The Art of Photographing Animals

No, this is not a tutorial on the best practices of photographing our fine feathered friends, the wild and wooly wildebeest, daringly destructive deer, or the bulky brown bear. This article is better described as an expose’ of my sad attempts at capturing the wild kingdom on [digital] film. Try as I might, I have found it virtually impossible to command a photogenic pose of any species of the animal kingdom – and yes, that includes the human species. I find that trees, lakes, mountains, flowers, architecture, vehicles or anything without a personality or the ability to move away on its own accord is more to my liking and ability. My own dogs, for example, seem to forget the command “stay” when I have camera in hand; the only time they don’t move or give me the evil eye is when they are peacefully snoring in their own dream world, and even then, most times are chasing dream rabbits. Oh Pshaw, you say? Don’t get me wrong, there are some shots that have turned out pretty good, but that’s as good as it gets – pretty good. So, in order to justify the Animals gallery on my SmugMug site, I should refer to it as A Humorous Look at Animal Photography, or How to Create Mediocre Animal Art.    Some examples: