Pet Photography
One of the things I did almost immediately after getting my photography degree was taking another photography course. This one a lot more niche; Pet photography. While I've been photographing our family pets for what feel like my entire life I wanted to get a more technical deep dive on what is a pet photographer really does.
While photographing Tiger; my childhood cat we had for over 20 years, was my first pet with a point & shoot. It felt right to share my favourite photos of Lucas as the first thing you see in this post. He was my first model with a professional camera. He was my childhood dog & although I didn't always have the settings down perfect I love every photo I have of him like this photo in my parents back yard with the lilacs in full bloom.
It feels fitting to share a photo of Cheeto (Chito) as my next set. This was a attempt at some valentines photos where I made a little background however he had other plans. If I've learned anything from years of photographing pets, specifically cats, is that they do things on their own time. Cheeto is our stray we took in this year, He even posed for me for a School assignment, we had to 'copy' another photographers photography to push ourselves to break down the photo, how it was taken, how it was edited & do something we have not done before. If you want to see those two photos side by side scroll to the bottom!
Above is Kip the dog my parents adopted last year & he's been the perfect addition to our family & has taught me that we need a buffer for session as the zoomies take some time to get out. We had a golden hour shoot where we almost ran out of sun light due to him running around enjoying the beach. He has quickly became on of my best models & has taught me a lot of lessons on the reality of pet photography.
Last but not least I can't post pet photography without baby girl Ella. I've been photographing her since day one of getting her & her sass is evident in every photo. If you didn't know the MacGillivray crest is a cat! Crazy cat lady is literally in my blood! While little miss Ella is my dad's best friend & lives with my parents & their cat she bonded with I still take every opportunity to smother her in love & snap photos of her. One of my school assignments about exposure required me to take a series of photos with incorrect exposure & one correct; my model call fell through so Ella (Against her will) was my model. It feels very full circle that the cat I adopted at 19 who wore costumes & took selfies with me has now helped me in getting my degree.
See more from my collection of pet photography here
Here's Cheeto modeling my for my school assignment. While I don't think we should copy other artists work this assignment did teach me a lot. I immediately had this image pop up when I read the assignment & knew that Ella would not 'pose' for this so had started looking for other images to recreate. Cheeto happened to be outside that day so I let him in & despite it being a gloomy winter day the sun peaked out & left the perfect ray of light in my kitchen to attempt this photo. Cheeto is very food motivated & happily posed for this photo in exchange for some treats. While the pose is slightly off I am very happy with this image & even have it printed in our home.
The first Photo is by Shriveling of a kitten
My copy of Cheeto
I plan to start offering pet portraits in 2026 & will be doing a few model calls once the weather gets nice again, Keep your eye out on my socails for those model calls if you're intrested.
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