Dogs Photography

Dogs (or pet generally), like kids, will not keep still when you are shooting photos of them and frankly, you do not want to shoot a dog that is very quiet, sitting or lying there without any motion or expression... well... you will be better off shooting a statue.

Anyway, herewith, I would attempt to touch on some aspect of the dog photography in my very limited experience. I have not yet try the servo or continuous shooting of the dog. You can actually treat them like how you would do panning, slower shutter speed, but follow your dogs through.

Of course you need a lens that is very fast in acquiring AF, or it is very difficult to get a sharp shot of your moving pet.

Well... to say the truth, my lenses do not acquire AF very fast, thus I did quite a bit of manual focusing, which sometime is faster than the AF itself. And normally prefocus in a certain area and when the dog came into view, I shoot.

But in good lighting, focus can be quite alright though.

Well in this shot, the lighting is terrible, my 70-200mm f4L lens had a problem locking on focus. So I generally manual focus the entire shot. I knew the pup would be running up the stairs from around that area, manual focus to the area and when she came, I just shoot and pray it hits.


ISO: 400
Shutter Speed: 1/60
Aperture: f/4

Another thing about your pet... is... try to shoot at a lower angle, so that you can face it directly... like what I do with the pic to the left. In that pic, I use a external flash to light up the face and to aid in my focusing. However I twist the flash away from her face and use a bounce card to soften the glare, so as not to give too harsh a lighting and to make her uncomfortable.

ISO: 400
Shutter Speed: 1/250
Aperture: f/4

 Now, I did mentioned that you would not want your dog to be too still... it would be like taking photo of a statue. But sometime when your puppy or matured dog is still, it can also be quite a piece of art, if you know how to shoot them well.

Using what I have... the dog slacking on the ground, leaning onto the leg of the chair, her reflection on the marble floor and stuff like that to achieve the effect I want and make an interesting pic.

Note that for this type of shots, you would not want to use the flash. First it will break the lazy nature of the slacking dog... and it will consume the reflection.

So in bad lighting, pump up your ISO to achieve the fast enough shutter speed.

Taking photos of pets, your shutter speed must be fast enough.


ISO: 2000
Shutter Speed: 1/60
Aperture: f/4

Like I have said before, try to keep your camera aimed at eye level to your puppy, dog or pet. It will be more dramatic... and if you have to be laying on the ground, so be it.

For this shot, I am on the hot ground, positioning myself for a shot... as it was a blistering afternoon and my miniature bull terrier is sunning herself.

She seemed quite interested at the 7D pointing at her... but make no effort to come after the cam.




ISO: 100
Shutter Speed: 1/1000
Aperture: f/5

Okay, this shot is done with me standing up, so I can get her entirely in my frame.

And it works, it also show her whole body and how she slack when sun tanning.

Herewith, I keep my aperture small, so that I ensure that I have her totally sharp in my frame.

ISO: 100
Shutter Speed: 1/200
Aperture: f/11

Like shooting in the field or taking any photos... you must tell a story with your photo.

In this shot, my bull terrier miniature was looking into the kitchen whereby her food was being prepared. It tell a story of the dog being hungry, greedy or was just waiting longingly to be fed.

That very picture, tell lots of things... and it rising questions too... so I like this pic alot.



ISO: 1600
Shutter Speed: 1/13
Aperture: f/5.6


Also in dog photography (pet photography), your dogs have very funny expressions... capture those expression as much as possible.

The puppy is playful... and it is the type of expression that I wanted to take. I have been waiting for her to do it... position my camera and shoot.

Of course this photo is taken in good lighting and so focusing is pretty fast... but even then, I have risen the ISO value up pretty much to ensure that I have a fast enough shutter speed.

ISO: 3200
Shutter Speed: 1/640
Aperture: f/4

Because puppy are moving pretty fast, if your speed is anything lesser than the equivalent of the speed she moved, you will get blurred pictures, so to ensure your relatively sharp shots, rise your speed up as fast as was possible... and sometime it will reach 1/1000 sec, you do what you can.

Shooting animal is like shooting human being... facial expression is important... and sometime you do not need your model to be looking at you. Sometime you want her to look the other way.




ISO: 3200
Shutter Speed: 1/250
Aperture: f/5


Well... for animal shots, it is the same... the only different is... you cannot command her to look the other way... or it would either be too unnatural or you need professional training of the dog to do it.

So in the above photos, I was laying on the floor for quite a period of time, waiting... then shoot when I saw that the puppy is looking other way. And it show the white of her eyes... making the entire photo interesting... as if she was ignoring me.

In conclusion, there are many ways of taking dogs photo... not all of them require the dog to be running around and jumping around. Dogs had expression of their own. Capture those expressions and you will be successful.