Hey photographer friends! Welcome back to our Photography Blog, Mastering the Wedding Photography Biz with Hunter and Sarah! We have couples ask us ALL THE TIME if they can bring their dog along on their engagement session or incorporate them into their wedding day. And while we do everything we can to accommodate this, it changes the way we set expectations and how we structure our sessions. So today, we’re teaching all about how to photograph dogs during your clients’ portrait sessions!

 

 

Why You Should Accommodate Pets

So it may seem obvious to you that you should accommodate dogs in the first place. But early in our career, we had an experience where one of our couples brought their dog to their engagement session without telling us in advance. And since we had never shot a portrait session involving a dog before, had taken no steps to prepare, and were generally just still figuring out how to be portrait photographers… the session was an absolute mess.

 

Not only did we feel like we didn’t get great photos with their poorly-behaved dog, but the fact that their dog was on the session actually prevented us from getting very many good photos of our couple. Now, we were really new to photography at the time. So we made the mistake of thinking that the DOG itself was the problem, and not the fact that we just hadn’t prepared or set expectations with our clients. We just didn’t know how to photograph dogs!

 

Because the thing is, for a lot of young couples, their pets are an important part of their family. But even if you’re shooting a family session, a grad session, or a wedding day — incorporating a dog can be an incredibly personal and important touch for your clients. In fact, sometimes we will be reviewing our couple’s engagement session gallery ahead of a wedding day — really just to see which photos from the engagement session were their favorite. And we’ll see that they downloaded and favorited more photos that included their dog than ones of just them and their soon-to-be-spouse 😂

 

So yes, incorporating a dog into a portrait session can definitely be more stressful and complicated, but there are things you can do both in advance — and during the session — in order to make the experience less stressful for you, to give your clients and their dog a great experience, and to deliver some incredible photos that your clients will cherish for a long time.

 

 

Step 1: Set Expectations

Now, all of that being said, this doesn’t mean that we recommend that every client bring their dog. The very first thing we want to do is set expectations with our clients. In fact, when one of our couples first asks us about this, our first question is whether or not they believe a portrait session is the type of environment where their dog is going to thrive. So, if their dog is super social, well-trained, and loves going to parks or other outdoor locations and meeting new people, they’re probably going to do great during a portrait session.

 

But we also want to help our clients realize that if their dog doesn’t like meeting new people or being in strange public spaces, or if they have a brand new puppy who has absolutely no semblance of obedience, and will just run around with that insane puppy energy for the entire session, then bringing them along, may not make the most sense for their engagement session, and could just serve to distract them from what’s most important: capturing their love story.

 

And in a way, this goes for them as well as their dog. If they think that bringing the dog is going to stress them out a lot, we’ll encourage them to just leave the dog behind and let the engagement session be about them and just them. Especially because most dogs are really attuned to the moods of their owners, so if our couple is feeling anxious and nervous about the dog and its behavior, that can actually make the dog more anxious and nervous, making their behavior even worse.

 

 

Step 2: Choose a Location

The second thing we think about when it comes to how to photograph dogs is the location. Sometimes we’ll do engagement sessions at a private location like a vineyard or our couple’s wedding venue that may not allow dogs at all. And other times we may be in areas that require some extensive hiking or is a really tight space where having certain dogs just wouldn’t be practical. So if having their dog with them is super important, then we will steer our couples toward a location that makes more sense for bringing their furry friend.

 

The final thing we want to do when it comes to setting expectations is making sure that our clients realize that their session will be different if they bring a dog, as compared to what it would be like if it was just the four of us. They will inevitably have less time for portraits of the two of them, because basically everything we do with a dog is going to be a bit more complicated take a bit longer. We actually tell our couples who bring a dog the same thing we tell our parents who are bringing toddlers to a family session. Their behavior is almost completely out of your control, both leading up to the session and during it. So just know that things may feel a bit more chaotic.

 

But, for parents of well behaved, social and energetic dogs, we tell them that we look forward to meeting all three of them at their session!

 

 

Step 3: Pro Tip… A Dog Wrangler

The first and most important pro tip when it comes to how to photograph dogs has nothing to do with your cameras! It’s this. We tell clients who have decided to bring their dogs that we emphatically insist that they bring a “dog wrangler”. This can be a parent, a sibling, or a friend — really anyone who can help us manage the dog while we’re shooting. This person will also be responsible for the dog during the part of the session that doesn’t include the dog, but is just us and our couple.

