You have to be ready to shoot from the hip when it comes to pet photography if you wish to capture those special unexpected moments, but there are situations were you will be able to prepare in advance. In this article, I will share my seven favourite photo tips for pet photography. Hopefully, it will help you take even better photos of your animal companions.
1. Don’t be afraid to experiment. With the advent of the modern digital camera, pet photography suddenly became much faster and cheaper. You don’t have to wait ages for photos to develop or pay a fortune at the chemist; you simply point and click and the photo will turn up an instant later in the camera display. Once you plug your camera into the computer, you will get an even better version of the picture that you can study in detail to learn more about which techniques that work for you and what you wish to change. Taking long photo series using different techniques, set-ups and lightings is a great way of learning more about pet photography. Be playful and don’t hesitate to try new ideas.
2. Try doing a set of prepared photographs. Start by deciding which pet to capture on film and against which background. Make the first set of photos very basic and simplistic, using a simple non-distracting background and keeping the surroundings straightforward and clutter free. Then take a few more series of photos, gradually including more items in the picture or trying different backgrounds. As you review your photos, you will develop a feeling for which type of background and surroundings that work best and how you can use different settings to achieve different types of pet photos.
3. Do another more improvised photo session where you encourage your pet to play and move around a lot. Taking a long row of pictures of a pet that’s genuinely enjoying itself will often yield at least a handful of really charming and beautiful images.
4. Don’t be afraid to use computer programs for picture management. You don’t have to learn and understand each and every function of programs like Photoshop and Office Picture Manager to be able to use them; just start by learning a few basic functions and then gradually advance to more complicated functions when, and if, you have need for them. You can for instance start by learning how to crop pictures; i.e. how to cut away unnecessary parts of the photograph to focus on what’s important. After all, you want to show of your adorable little terrier, not the pile of clutter it’s sitting next to.
5. Lighting is a very important aspect of pet photography. Pick one of your pets and let it model for photo sessions during different parts of the day to see how the photos change depending on the light. Try morning light, midday light, afternoon light, and early evening light – and don’t forget to pay attention to the shadows. Also take series of evening pictures with and without the flash. You can also experiment with other light sources than the flash. Generally speaking, natural morning and late afternoon light tend to generate the best pictures, especially if you’re a beginner, but other types of light can generate really impressive effects so don’t hesitate to include them in your experimentation.
6. When you have experimented with different lights, its time to involve the shutter if you have a camera that allows you to adjust shutter speed manually. The shutter is the part of the camera that lets in light and a slow shutter speed will allow more light to come in than a fast one. It is therefore common to decrease the shutter speed when taking pet pictures in poor lighting conditions without using the flash, e.g. indoors and in the evening. A pitch black environment will of course require a flash regardless of shutter speed, but adjusting the shutter can have a huge impact in semi-dark environments.
7. Pictures of pets in their “natural” environment are often very eye-catching. If you have a parrot, let it pose sitting in your potted palm-tree instead of simply putting it on top of its practical but quite unsightly modern aluminium cage. Is your best friend a water-loving Newfoundland? Take it to the beach and let it show off its true colours in front of the camera. If you wish to take wonderful pictures of guinea pigs, rabbits and similar grazers, give them a playpen in your garden and bring them out to enjoy the green grass on a day when the climate is favourable. (There are foldable playpens that can be brought to the nearest park if you don’t have a garden.)
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The author is an avid pet photographers and has a special interest in photographing fish. You can find the author and a lot of photography tips on fish photo forum under the username William.
