Tracy Munson

Tracy Munson, MPA

Tracy’s first word was “cat”. The cat didn’t even like her but was still her favourite member of the family. As a little girl, she never dreamed of having babies. She dreamed of having a koala bear and a monkey. She didn’t have imaginary friends, she had imaginary pets.

Little has changed. Tracy still unapologetically prefers animal company to humans. Her award-winning pet photography work demonstrates a natural connection with her subjects and a seasoned understanding of animal behaviour.

For over 25 years, Tracy nurtured the human-animal bond as a veterinary technician and animal shelter worker. Now, she is deeply committed to creating a fun and positive experience for the animals in front of her lens and believes that this is the key to capturing the personality-filled pet portraits that her clients love.

While living in Toronto, Tracy took every opportunity to escape the city and her rewarding but stressful job in one of the country’s largest animal shelters. For many years, she and her partner Graham explored Canada by car with a tent, a camera, and their 2 tiny dogs. After seeing it all, Atlantic Canada kept drawing her back and in 2018 she escaped city life for good, relocating to the beautiful Bay of Fundy Region in New Brunswick to photograph companion animals full-time.

Every Pet is a Masterpiece – Animal Behaviour for Photographers

From chaotic canines to contrary kitties, the key to capturing stunning animal portraits is understanding their behaviour. Knowing how to prevent, recognize, and manage stress will set you and your animal subjects up for a fun and successful session.

Over half of Canadian households own at least one dog or cat, and consider their pet to be a part of the family. Even if pets are not the main focus of your photography business, that’s over 50% of your clients who would probably love to include furry family members in their portraits!

During a 25-year career in animal care and welfare, Tracy learned to safely and humanely handle just about every kind of domestic and exotic pet you can imagine, as well as most of our native Canadian wildlife. She has her Master of Photographic Arts designation (PPOC) and is an Accredited Professional of Animal Imagery (AIM). Her playful and charismatic animal portraits have been awarded top honours in national and international image competitions.

During this presentation, we’ll discuss:

• Selecting and preparing session locations with your subject in mind
• Human and animal body language
• Some of the subtle and often overlooked signals of stress in dogs and cats
• Tips for photographing domestic animals with and without their humans
• Preparing the client for a fun, positive, and stress-free session
• Photoshop as a tool to ensure safety
• Ethical and safety considerations when using animals as props
• Photographing wildlife without endangering your subject or affecting their behaviour
• Choosing images to share online
• Recommended gear and equipment
• Tons of tips and tricks that will improve your animal images, and maybe even your relationships with the animals in your life!

Click here to visit Tracy’s website.