For portrait photographer Martin Schoeller, known for his signature eye-to-eye, full-face portraits, the least of his worries is having his subject stand still on the X marked on his seamless background. But when it came to a three-legged decorated war hero, one leg lost to surgery after taking four rounds from an AK-47, this was exactly the problem.

Layka, a Belgian Malinois, a breed known to have inexhaustible energy—the highest of all dog breeds—graced the June 2014 cover of National Geographic magazine. “She was a celebrity in her own right,” Martin said, and after capturing a few frames, “I knew I had my hands full.”

Martin was going for a dignified look, fitting of a war dog that almost gave her life