 6in by 4in print from him. Instead, they can order a stunning contemporary mount for the wall.

Lee says: “Most pets adapt really well while I am there and I manage to choreograph them in a way their owners never thought possible.

“I don’t get many mishaps, but when I first started out there was a Staffordshire bull terrier puppy which ran towards me as I went into the house and jumped up into my arms.

“I missed him and grabbed him around his waist, which resulted in him weeing all over me. It looked as if I’d had an accident myself.”

Lee likes to photograph pets from the comfort of their own home and many of his pet portrait sessions are currently free with no obligation to buy.

“The average pet portrait session takes 20 minutes,” says Lee. “But sometimes it can last an hour and on occasions there are times when I have struck lucky and taken just five minutes.”

When he is not photographing, he likes to spend time with fiancee Sarah Skitmore and their cocker spaniel Gibson, who is featured on his website.

Sarah runs a mobile pet grooming service and the pair also have a rabbit called Harvey and two cats called Devil and Udder, so pets are very much a way of life.

“Pet photography is challenging, but hugely rewarding,” says Lee.

See Lee’s website at www.pictureson.co.uk or phone on 01484 319467, mobile 07884 230817.