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August 09, 2007
[ PET PROJECT ]
IMAGING’S CAT IS OLD (would you believe twenty years), beautiful and infuriatingly uncooperative when it comes to having her picture taken.
The first rule of pet photography is to get the camera on the level of the animal, which is all very well. As soon as she sees the camera near the ground she comes straight up to it and rubs her cheeks against the lens, presumably marking it as her property. Which means that the best way to get her to pose is to put her up on a place where she can’t move too much, such as the back of a chair.
Even after we have imposed rule number one of pet photography – be on the same level as the animal – we must implement rule number two. Have an assistant. To get any animal to look animated it must be entertained or it will fall into its natural state of torpor if it’s a cat or, in the case of dogs, will lick the lens.
Pet portraits are no different from the human equivalent. You are trying to capture the personality of the Best Friend, so she needs to be alert and perhaps even a little alarmed. At the very least she needs to be offered a peacock feather as a stimulant.
Rule three is to use available light. Turn off the flash. For some reason that animal ophthalmologists can explain dogs and cats are more prone to flash red-eye even than humans. We have seen many a picture of a red-eyed hell hound or an evil witch’s familiar with ruby orbs where her eyes should be.
Filtered light through a window is nice. Or, if outdoors, an overcast day always produces better results than bright sunlight. If the animal sports a full range of tones from black nose to white socks then remember that the dynamic range of the digital sensor is being pushed to its limits. In bright sun the blacks will be inky blobs and the whites will be completely featureless.
Set the camera exposure meter to centre-weighted or spot and auto-expose from the brightest area on the animal’s body. If your best friend is a sulphur crested cockatoo you may need to make an exposure adjustment – usually towards under exposure – in order to preserve the white feather detail.
Consider the background. If your moggie is a miniature tiger with a primitive hunting instinct then she may best be photographed emerging from a backyard jungle, but usually it is easier to get a stand-out pet portrait against a plain or unfussy background. A longer focal length lens will soften or blur the background.
Including the animal’s human in the picture, holding the Best Friend, solves the problem of getting the camera and the subject onto the same level and, when well done, captures the relationship of the two.
Now, the most important rule. Get close. Remember the golden rule of photography – if your pictures are no good you are standing in the wrong place. Focus on the eyes. Set the camera’s autofocus to centre spot so that it coincides with the auto exposure area and then aim at the animal’s eye, half depress the shutter and, if necessary reframe while holding the button halfway down.
How hard is that?
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Posted by terry at August 9, 2007 06:06 AM
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Comments
Hullo Terry
Good reviews; useful and interesting and funny
'Pet portraits are no different from the human equivalent. You are trying to capture the personality of the Best Friend, so she needs to be alert and perhaps even a little alarmed. At the very least she needs to be offered a peacock feather as a stimulant.'
I did notice you wrote this at 6.06am ..
cheers
pm
Posted by: peter mumme at August 14, 2007 11:52 PM
Hmmm. I didn't write and post the article at 6.06am, but I'm glad you have pointed this out to me. For some reason I have never noticed these posting times at the bottom of an entry. I presume that the time shown is the time that the entry is uploaded to the blog, which is hosted on a site in the US. Verrry interesting.
Posted by: Terry at August 16, 2007 04:43 AM