The best frame is always cut off: framing in dogs in action photography
You know the frame. The dog is coming straight at you, closer than ever, eyes locked on yours, the expression you waited for the whole session. It's the most intense frame of the burst.
And the ears are cut off. Or the front paws are outside the frame. Every time, it's that one.
It isn't bad luck. In dogs in action photography, the frame you want most is exactly the one most likely to be cut, and the reason is pure geometry.
The closest frame is the one you lose
The size of the dog in the frame depends on its distance from you. When the distance halves, the dog doubles in size. Going from 10 meters (33 feet) to 5 (16 feet), a dog running at 40 km/h (25 mph) takes less than half a second, and in that half second it grows to twice its size in your viewfinder.
Now look at how much room you actually have. With a 200 mm on a full frame camera, at 5 meters (16 feet) the whole horizontal frame is only 60 centimeters (24 inches) tall. A medium dog standing still is about 65 centimeters (26 inches). It simply doesn't fit.
So the closest frames, the ones with the strongest expression and the most detail, are also the ones where the dog no longer fits in the picture. It isn't a framing mistake you make at the last second. It's built into the distance.
A dog in action isn't as tall as a dog standing still
This is where the numbers on paper stop being enough. A dog that is 65 centimeters (26 inches) tall standing still takes up less height when it runs, because it lowers its body into the stride. When it jumps a log it stretches out, and takes up even less.
This changes where the good frame happens. In my experience, for a dog running straight at me, the good part with a 200 mm is between 7 and 10 meters (23 to 33 feet). With a 300 mm it's between 11 and 13 meters (36 to 43 feet). When the dog jumps, it gets closer still, because a stretched body needs less room.
Look at the jump at the top of this page. The dog is flying over the log, front legs tucked in, and there's room above the ears and below the paws. A meter (about 3 feet) closer and that room is gone.
The framing window in dogs in action photography
The same framing always happens at a distance proportional to the focal length. That's geometry, not opinion. Starting from my 200 mm window of 7 to 10 meters (23 to 33 feet), here is where the good part happens with the lenses most of us use:
85 mm: about 3 to 4.3 meters (10 to 14 feet).
105 mm: about 3.7 to 5.3 meters (12 to 17 feet).
135 mm: about 4.7 to 6.8 meters (15 to 22 feet).
200 mm: 7 to 10 meters (23 to 33 feet).
300 mm: about 10.5 to 15 meters (34 to 49 feet) on paper, 11 to 13 meters (36 to 43 feet) in my experience in the woods.
Now turn those meters into time. In a forest a dog runs somewhere between 30 and 50 km/h (19 to 31 mph). With an 85 mm the good part is about 1.3 meters (4 feet) long: the dog crosses it in less than two tenths of a second, and at full speed in less than one. With a 200 mm the window is about 3 meters (10 feet), between a fifth and a third of a second.
Sometimes a tenth of a second. That's how long the photo you're after actually exists.
Distance isn't only a number
There's something the numbers don't show. With an 85 or a 135 mm the good part happens 3 to 7 meters (10 to 23 feet) from you. At that distance you're inside the action: the dog sees you, looks at you, and can change its path because of you. The run you photograph is no longer the one it would have done.
With a 200 or a 300 mm you don't interfere, and you still keep the contact, the eyes, the emotion. With a 400 mm the window gets even longer, but at that distance the emotion fades. More good frames doesn't mean a better photo.
Same framing, same sharp zone
Many photographers think a longer lens makes the sharp zone thinner. At the same framing, it doesn't. When the dog fills the frame the same way, the depth of field is practically the same with an 85 or a 300: at f/2.8, about 20 to 40 centimeters (8 to 16 inches) across the window.
What does change it is the aperture. Shoot your 85, 105 or 135 at f/1.8 and that zone drops to about 13 to 26 centimeters (5 to 10 inches), roughly a third thinner. The background gets softer, but the margin for the autofocus shrinks too.
And the longer lens still blurs the background more. That's a different thing from the sharp zone, and it's why the focal length changes your background even when the depth of field stays the same.
Remember the frames that come too close? Last week we saw that at 5 meters (16 feet) with a 200 mm the sharp zone is about 10 centimeters (4 inches), and the autofocus often lands on the nose. The frames outside the window are the cut ones and the ones with soft eyes. Same frames, two problems.
Why holding the button down doesn't save you
The natural reaction is to shoot a long burst from the moment the dog starts until it reaches you. Somewhere in there, the right frame must be.
It doesn't work that way. The good part lasts a fraction of a second, and in my experience a long burst makes the autofocus less precise and makes you less aware of what you're doing. You end up with forty frames and none of them in the right place.
What works is the opposite: knowing before the dog leaves where the good part will happen, and taking about three frames there, on purpose.
Where you stand decides your whole window. The free lesson on choosing a lens for dog action work covers focal length and working distance, the two things that decide where you can stand. Watch the free lesson
What changes when you understand this
The best frame isn't the one you happen to catch. It's the one you place: you choose where the dog will be, at what distance, with which lens, before it starts running.
It's a different way of looking at the field. Not "I'll shoot when it gets here", but "the photo happens there, between that tree and that log, and I'm ready for it".
This is the what. The how, reading the field, choosing the window for each lens and each dog, and being ready when the dog gets there, is what I teach in the full course, the path to the Master certification.
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