So I worked with Kevin Horan last week shooting for a magazine you may have heard of called National Geographic.   The assignment was to photograph a pair of spider monkeys who are being tested for color blindness at the University of Washington’s research labs.  We got to the lab at about 7:30 AM and after a short safety briefing, where we were told we had to wear masks, gloves, booties, and disposable lab coats while were were in the lab with the monkeys.  This wasn’t for our protection, it was to protect the monkeys from our dirty human germs.   We donned the garb and proceeded into what was to be our “photo studio” for the next 6 hours; a tiny 10×12 room, half full of carts and cages and a computer and testing area, plus a sizable counter for food.  We were to add to this our soft boxes on stands, as well as additional background lights, not to mention the two researchers, the two monkeys, as well as Kevin and myself.  There was barely room to move, no windows, and no air conditioning.  Apparently spider monkeys like it warm and claustrophobic.   After setting up the lights, the first monkey is brought in and he’s very nervous, curious about the all the lighting equipment, and very interested in all of the food.  After some time exploring, he relaxed and started snacking our our cornucopia of delicious monkey treats.  Since the story was on color blindness, Kevin had arranged a variety of red and green fruits and veggies for the monkey could nosh on while we photographed him.  As much as we pushed the nice red strawberries and red bell peppers, apparently spider monkeys prefer green things like peas and green peppers.  They even prefer the green dots (the candy) over the red ones.  Who knew monkeys preferred green food?  By the end of our shoot, I loved both of the monkeys and wanted to bring them home with me.  However, I found no way of sneaking them into my pockets without being caught. One of the scientists mentioned that back in the 70’s,  spider monkeys used to be sold in ads in the back of Boy’s Life magazines.   When I got home, I looked this up and it turns out to be true.  Check it out. For 18.95, I could have ordered myself a spider monkey.  I can’t see that it’s very humane treatment to mail  monkeys to young American boy’s households, and I’m sure few parents allowed their kids to order one.  It turns out, raising spider monkeys is a fairly time-consuming and expensive.   They get sick very easily, need a lot of attention (as you can imagine, they are very clever), and require a variety of fruits, vegetables, and tropical insects to get proper nutrition.   Not an easy job for a 9 year old kid from Iowa.  So perhaps it’s best that they no longer sell monkeys in the back of kid’s magazines.  Anyway, these lab monkeys were born color blind and through the marvels of science, these researchers have found a way to inject some kind of scary sounding genetically altered virus into the eyes of these monkeys (ouch, and can you say “28 days later”?) and now they can see colors.  Soon color blindness will be curable!   Thanks little monkeys!  Look for the story in National Geographic Magazine coming soon!