Helping Animals with Photography

The RedRover Junior Advisory Board, a group of students from around the world aged 9 to 14, recently learned about pet photographer Kaylee Greer. Kaylee was featured in our September/October 2021 issue of Kind News magazine for her amazing dog photography. She explained how she uses perspective-taking to help dogs become comfortable around her. Students learned how Kaylee started her photography career by taking pictures of shelter dogs and how her bright, colorful photos helped pets find their forever homes. 

After reviewing her website to look for inspiration, students were tasked with taking their own creative animal portraits! Some Junior Advisory Board members preferred to take pictures of the pets at their home while others opted to take pictures of wildlife they encountered. Students were encouraged to think outside the box and use whatever they had at home to capture the purr-fect photographs! 

While some students took pictures to explore and have fun, others took photos to help animals in their community. Tal took pictures of two stray but very loving cats who need homes. Her caption read, “Both of these cats are brothers and my aunt thinks they are about 11 months old. They live in Fort Lee [New Jersey]. My aunt also said they’re very affectionate. A lot of the time, they can be seen together.”

When asked what she learned while practicing her own photography, Junior Advisory Board member Krithi said: “I learned to stay patient and wait for the right moment to take a picture rather than taking a bunch of pictures at once. I also learned that different lighting can give different effects, bright lighting could have a happy mood yet dark lighting would be sad or ominous.”

Anna decided to take pictures of frogs during a nature walk with a friend. She learned that “in order to get a good photo, you have to try different animals in different locations at different angles.” She said finding the frogs was difficult so she had to be diligent with her search.

“[Frogs] camouflage with their surroundings pretty well but thankfully, my friend who was helping me is very good at finding them.”

Ezzie even brought a family member with her to take photos! She chose to take the picture of her uncle with his new puppy “because I saw a really beautiful moment that captured [their] human-animal bond and I wanted to save those moments in something more permanent.”

When asked what she’s learned, Ezzie answered, “I’ve learned many things – mostly with my grandpa – but something I’ve learned that will stay with me forever is that photos can mean a lot when you capture them just the right way.”

Check out the rest of the Junior Advisory Board’s work below!