Perfect Your Pet Photography With These Practical Tips

Photo by David Burleson 

Taking snaps of your beloved pet can be a little tricky and troublesome. Your cat may not want to linger in one specific spot while your pooch, in its infinite curiosity, might try and sniffle your lens until it becomes an opaque garner of the dog’s saliva. But don't worry; My-Picture have got a few tips on how you can perfect your pet photography and hopefully, carry out a photo shoot with ease. 

Recognise Personality

It’s safe to say that each and every one of our pets are truely unique and have original personalities so it makes sense to try and capture these traits in our photographs. If you have a lazy four-legged pooch, capture them in their bed or favourite snoozing spot while if you have a cat who's a hyperactive rocket of fur, make sure you capture the essence of this as they run from one side of your apartment to the other.  

Get Down Low & Close 

As we often look down to see our pets, you can give your images a unique perspective by getting down low and don't forget to focus on the eyes. With features like LiveView, getting a composition from ground-level is easy enough.

If you can, get close to your pet so you can fill the frame with their furry face. Most cameras have a pet mode that is useful for beginners or try using aperture priority mode and use a wide aperture to throw the background out of focus. Want the background to be more out of focus? Try to position the animal further away from it as more distance allows the background to be thrown out of focus easier. As for lens choices, you can't go wrong with a nice 70-200mm f/2.8. 

Follow Movement 

Shots of your pet running, chasing, jumping or performing a 360 spin in mid-air as they reach for a flying frisbee are fab but capturing them can be easier said than done as dogs, in particular, are fast and they can be unpredictable. Having someone with you will definitely be a big help as you can ask them to call for the dog while you concentrate on capturing images.

Try autofocus with continuous shooting and see if it can track the subject. It might cope well but as dogs move quickly and their coats are low contrast, autofocus can be tricky so try manually pre-focusing on a particular spot and when your dog runs to it, press the shutter. You'll also need a reasonably fast shutter but not so fast that the dog is frozen in the image. Having a mix of sharpness and blur can work well, or just use an even slower shutter speed for more blur to exaggerate its movement. 

Watch The Light

If you're trying to capture fast-moving subjects in low light, such as indoors at an event,  you’re going to need to use higher ISOs or use a bit of flash. However, sometimes flash photography isn't allowed so do check. As with portraits of people, if you're working outside with natural light, try organising your shoot early in the morning on later in the day when the sun's not so high in the sky. For maximum detail in the coat, a bright sky when the sun is gently diffused by high cloud can work well.

We hope these tips help you perfect your pet photography so you can capture a shot that's worthy of a National Geographic cover or at least  a canvas print to decorate your wall with.