Tips For Taking Digital Photos Of Puppies
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5 Awesome Tips For Taking Digital Photos Of Your Puppy
When it hits you that your new puppy will be a youngster for only a few months, you may decide to capture the memories while you can. These 5 tips for taking digital photos of your puppy will help you with this effort.
Pay attention to these tips and soon you will shoot pics every one will admire (and want copies of - be prepared!)So find the camera you use on vacation and start snapping the pup's expressions. Most dogs make excellent photography subjects.
Amateur Or Skilled Photographer
If you're skilled at photography, you'll take clear, properly composed shots of everything from the pup sleeping upside down to playing with his friends. If you're not skilled, use these tips for taking digital photos to your advantage.
Cameras and Equipment
A point-and-shoot digital camera or a Single Lens Reflex (SLR) digital camera is your main tool. An example of an excellent SLR is the best-selling Canon EOS Rebel T1i. This camera is an upgraded version of the one used to take the pictures in this lens (Canon EOS Rebel XTi).
Make sure you have plenty of picture cards.
For those with SLR digital cameras, a tripod comes in handy for portraits.
If you plan on cropping, color balancing, and otherwise adjusting pictures, get editing software like Photoshop or use the software that normally comes with a digital camera.
"Focus" on These Five Areas As You Take Your Picures
1. Lighting
2. Focus
3. Angle of Shot
4. Fill the Frame
5. Fix Your Mistakes
The next few modules address each of these tips for taking digital photos. Read them all before you grab the camera. You'll still take a lot of pictures, but they're be more exceptional pictures of your cute pup.
Tips For Taking Digital Photos - Let There Be LIGHT!
You Need the Right Lighting to Shoot Good Pictures!
Take the pictures where there's good lightning, either inside or outside. Experts say that outside on a cloudy day is the best lighting for dog pictures. Pictures that I take (with a digital SLR) in the sun are too blue and must be color adjusted.Use Your Flash When . . .
Flash does not always produce true colors. The one time where flash comes in handy is when the light is behind the dog (he's backlit). For example, your dog is lounging on a window seat (window behind him). He turns to you and you take a shot WITH flash. The result is a well lit frontal shot. Without the flash, the light is behind him and his face would be dark. he picture shown here was taken indoors with flash against a window.
Tips For Taking Digital Photos - Perfect Focus
Fuzzy Is Not How You Want People To Describe Your Puppy Pics
Out-of-focus shots are maddening. You've taken an outstanding puppy expression, but the picture's fuzzy. Get the dog's attention with a toy or another person and shoot away before he moves (uh huh!). You can use a tripod or rest the camera on something if you get blurring. When you use a telephoto lens, it's even harder to prevent camera shake.Automatic Focus
Basically, you have no excuse for an out-of-focus shot if you use automatic focus. If you keep getting fuzzy pics, you have not accounted for motion (dogs move a lot) by the camera's aperature and speed, or in a portrait situation, the camera is shaky.
The photo on the right might have been a good "teddy bear" shot. Unfortunately, Alvin's fuzzy face is out-of-focus.
Tips For Taking Digital Photos - Shot Angle
Get Down to the Dog's Level or Raise Him to Your Level
Try to shoot at the dog's level. Sometimes that's a little difficult but you need to be creative. Put the dog on a chair or a top stair so you can get to his level.Alternatively, you can lay on the floor to take a shot. Be aware that the dog might decide that since you're on the floor with him, it must be play time. Beware of the camera lens lick - it's hard to remove dog saliva from the lens.
To take the picture on the right, I sat Alvin in a patio chair. He looks like a little soldier because was concentrating on activity behind me.
Tips For Taking Digital Photos - Fill The Frame
Imagine The Final Picture Before You Shoot
When I was doing wedding photography, my partner kept insisting that I "fill the frame," especially for group shots. You'll get a quality picture if you move a little closer or zoom in until your subject fills the frame completely.Crop To Fill The Frame
You can always crop a picture to fill the frame, but why correct a picture if you can take a good shot when you're with the subject (your dog).