 

Because, after all, this is their engagement session! We know that the bulk of the photos we take will just be of the two of them. And so what we don’t want to do is spend 75 minutes of a 90 minute session with their dog tied up to a nearby fence or locked in their car with the windows down!

 

Without a Dog Wrangler…

A few years ago, we had a couple who brought their dog, but ignored our advice about bringing a dog wrangler. And so once we finished up with their dog photos, their new puppy spent more than an hour straight just crying and whimpering, tied up nearby 😫

 

Of course, this made our couple (and especially our bride) visibly stressed and guilty for pretty much their entire engagement session. And honestly, we could see it on her face in some of their photos. It sort of tainted the entire experience for them, and we know that they didn’t love their engagement photos as much, because all of those negative feelings were associated with our time together.

 

There have even been times where tying a dog up nearby wasn’t an option, and so one of us spent the majority of the shoot trying to shoot with one hand, and hold a leash with the other. Which, as you can probably imagine, was a huge mess and we will not do this anymore. Much better to have a close friend or family member who the dog already knows and loves just take them for a nice long walk during the latter portion of the session!

 

 

Step 4: Best Practices for Including Dogs in Portraits

Here’s a few more pieces of advice that we give our clients ahead of a dog-friendly engagement session. The first is to have them arrive early to acclimate the dog to the new environment! So often we hear our clients tell us how much better behaved the dog is at home, which honestly makes a lot of sense. Dogs and children will get a lot of nervous energy when they find themselves in a new and unfamiliar place, which can lead to them disobeying commands and otherwise just being harder to work with. So having our couples arrive even just 10 minutes early and taking the dog for a walk around the location will help them to feel a bit more comfortable when the photos start.

 

Another thing we recommend is that you as the photographer spend a minute or two interacting with the dog before you start shooting. After you arrive and say hello to your clients, get down on the dog’s level, pet it, say its name a few times, and generally just let it know that you’re a friend. You can even bring your camera down to its level and let it sniff your camera once or twice so that knows it that big black item in your hand is not a threat. Just keep your lens cap on so you don’t end up with a giant dog-lick mark across the front of your lens.

 

Finally, we tell our couples to bring their dog’s favorite toy and a handful of treats. The more attention-grabbing the toy and the tastier the treat, the better. This is what we’re going to use to get the dog’s attention throughout the session, and to reward good behavior.

 

 

Step 5: How to Photograph Dogs with Your Clients

Finally comes the session itself. When one of our couples brings their dog to an engagement session, we typically only want to spend 15 or 20 minutes of our time together taking photos with the dog. However, if the dog is especially anxious or excited or just not well-behaved, that 15 minutes of shooting can take the first 30 minutes or more of the session. And so we always start the session with dog photos, so that once the dog has been passed off to the dog wrangler, and our time with just our couple begins, we know exactly how much time we have to work with them.

 

We would hate to shoot with just our couple for an hour and 10 minutes, and THEN start the dog photos, thinking it will only take 15 or 20 minutes. But then if it takes 15 minutes just to calm the dog down, and then the sun has set and the session is over, we may have missed out on photos with the dog entirely.

 

Once the time comes to actually start shooting a couple with their dog, this part of the session itself is really simple. We usually start with some walking photos, telling them to just walk the dog on a leash, just like they probably do every day. We just ask them to keep the leash a bit shorter, so that the dog stays relatively close to them. This, plus a more close down aperture will help us make sure that all three of them are in focus. (By the way, if you need help with aperture, check out this video here).

 

 

More Dog-Friendly Poses

The next thing we do is try to get photos of our clients just interacting and snuggling with their dog. We might have them throw a ball, or just give them a treat and give some belly rubs. These more genuine and authentic portraits are often the fav of the entire session.

 

 

And finally, if the dog is well behaved and it seems like it’ll be able to handle a posed portrait, then we’ll have them all pose together for a family portrait. If the dog is big, it can sit while the couple stands, or if it’s smaller they can either hold the dog in their arms, or crouch down and get on its level.

 

 

While we’re taking these and any other photos, we make sure to use any commands the dog already knows. And when trying to get the dog to look at our camera for a posed shot, we’ll literally hold the treat or its favorite toy right above our lens with one hand and shoot the other. That way the dog appears to be looking right into the lens. This goes especially for the solo photos of the dog, which are always a big favorite!

 

And whether you’re shooting dog portraits during an engagement photoshoot, on a wedding day, or as part of a family session, just be sure to have fun, and be very gracious with your clients. They’re probably feeling nervous about whether or not their dog is behaving, and you taking the whole thing in stride and being very laid-back and accommodating will make everyone feel more at ease.

 

 

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