Not too long ago I wrote a post about Great Dane photography. Here is the first photo tip in that series of posts.
First and easiest pet photo tip: POV
The easiest way to improve your photographs of your Great Dane is to be aware of your POV, point of view. Most of the time getting eye level with your dog will give you the best results but that doesn’t mean you can’t get good results from other angles as well.
Eye Level POV
As stated above, most of the time the best position is eye level. Their eye level that is. This is much easier for us with Great Danes than it is for people with smaller dogs, say Chihuahuas for example.
Reasons this helps
- Stronger connection between the pup and the viewer when you are eye to eye. Preferable they are looking at the camera that you are holding. Varel almost always looked away from me or made a face when I pointed a camera at her.
- Get a glimpse of the world from their perspective. By getting on the same level we now get to see the world the way your Dane does.
POV From Below
Most of the time you are going to rock it with eye-to-eye photos. But it is OK to do something else sometimes.
Looking up at a Great Dane works especially well with their floppy lips and big ears. This is the point of view a Chihuahua might see when meeting a Dane. It also might explain why Chihuahuas jump at every noise and are shaking all the time.
POV From Above
Most pet photography tips tell you don’t take photos looking down on your pet. But there are times being above and looking down can work.
You know that special look you sometimes get from your pup when they look up at you? Capture that. I guarantee most of the time you won’t have a camera when they do it but if you do you will happy you did.
Level up tip
For people using cameras with adjustable apertures, open it up to a create a shallow depth of field. When the f-stop number is smaller the field of view in focus is smaller. This will blur the background and give what is called “bokeh”. All the photos shown here are examples of this. It helps to keep the background from becoming a distraction. Just make sure the eyes are in focus, unless you are going for a nose shot.
Auto focus usually goes for what is closest to the lens which will be the nose. Many of today’s cameras have eye focus, in other words they will find the eye and keep it in focus. The ability for a camera to find and lock on non-human eyes is a newer feature than finding human eyes. So make sure your firmware is up to date.
On a phone camera you can achieve a blurry background by using portrait mode if your phone has it.
