Photography Magazine

Photographing pets is one of the most common of reasons why people buy cameras at all. Pets, children, family get-togethers and the likes of such everyday subjects make up the blk of photography of the ‘usual’ kind. Since photographing pets is one of the most common of reasons for people investing into cameras, we decided to run an article on how this can be done best.

When you are taking photographs of pets, remember it is much like photographing toddlers. Babies trust very few people, and so do pets. It will be difficult to get good images of a pet if its owner is not on location, especially if it is only a few times that you have met the animal. So, make sure that the pet owner is around, and ask him or her to interact with the pet as you look on and take photographs. Photographing a portrait of the pet with its owner is also a great idea. If you are looking for an individual portrait shot of the animal, you could ask the owner to stand by your side while you focus your camera on the dog or whatever it is that you are photographing. Well, thats the psycological part of things, now for the technical.

Use slightly higher shutter speeds, because the movement of an animal can be quite unpredictable, especially in the case of very young and active ones. Cats tend to dart at things all of a sudden, and so do puppies. Wait for the right moment - this is imperative. Pets rarely pose for you. Keep the animal in the vie finder at all times and be ready to fire away at literally a moment’s notice. More often than not, you miss the good shots simply because your finger was not present on the shutter release button, even if your eye was on the viewfinder. Keeping all this in mind, it is good to use fast ISO settings and greater depth of field and shutter speeds. However, if the pet tends to sit still for a bit, go to the larger apertures and thus blur out the back ground.

Another HUGE point here - ALWAYS get down to the eye level of the pet while photographing a portrait. It works wonders as far as composition goes, and also makes things more ‘personal’ if you may. You can interact much better with the animal from it’s eye level. The greatest pet portraits, as you will see on web sites and in magazines, have been photographed from low levels, in other words - the eye levels of the pets.

Finally, you may want to make sure that the pet is looking well-groomed, especially if the shoot is for professional reasons. A shining coat of fur makes the pet, and thereby our photograph, look that much better. Go ahead, have a great time photographing pets!