I was recently privileged to photograph a friend's pet dog. Biscuit, a 15-year-old terrier-chihuahua mix, was deaf, ailing, and not expected to live much longer. His owner was in desperate need of photographs to remember him by. I didn't have a lot of experience in pet portraits, but it was an important job and I knew I'd learn something by doing it. We met at a local park with a large, grassy field. Some things worked and some things didn't. I'll go through some of the photographs and tell you what I learned.



Just Run Around

I started out just letting Biscuit walk around and explore, following him with a 70-200 telephoto lens. Since I knew I would be getting close-up portraits later, I was going for a full body shot here. His crooked tail and awkward gait were apparent in these first photographs. These aren't award-winning features for a dog to have, but in showing them Biscuit's unique characteristics are revealed.

Stand Still

Having Biscuit's owner present made things much easier for me. While she told Biscuit what to do and offered him treats as rewards, I was able to concentrate on the photographs. We wanted a shot of Biscuit posing for the camera, standing still. I again used a 70-200 telephoto lens to keep the background clean and pleasantly blurred. The photograph below was the best one we got from this setup. Since striking a pose was not one of Biscuit's strengths, we moved on to the close up.

Time For Your Close Up

This was the photograph I was after from the beginning. If you want your photographs to look professional, use shallow depth of field and get in real close. Doing so will give you a photograph that clearly didn't come out of a point and shoot camera. For these photographs, the dog's owner stood behind me to fix the Biscuit's attention in my direction. Again, a 70-200 telephoto lens focused on the eyes and shot at a large aperture.

Once we had these close up photographs I knew we had something. And at that point the pressure to produce becomes a little less of a weight. That doesn't mean stop shooting. It means you can take a few more chances.

One More Thing

While I knew that Biscuit was the focus of the photo shoot, I asked his owner to hold him up for a portrait of the two of them. This made for a nice photograph, the two of them smiling at the camera. I knew they would like that photo, but I wanted to get something more. The key was to wait for a moment or two to see if anything developed naturally. It did. After a few smiling shots, Elaine planted a kiss on Biscuit (below). To me, that was the shot. If you're in this situation, there's no reason you couldn't ask the owner to kiss their pet. But the natural moment always looks better.