Tips for Great Animal Portraits

Today at Wintergreen dog yard. We're bouncing around the dog yard, which can hold up to a hundred dogs. You got a hundred dogs barking, especially during feeding in the morning when it's absolutely, frenzy and chaos. You can get some remarkable action shots of the dogs, as they are waiting to get fed. Once they get fed they calm down. And when they calm down, it's like anybody, it's a good time to get portraits of the dogs. So one of the things, you know you get these great portraits of these dogs. And like right now Ohlee, has got his legs crossed. Oh, look at that, it's just fantastic. If I go over there... Hi Ohlee, hi Ohlee! If get too close to him... I'll try to get a shot now while he's got his legs crossed, Cause the minute I walk over to him, he's so excited. He wants to see me. He gets up and I missed the shot. So what I'm gonna do is try the old technique where I don't look at him and I'm just gonna inch a little closer and then I'm gonna go down. Op, I heard him get up. He got up. Oh, wait, he'll go back down. Oh, see, there it is. So I've got a longer lens on. Ohlee, Ohlee! Oh, there it is. He's got his legs crossed. We've got a long lens on because I can get tight without getting right up next to him. One of the things that I want to point out is that if you look at the dog yard, if you get down low there's busy stuff, you know, there's wires, what have you, that keep the dogs from each other. And, But yet there are flat evenly colored surfaces behind them. So when Millie was up on her yellow dog house, I've got a brown background. It's great for photographers because it's almost like having your own backdrop back there. I can find a position to where I can eliminate all this confusing information behind them. You know, all the poles coming out of their heads, other color. Get to a spot where you can just get a nice clean background. It's a beautiful portrait then of just a dog. So just like the guides, just like your friends just like the people on the trip, the real stars of the show here are the dogs. And so this is where you want to spend a lot of time getting your portraits. So remember now, the other thing is to make sure after you've gotten your shot of your dog, you know. You want to make sure you know who the dog is. I don't mind taking a shot of the frame. And It happened right after I got the shot at, so I know that that's Millie. That's a great way to be able, especially for if you're shooting for publication. You can not send a picture in to an editor and say, "Oh, Wintergreen sled dog." You need to say, "This is Millie, at the Wintergreen Sled Dog Lodge." And that's how you really impress your editors. And you create information for yourself that's important to have. You don't want to bypass that. It's too important. You got to know the names of the dogs. Right, McKenzie? Yeah. So we've got some new puppies here at Wintergreen. And these Inuit dogs are so cute and cuddly. So what we've got here is Bob, one of Wintergreen's guides here. We've got two gorgeous Inuit puppies. And one of the things that we're gonna do is we're gonna get a portrait of Bob with the pooches. I'm gonna pass one off here and you can see it's impossible to not get a great shot of a puppy, right? But there are some things you want to consider when you're doing it. One of the first things we do is, when you got the pups like this, we have an overcast day, overcast skies. So if we're in a position where, like right now, if you look behind Bob, we've got a lot of sky. If you get down low and you include that sky your eye goes to the brightest and the sharpest spots first in any photograph. So if there's sky behind him, it's gonna compete with the puppies and with the shot of Bob. So one of the things you want to do as a photographer is you can either talk to your subject. Bob, if you wouldn't mind, come on over here. If you can stand right here, Bob. Now, look at the background. Now, here's the other thing is that I'm going to walk Bob forwards. Just follow me Bob. And the reason I'm moving him forward is that the closer he gets to the tree the more of the tree becomes in focus. Again, competition with the shot. So if we can pull him away from it, shoot wide open aperture, you don't have to shoot all the way down, but shoot wide open to help throw this background out of focus. You'll get a much cleaner shot of Bob in the portrait. So the other thing is that, you know you don't necessarily need to get a full length shot of Bob. Where's the important information here? It's from right here, to right here. So you get shots of the pooches and you get shots of Bob and then you've got your shot. So shoot wide open, if you can. Blur the background, keep the sky out, and come in tight. Vertically and horizontally whichever way you think is best but that's the best way to get shots. And you'll see, these guys can be really cute. And if you need, you know, we can... You have a more comfortable way to hold 'em Bob. Are you okay? Oopsy, it's okay, sweetie. There we go. Oh my gosh, look at that. That's just, how cute is that? So just go ahead and get your portraits and get your shots of these guys. When you get the opportunity, when you can. And one of the other nice things to do here is to... You can zero in on the puppy's faces. You can photograph all of them. I mean, some of the times nice... Bob would you do me a favor, bring them closer together, so they're kind of close. I'm going to come in and get just a portrait of the puppy's eyes. Oh, he's so darn cute. And if I pull back a little, you'll see. If I pull back a little bit and I've gone to vertical. All right, Bob, nice smile now. We're gonna put the paint on you. Oh, fantastic. See, oh my gosh. That's when you come in close here, see. Fabulous. Next thing you know you've got your great shot of a puppy. You've got a shot of a guide. You've got parts of Wintergreen. You've got great eye candy for any story. Picture, story, presentation you're giving. Cause you just can't lose with puppies.