Critique my first puppy session

I have never photographed a puppy before, and this 5 month old cutie was ACTIVE. I really struggled to nail the focus and capture something other than the back of her head as she was easily distracted. Anyways, here's some shots I would love to get some feedback on:

Holly,
first reaction based on personal knowledge is that it was just too hot to be shooting outdoors. There's no way you're going to get that tongue to stay in the puppy's mouth at 90 degrees and 90% humidity. I scrapped a Moxie portrait session this weekend for that reason.

These shots have good lighting and good focus but I'll bet it was a struggle since that puppy girl looks very busy. In case folks don't think that portrait work is "action photography" .

I'd suggest you shoot very early in the day or very late -- I'd opt for early since we're getting thunder storms as early as 10 in the morning and they tend to last pretty much into the evening. You might get a large fan and shoot in a place you can plug it in to create enough breeze to keep the dogs comfortable. Or, better yet, find an air-conditioned place indoors and use props to capture the dogs' personalities.

Jim

Holly,
#1 is my fave of the 3 because I feel I'm more at the dog's level where as the other two seem like you were shooting down on her

tongue trick, put a drop of lemon juice on an assistants finger and have them tap the tongue as you are ready to take the pic, the mouth closes for a good 10 seconds, long enough for a couple of shots LOL

watch your busy backgrounds, they're competing with the subject for the viewers attention

great job on exposure, maybe try a tighter crop, more 8x10 or square orientation, you don't need to show all the way down to the feet if you don't want to

ouch 90degrees yuck!! agree ... very early in the morning would be better for you

Yeah, lovely puppy first of all I would echo the view that although you can get super shots looking down at the doggie, a few of these dont quite work.

Also, i would have liked to have seen a couple of the dog making eye contact with the camera, its nice to have a few of him looking past you, but a few of him looking at the camera would have been nice. Again, if you are going for a top down view, click your fingers to get his attention to look straight up at you.

I reckon as well you cuold have gone with going for a slightly larger aperture, get those backgrounds nice and blurred, if your shooting against a crummy background that its not the end of the world, you just have to be a bit more creative with your camera

I think NinaS hit it on the nose. The most noticeable thing in all the images is the busy backgrounds. You were able to mute it a bit in the first image with the larger distance to help the depth of field but try to isolate him on a more solid background. If its limiting, as an area like that might be, sacrifice your angle for a better background. Although it is better to be at eye level, if you shoot downward a bit with a wide aperture you can use a green grassy field as a nice solid backdrop that doesnt subract from your subject. Good job though, keep it up!