Friends we have a new addition to the Shriver family! Meet Chase. He’s a nine week old German Shepherd. And yes he is named after the German Shepherd from Paw Patrol – any of my friends with kiddos get the reference. ;) He’s sweet, lovable, laid-back, great with the boys and with our almost five year old doggie Lucy. Chase fits in perfectly.

This is Lucy, our first puppy-child. She’s a rare combination of Australian Cattle Dog, Dingo, and Pit Bull Terrier. She can be a bit hyper, but is the sweetest love bug.

As I was out in the yard photographing these two this afternoon I thought it may be a good opportunity to share a bit about how I photograph my pets. Many of these tactics can apply to photographing kids, too.

1. Lighting: You don’t have control over whether it’s too bright (harsh light), too cloudy (flat light), or just right (what I call dynamic light). But you do have control over your camera’s settings and maximizing your camera’s abilities to give you the best result possible with your given lighting situation. You can also choose a certain time of day that can be better than others for the lighting you desire. I like about 1-2 hours before sunset. That’s when I took these images. I also like the look of mostly back-lit images. You can see the sunlight is falling on Lucy and Chase’s backs at about a 45 degree angle from me in the photo below. I try to have the sun at either my 10 o’clock or 2 o’clock.

The photo below has more flat lighting because we were in a large shady spot. So I dialed back my shutter speed to let in more light so the photo would be exposed properly. The following two images were in bright, harsh lighting. For those I increased my shutter speed for two reasons. 1. So the image wouldn’t be over-exposed. 2. To be able to capture their quick movements with sharper focus.

That brings me to point number two:

2. Movement: Whether you’re photographing pets or kids, they rarely sit still long enough to capture them with your normal go-to camera settings and photography techniques. If you’re photographing in manual mode then adjust your settings so that your shutter speed can be higher than 250, ideally in the 400 – 500 range to capture quick movements. Increasing your shutter speed while not adjusting either the ISO or the aperture will leave you with an under exposed image (too dark) so be sure to increase your ISO, too.

We think Chase is going to be a BIG boy! We got to meet his parents and his grandfather at the breeders when we went to pick him up. His parents are the normal German Shepherd size, but his grandfather is the largest German Shepherd I’ve ever seen in my life. His back was at least three inches taller than the parents! I mean, look at the size of his paws compared to my feet in the photo below!

My last tip:

3. Perspective: Get on their level. Photographing a child or pet from your adult height doesn’t create a very flattering image most of the time. So kneel, sit, or even lay on the ground to capture them on their level. I was nearly laying on the ground to capture this image of Chase.

Are you a beginning or aspiring photographer?

Maybe you own a nice camera but don’t know how to maximize it’s capabilities. I’m currently working on putting together my first DSLR workshop to introduce you to manual mode and teach the basics of aperture, shutter speed, ISO, white balance, and composition as they pertain to photographing your life and your family! This workshop will be ideal for beginners, aspiring photographers, parents, or pet parents, who want to capture better images with their DSLR camera. Even if your current camera doesn’t have much, if any manual capability, this workshop is still a good fit for you because it will set you up to better understand what situations to use your camera’s automatic settings and methods to capture better, more dynamic and story-telling images that will last a lifetime!

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