Panning is the technique of following the motion of something as it moves from side to side across the scene in front of you.

Our challengers were asked to capture a pantastic action shot either capturing the movement sharply, or slowing down the shutter speed to introduce some motion blur to the extremities of the dog, while still maintaining a sharp face.

These are the top 10 images for the Pantastic Challenge, in no particular order.

Huge congrats to the photographers!

- Charlotte & Craig 🐶 📸 ✨

Blue Amrich | Beyond the Fence

Excellent panning technique and the resulting shot has a great expression and lovely subdued colour palette.

Cindy Mayes

What a speedy little floofball! Excellent panning technique, great expression and those little flying back paws are wonderful.

Diane Gollowitzer | Dogs in Focus Photography

Beautiful use of backlight and shadow. The dog's face is tack sharp, but there's quite a lot of motion blur in other areas, perfect for this challenge.

Holly Cook | Holly Cook Photography

A pantastic hound in a typical stance for the type of dog. The light is gorgeous and feels quite magical.

Jeff Rooney | Hightail It Photography

Great focussed expression on the dog's face. The flick of the back paw with a little motion blur is well caught sand the amount of negative space feels very balanced.

Kelly Pettitt | Kelly Pettitt Photography

What a fantastic action shot, the dog is in full stretch, the flicks of sand add to the feeling of speed. The angle allows the dog to be isolated against the water and really stand out too.

Keri Nakahashi | Keri Nakahashi Photography

The sun on the dog give it so much texture which is wonderful against the slight motion blur of the splashes of water. Great expression, especially in the curled tongue!

Kim Hollis | BARKography

This is such a. joyful shot. Beautifully edited to add to that feeling, great expression and the panning technique is excellent. 

Marika Moffitt | Soul Dog Creative

Beautiful composition, gorgeous light and the dog moving across the frame is placed perfectly. The short grass acts as a leading line too.

Nicole Hrustyk | Pawtraits by Nicole

A speeding greyhound, possibly the ultimate in canine speed. Captured beautifully with some excellent motion blur, while still having a super sharp face.

Emerge is the second series in our Unleashed Challenge courses and is made up of 12 challenges over 6 months. It’s open to anyone who has completed our first course in the series, Embark.

So much more than just a challenge, the Unleashed Challenges are an invaluable educational resource that will help you build up a go-to list of shots to help create variety in your work. Designed for anyone to be able to complete whether you just want to photograph your own dog or you are a professional pet photographer.

If you'd like to know more head over here to register your interest and we'll send you all the details when enrolment for Embark next opens in 2022.