First posting attempt - playing puppy

[Fredrikro]

Hi,
This is my first attempt at posting pictures, having followed several forums for a while. The pictures are of our 3 months old puppy playing in the garden, in the first one chasing her older (7 years) sister/stepmother. Love to ger some C&C. And yes, I know that I cut off a paw and some tail in the second picture.
Fredrik

[gregj1763]

Hi Fredrik, Welcome to CIC.
That's a great looking pup I'm sure you will have a lot of fun with her.
Both photo's are sharp enough and show a dog at play which is what you wanted to portray to the viewer. I do feel that they suffer from the subject being too tightly cropped. Perhaps more room in front of the subject would help this type of shot.
Hope you enjoy this forum, It's a great place to learn.
Cheers Greg

[WJT]

Hi Frederik, They are sharp enough. A few things which may improve future shots. One is to get down to their level so that your not looking down on them ( a good rule for all creatures, especially children), and another is to use a big aperture to fade out the back ground and define the dogs more(2.8 to 5.6). Welcome to CiC and keep shooting.

[rpcrowe]

One plan that I always use when photographing moving dogs is to shoot LOTS of images and then when I am through, I shoot some more for insurance. You cannot shoot too many images because there are always going to be a number that will be discarded due to poor focus or framing. That is the wonderful advantage of digital over film, virtually free shooting.

It seems easiest to me when to shoot animals coming towards the camera. I use AI Servo auto focus mode on my Canon DSLR cameras. I will shoot in aperture priority, wide open or close to wide open, and use a relatively high ISO (320 or 400 or so) so that my shutter speed remains high enough to freeze the action.

I will loosely frame the dog at the start of its run and then zoom back as the dog approaches me. I shoot in burst mode. I usually frame most images pretty darn close but, I allow for a little slop in the sides when I am shooting a moving animal. I always use through the lens focus rather than liveview.

BTW: I am in awe of the autofocus capability of my 7D and 70-200mm f/4L IS combination. Additionally, the high speed burst sounds like the burst of a machine gun.

[Fredrikro]

Thanks for taking time to view and comment!
To Greg: Actually the pictures aren't cropped, at least not in front of Omla (that's the pup's name). But I agree that thet would benefit by more space there.
To Wayne: Both pictures are taken at f/4. That's what my 70-200 stops at. But again I agree with your point.

To all of you: Is this better? Omla hasn't grown that much, it's a friend.

[gregj1763]

Now that's a nice photo
Sharp, plenty of room in front of the subject and your at the dogs level?
If you have software to lighten the shadows you could try that to see if you can bring a little detail out in the dark side of the dogs face but that's being picky.
Great work.
Cheers Greg

[WJT]

Thanks for taking time to view and comment! To Greg: Actually the pictures aren't cropped, at least not in front of Omla (that's the pup's name). But I agree that thet would benefit by more space there. To Wayne: Both pictures are taken at f/4. That's what my 70-200 stops at. But again I agree with your point. To all of you: Is this better? Omla hasn't grown that much, it's a friend.

This is a winner Fredrik. Great capture

[Dave Humphries]

Hi Fredrik,

To all of you: Is this better?

Yes, that's smashing!

As Greg suggests, a little more detail on the shady side would be nice and easily doable in most image editors - which one do you have?

Cheers,

[Fredrikro]

Thanks again for your nice comments. I use LR4 (mostly) and PS CS6 (much more seldom), so lightening the shadows is no problem. I'll try that.