Every breed page covers the same three things: which source photos work for that coat and muzzle, what tends to go wrong, and what the finished portrait looks like.
Make Your Dog's Portrait →The generator works from your photograph, not from a breed template — so a mixed-breed dog, a rescue of unknown parentage, and a pedigree champion all come out equally recognisable. Breed does not change the process.
What breed changes is which photo of your dog will work. A black Labrador and a white Samoyed fail in opposite directions: one loses all facial detail in shadow, the other blows out to a featureless white shape in bright light. A pug's flat face and a bloodhound's long muzzle sit under a towel turban completely differently. A poodle's tight curl holds edge detail that a smooth-coated boxer simply does not have.
That is what each breed page is for. Not a different product — a different set of instructions for photographing the dog you have.
Almost every breed-specific photo problem reduces to one of four coat situations.
| Coat | Typical breeds | The failure mode | What to do |
|---|---|---|---|
| Dark and solid | Black Labrador, Doberman, Rottweiler, black Poodle | The face becomes a silhouette; eyes and muzzle vanish into one dark mass. | Shoot with light on the face, not behind it. Overcast daylight is ideal. Avoid backlighting entirely. |
| White or very pale | Samoyed, Maltese, Bichon, West Highland | Bright light blows the coat out to flat white with no visible edges. | Open shade rather than direct sun. A slightly underexposed photo recovers far better than a blown-out one. |
| Flat-faced | Pug, French Bulldog, English Bulldog, Boston Terrier | Shooting from above foreshortens an already short muzzle into something odd. | Get down to their eye level. This matters more for these breeds than any other. |
| Long-muzzled or heavy-eared | Bloodhound, Basset, Dachshund, Collie | The ears and jowls fight the towel for the same space. | A straight-on head shot rather than a three-quarter angle keeps the proportions readable. |
Everything else — double coats, merle patterning, brindle, heavy facial markings — is a variation on those four. The full photo-prep advice sits on the dog bathroom art hub.
Grouped by the portrait problem they share rather than by kennel club classification, because that is what actually determines which photo you should use.
The most-owned group in the country, and the hardest to buy a non-generic gift for.
Small dogs photograph best from floor level — the single most common mistake here is shooting down at them.
Dark coats and heavy muzzles need more light than you think to keep facial detail.
Alert ears and a strong forward gaze — these tend to produce the most striking portraits.
Thick double coats and pale eyes. Overexposure is the usual failure.
Long muzzles and heavy ears change how the towel sits. Worth reading the breed note.
Flat faces and tight curls are the two coat types that most reward a good source photo.
A significant share of the portraits made here are of dogs whose breed nobody knows, and they are not second-class results. The model reads the animal in front of it. If anything, mixed-breed dogs make more distinctive portraits, because the whole point of the exercise is recognising one specific dog rather than a type.
Two notes that come up repeatedly with rescues:
For dogs who arrived late in life and have since died, the memorial guidance covers choosing from a small and imperfect set of photographs.
One photo, about a minute. $5 for a single portrait or $12 for four. Mixed breeds and rescues included — the model reads the dog, not the pedigree.
Start With One Photo →