What happens with dogs is just after you've composed the perfect shot, they move. Every so often I'll use the contiuous shot feature on my camera. That way I take several pictures a few seconds apart.
Here's an improvement on the previous picture of Alvin in the chair by filling the frame with a cropped shot. I did not think about a close-up at the time I took the chair picture. It turns out the expression on his face was worth the crop.
Tips For Taking Digital Photos - Fix Your Mistakes (If You Can)
Perfect Your Photo!
Some mistakes can easily be fixed. For example, your picture is a wee bit too dark. You can lighten it up with your editing software. You don't have to pay big bucks - you can use the ediing software that comes with your camera OR search the web for free software.With a sophisticated program like Photoshop, you also can combine pictures, crop, layer, and fix the colors. You can even make a black and white picture. It is best to take a good picture initially, but that's not always going to happen.
The Camera Used To Take These Puppy Pictures
You Can't Beat A Canon Rebel Digital Camera
My camera is a Canon Rebel Xti Single Lens Reflex digital camera, an oldie when it comes to Canon's Rebel series of cameras.I'd love to get the most recent Canon Rebel - the Canon EOS Rebel T2i 18 MP CMOS APS-C Digital SLR Camera with 3.0-Inch LCD and EF-S 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 IS Lens
.It's a Rebel Digital Camera (they're the best) AND IT TAKES VIDEOS!!
What a great feature - great puppy pictures AND action, all with the same camera.
Hopefully, an elf will get me a Canon EOS Rebel T2i for Christmas!
Cool Things To Do With Your Dog Photos
Suggestions for Displaying the Best of Your Dog Pictures
You've got tons of pictures. What do you do with the best of your cute dog pictures? Here're my suggestions:1. You think your dog is the cutest dog ever (I do!). Enter him in a cute dog contest. Example at yapstar.com.
2. Make a video on animoto.com. It's easy and free. Here's several examples: alvin and simon's videos.
3. If the photos are really good, publish them on a site such as bigstockphoto.com. You can earn royalties.
4. Post your picture to a dog forum. Here's one I recently posted because it's different: Dog Heads Magically Disappear.
5. Save the good ones on Photobucket.com for easy access.
6. Post one on your PC desktop. Change the picture frequently.
7. Stage a contest on a forum or on Facebook for the best photo caption. People love to be creative. I posted the picture on this page to a dog forum and got some really interesting captions.
Create Captions For Photos Of Dogs
Generate Creative Captions For Your Photos Of Dogs
When you get to suggestion #7 in the previous section, you'll notice it talks about creating captions for photos of dogs.
I have recently been looking at the hundreds of pics of my dogs because I frequently include them in blog posts, articles, and ebooks. Several of these photos actually beg for captions like the above picture of Alvin in the ecollar.
Your Challenge
Create captions for these photos!
I have recently been looking at the hundreds of pics of my dogs because I frequently include them in blog posts, articles, and ebooks. Several of these photos actually beg for captions like the above picture of Alvin in the ecollar.
Your Challenge
Create captions for these photos!
Your Ideas For What To Do With Dog Photos
How do you communicate/display your puppy or dog pictures?
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Whitepines
Sep 20, 2010 @ 7:36 am | delete
- Thanks for all the great tips on photographing puppies. I am working on taking better photos of an all black dog who is camera shy!
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LKW31
Aug 11, 2010 @ 3:28 am | delete
- This lens has really fantastic and useful tips. I think it's great that you've used your dog photos here too!
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Spotlight - Canon EOS Rebel T2i With HD Video!
Shoot Stills And Video With The Same Camera
Canon EOS Rebel T2i 18 MP CMOS APS-C Digital SLR Camera with 3.0-Inch LCD and EF-S 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 IS Lens
Amazon Price: $629.99 (as of 02/16/2012)
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I'm a copywriter who loves taking photos of my two puppies Alvin and Simon. My old camera is the Canon EOS XTi. My new camera - Canon EOS T1i with HD... more »
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Amazon Price: $629.99 (as of 02/16/2012)
