Beautiful Beasties: A Creative Guide to Modern Pet Photography by Pflughoeft

5 Pet Photography Tips from Beautiful Beasties

1. Have fun with it!

Make it a game. Be upbeat. Bring out the toys, participate in an activity your pet finds fun. For cats this may be a game involving tinfoil balls or a feather toy, for dogs this may be a squeaky toy. For horses, rodents and other pets, this is whatever puts them in the best mood–whatever their 'favorite' thing is.

2. Get on their level

Scoot, crouch, bend, scuffle, lay, twist, roll- whatever you need to to do get down and create photographs on the pet's level. Wear dirty clothes. No pet photographer ever worse expensive jeans and sneakers to a photo shoot.

Animals experience the world on a different plane than we do, and being able to create photographs captured on their level makes them more emotional, more engaging, and more connected, to the person that views the images.

3. Pay your model

You wouldn't expect a human model to work for you without payment right? So why should you expect an animal to work without getting paid? Figure out what's the most appreciate item for payment. A toy, a treat, an old rag, a carrot- whatever it takes to keep them engaged and motivated.

4. Pay attention to backgrounds

Nothing can ruin a perfectly good photo better than ugly, cluttered backgrounds. Nobody needs to see that old garden hose, or your dirty sock on the floor, in an otherwise beautiful photo of Rupert the cat.

Spend a few minutes before your photo session eyeballing the scene behind the animal. A few quick pickups of distracting 'junk' can mean you never having to say “Oh man, I wish that ____ wasn't in the photo” again, or spending unnecessary time in Photoshop or Lightroom. (Unless of course the offending object is something like a house or someone else's car, in which case–just move the animal).

5. Focus on expressions

Forget technical skill. Any pet owner will respond to an expressive, 'aww-inducing,' 'laugh-inspiring' photo over a technically perfect yet emotionally lacking photo any day of the week.

Capture a pet in the moment where it is expressing the essence of its personality, showing you it's true colors (whatever those may happen to be!), and the owner of the pet will forgive all manner of exposure, composition and other issues. All they really want is to say “You got him, you really got him!”.

If you hear “squeals”, “oohs,” or “ohhhs” coming from the pet's owner upon seeing your images, you know you've done something right.

Featured Photos from the Book:

I was laying on the floor on my belly playing with Taz the kitty, swishing his toy back and forth with my left hand, as my right hand controlled the camera. He didn't seem to mind me sticking my lens in his face, as long as we kept playing.
Technical information: 1/640 second at f/2.8, ISO 400, evaluative metering, 24-70mm f/2.8 L USM lens
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I had fleeting light here in which to capture Fergie launching herself into the air to catch a frisbee on the Pacific Coast in Washington. I metered off the sky and opened up my aperture to f/2.8 so I could make sure I had a fast enough shutter speed in the dying light to capture the action.
Technical information: 1/1250 second at f/2.8, ISO 400, evaluative metering, 20mm f/2.8 lens
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When I spotted the flowers at the nearby flower stall, I just knew I needed to have Skylark the puppy surrounded by them. Luckily she was an easygoing, mellow little girl who happily let me place her wherever I pleased. Here she looks out inquisitively at people and children passing by pointing and making “awwww” sounds at her.
Technical information: 1/60 second at f/5.0, ISO 125, evaluative metering, 20mm f/2.8 lens
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