11/19/2025
Dog sport exhibitors!
This isn’t a call out (maybe a call in?), and I’m not fussing at anyone either, so I hope this post isn’t taken that way!
If you want photographers to capture the memories of you and/or your dog at trials, competitions, shows, meets, etc.—you’ve got to purchase photos!!
It’s up to exhibitors to show photographers that the event is worth shooting, and the only way to do that is to support their work and purchase images!
There’s a TON of behind-the-scenes work put into every single gallery we publish. We spend hours upon hours photographing our subjects nonstop, often in blistering sun/blazing heat/pouring rain/frigid cold, and at the sacrifice of our own bodily comfort as we contort into strange positions or settle into some hard ground for extended amounts of time—ALL so we can ensure we are capturing the best angle, light, position, etc. and give you a high quality gallery! Then, we are spending an extensive amount of time(I’m talking 20+ hours minimum) to sort our images, toss the ones we aren’t using, edit the ones we are, upload them to our website, and sort them again before we FINALLY get to publish the images for purchase!
Only in very rare, select circumstances are photographers paid in any capacity to photograph an event. If we’re lucky, travel costs and room/board are covered by the club, but even that is more exclusive to larger events like Nationals or Championships. Often, for many conformation events, photographers have to pay the CLUB to be there and shoot! So, most of the time, we are coming out of our own pocket to be there!
The only compensation most of us get is from you, the exhibitor.
Now, for my absolutists, I don’t write this to say that you NEED to purchase every picture from every photographer! I enter my own dogs in events where there’s a photographer(that isn’t me), and I don’t always buy images! If you weren’t a fan of that photographer or the gallery they produced, then don’t buy anything! But for the photographers that you enjoyed having at your event and whose images were ones you would want more of in the future—support that person! Buy their images!! Buy 1 if it’s all you can afford. Share that image(tag your photographer!), show us how much you enjoy it! We love seeing our images go to homes to be loved and appreciated as much as we love them
ourselves🥰
I have events that I won’t shoot anymore because they were very labor/effort intensive and the sales were so poor—I love dog sport photography!! It is my passion through and through. But, I can’t pay for the gas I need to get there and back with passion.
I know we’re all hunkering down for the unstable economy that’s before us, so I hope everyone understands that this post isn’t saying you need to spend your last dollar on a photograph. Times are hard, they’re probably only going to get harder, and we photographers understand that! What I’m talking about is unrelated to financial hardship.
All I’m hoping to impress upon you with this post is that if you’re able, and if you loved them, and if you want to continue seeing that photographer at your events, buy the photos!
