Do you find it too difficult to shoot fabulous photos of your pet? Well, you’re not alone. Even professional photographers sometimes find it difficult to get a photoshoot done with a fussy pet. Taking wonderful pet pictures requires patience, a few tips, and creativity. And I’m going to tell you the secret about taking holiday perfect pet pictures to post on social media in this article.
Christmas holidays are approaching and who won’t be excited to celebrate the festival and share great photos of themselves and their beloved pets on social media? Whether it’s a holiday card, Instagram post, or a wall portrait, it’s incomplete without your furry family member in it. Here are some tricks and tips for you to click paw-liday perfect pet photos.
Understand Your Pet Well
You won’t have to expect your pet to be extraordinary to look good in photos. A happy pet doing what he likes will do. If you’re planning to have a professional photographer, you’ll have to tell what’s your dog’s favorite spot in the house or where he feels the most alive. For example, if your cat feels confident and happy sitting on his window perch or your dog is the happiest at the park, you should do the shoot there.
Ethan from Catlovesbest says, “A good thing about letting your pet just be himself for a shoot is you won’t have to make your dog pose for anything. Some candids and obedience training commands will do the job.”
Have A Play Session Just Before the Shoot
A dog with pent up energy will more likely to make a fuss. Similarly, a cat in a playful mood will be more active and moving; making it difficult to take pictures.
Your silly beloved pets don’t even know what a photoshoot or camera is. All they know is to love you and your company. If they’re playful, they will be super active and want to jump, run, play, and chase things. If they’re tired, they would stay calm, still, and tend to relax. The catch here is you’re supposed to click photos when your pet is relaxing.
Choose Appropriate Lighting
Generally, you should use the bright natural light to click better pictures. If you’re shooting indoors, draw the curtains and let the sunlight get in. A well-lit place will automatically add vivid colors to the pictures.
You can also use small catch-lights to click even better photos. A catchlight will make the eyes of your pet more elegant.
Let’s talk about low light photos now. Bright light can make your pet’s pupil narrow down, similarly, low light will cause dilated pupils. If you want to shoot photos of your cat with bigger pupils, try to keep the light optimum. However, you should keep in mind the difference between a poorly lit photo and a low-light photo, and should always avoid the former.
Declutter the Place
This is one of the most underrated tips for clicking holiday perfect pet photos. Your pet’s bedding, extra toys, and other useless props in the background make the photo look ordinary. You can simply make it look quite better by de-cluttering the background or rearranging the objects.
Choose an Appropriate Perspective
The most common mistake people do is they don’t get to their pet’s level to click photos. Edwin from Petlovesbest says, “If you don’t do so, photos will look like you’ve shot them from a certain height making them look like one of those random clicks. And it’s never a good idea to post them on social media.”
Positioning a camera at the eye level of your pet is a thumb rule to remember for taking good pet photos. Sometimes you would even have to lay down on the ground. In a nutshell, unless you require to change the perspective, you should get to your pet’s level to take those stunning photos to flaunt them on social media.
Take Enough Breaks and Ensure Your Pet’s Comfortable
The photoshoot can be daunting because you just can’t tell your dog where to look and stay still. Your pet can get bored and tired and need some break from your commands and relax alone for a while. You can continue the shoot after a quick break.
Keep in mind that your pet’s comfort is paramount. If your pet’s Christmas costume is too uncomfortable, you should go with something simple. A holiday collar or bandana will just work fine. Your pet’s charm is enough to make him look the happiest and handsome.
Moreover, try to look for the places decorated around your neighborhood which you can use for a photo shoot. If your pet doesn’t make a fuss about visiting different places for a shoot, you can click a variety of holiday photos easily.
Grab Your Pet’s Attention and Click A Lot of Pictures
You’ll need your pet to look directly into the lens of the camera. You know how you can grab the attention of your beloved furry buddy. You can use obedience commands like sit, stay, and hold a treat just near a camera lens. A squicky toy works well too.
Don’t hesitate to click more pictures because that one shot you aimed to be perfect isn’t good enough.
Post Processing of Images
This is crucial and unavoidable for great pictures. You’ve already done a great job by clicking pawesome holiday photos and all you now need to do is a little bit of editing and fixing a few things.
You can use Adobe Lightroom, Photoshop, or any good image editing tools you’re familiar with. If you’re not quite familiar with the tools, just ask for your friend’s help with touch-ups. This includes color corrections, adjusting exposures, sharpening, dodge and burn, red-eye correction, etc. For making posts on social media, you will have to put photos in the standard dimensions of the platform you’re going to post them on.
Article written by Clara Lou is Co-founder and the Head of Marketing at Petlovesbest.com. Pet Loves Best is a one-stop solution for all your pet supplies shopping and pet-related queries
Image by Wokandapix from Pixabay