A word from
For those photographers considering helping with pictures at your local humane society or shelter, I thought I would give you a few suggestions on how to proceed. I'm a club member and I happen to be on the Board of Directors for the shelter where Wendy takes pictures.
A few years ago, our shelter was approached by one of the local residents. She wanted to help by taking pictures of the adoptable animals. At that time, we did not have a web-site but we were in the planning stages for developing one. Fortunately she had done this in the past for another shelter and could answer our questions.
A few information items to get you started
Most shelters are understaffed and the staff there are not paid very well or not paid at all. The staff is often busy just getting done what is absolutely necessary. For this reason, it may be best to find out who is on the board of directors or who the decision makers are for the organization. If you have the support of one of the board members, things will go much more smoothly.
You will need someone to keep track of the order the pictures are taken and help with the dogs and cats. If you know someone else who may be willing to volunteer to do this, solicit their agreement to help in advance. The assistance you receive from the shelter staff may not be consistent especially if they have a busy day with clients.
There is a national web-site called Petfinder.com in the United States that any shelter can utilize for posting pictures. It is simple to join and not difficult to use. This site may also service Canada. Other countries may have a similar service. This is important to know because even if a shelter does not have a web-site, taking pictures of their pets and posting them on Petfinder will definitely increase their adoptions. We started out on Petfinder.com and then added the pictures to our web-site once it was up.
The next step
If you are not sure what shelters are in your area, just go to Petfinder.com and type in your zip code. It will bring up the names of the shelters around you. You will know these locations are already taking pictures and you can go to their site and see the quality of the photos. You can then contact them and find out who is updating Petfinder and speak with that person. Chances are they will already have a process in place and may be very happy to get your help.
If a shelter does not have a web-site and doesn’t use Petfinder, it will take a little more effort to get them going but these are the shelters with the greatest need. You will need to contact a decision maker and see if you can get them enthused about the project. Make yourself familiar with Petfinder and the information that is entered in the system as you will be dependent on someone gathering the information for you.
I don’t want to make this any longer so if you want more information or have specific questions, please let me know.
Information of Taking Pictures: Part Two
Information on Taking Pictures: Part One gives some basic information and will help you find and approach a shelter. Here are some tips to help you once you have found a shelter to contact. The more excited an individual from the shelter is about getting their pets on-line; the easier it will be for you. Make sure you stress that having pictures on-line will definitely increase the number of adoptions.
You will need at least one person to help on a regular basis; preferably two. One should be from the shelter and used to handling all the animals. It also helps if they know something about their personalities. The other can be any willing assistant. You will need to work with these individuals to get them used to positioning and holding the pets. They can be quite active. Have some cat and dog toys on hand.
If the shelter does not have hand sanitizers around, it is a good idea to take your own. It is best to clean your hands between animals if you touch them. This helps prevent the spread of disease such as upper respiratory infections in cats.
The shelter that I'm involved with collects the basic information needed as they test and place the pets up for adoption. They keep a running log so no matter when we show up; the information is ready for us. We try to keep a schedule so the staff knows about when we are coming.
The shelter should name the pet if it doesn't already have a name and provide the following information:
ID #; sex, spay/neuter status, breed, color, age, special needs (not good with cats, children, etc.) and something about their personality. If you take a look at petfinder.com you will see what information is asked when you add a picture.
If you have two people helping, the second person should keep a record of what pictures you take and in what order as well as help out with distracting the pet. You will need to be supplied with a list of pets and a brief description of each so you remember the names of the pet once you start your editing. If you take pictures back to back of pets that look a lot alike, it helps to take a picture of the floor or wall between them.
You also need to know who is going to update either the web-site or Petfinder because the pictures will need to be sent to them.
If it is a shelter totally inexperienced in this process and they don't have a web-site, they will need to register with Petfinder and hopefully supply a person willing to load the information. I suggest encouraging them to take that responsibility unless you have a lot of time available for this project. Petfinder as well as any web-site needs to be updated when adoptions occur etc. in order to keep it current.
Hope this helps. If you have questions, let me know.
Inactiveness
Welcome to Artists for Shelters!
::NEWS::
Please forgive me! I'd like to extend extra apologies to =IrishRaine, because this was her club to begin with, and I haven't put in as much time and effort as I should, and I barely even used the subscription she bought for the club. 
I hope I can have this club be as great as it was before, if not, better. 
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