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CM Bryson Photography

Name: CM Bryson Photography
Address: Watkinsville, GA, 30677, US
Telephone: 7066889138
Price range: $$

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CM Bryson Photography

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Photographing the south's most loved pets from Atlanta to Athens & beyond. Atlanta based dog & equine photographer.

When it comes to photographing the furry love of your life – you should hire a pet photographer. If you love the way his forehead wrinkles when he’s being serious, or the gleeful way he retrieves the ball, or maybe it’s just the way he looks adoringly at you while you’re holding his favorite treat, those are the moments we’ll use to create personal art for your home. With more than 10 years working with pets & their people, I create a luxury pet photography experience for Atlanta’s pet parents and deliver art, albums, and wall portraits to fill their home with artwork featuring the furry faces they love most. Imagine finally having gorgeous photographs of your pet, an experience you’ll both love, & ready to display artwork delivered to your door. This is pet photography designed for the pet obsessed.

10/29/2026

What does it actually feel like at your dog’s session?

Laughter, silly noises to get your dog’s attention while I lay on the ground, play breaks when your dog steals my squeaky pig, you holding the leash just out of frame, you setting aside an hour or two just for your dog.

I’ve been photographing dogs all around Georgia for the past decade and the most common thing my clients say at the end? “Wow, that was actually a lot of fun!”

If you’ve been worried that your dog isn’t “well-behaved” enough to be professionally photostated, let’s talk. My DMs are always open.

10/20/2026

Challenge 10: Glow Up

I love a golden retriever in golden light, so when the Glow Up challenge asked us to create a backlit image with rim light visible all the way around the dog, I knew exactly which breed of dog I wanted to feature in this challenge.

I also knew exactly where I wanted to go. Indian Creek Park in Rutledge feels like my own private park for most sessions. It also has a beautiful spot for back lighting at the top of the hill. The trees create the perfect diffusion of the late sunlight coming through while the front of the dog looks toward to open parking lot allowing for plenty of secondary light filling the front and giving great catch lights in the eyes (another check for the challenge brief).

Murray was the perfect model. He quickly figured out what we were asking him to do and was very willing to look at me and my distressed rabbit call. 🐰

Technical Details:
Nikon Z8 ISO 640 170mm f/3.2 1/800

RAW: Controlling the light was the primary goal, I exposed for the highlights here so nothing was lost.

PROCESSED: White balance, exposure, highlights, shadows, whites, and blacks adjusted. I also decreased the overall saturation by 5 to tone down the color intensity from this July summer evening. I also used masks to paint with light making Murray the clear focal point.

FINAL: Removed Murray’s leash & collar, plus his mom’s arm. Cleaned up the scene and did a slight crop.

Only 2 Challenges remain!

10/20/2026

“This sweet and engaging portrait is beautifully sharp and the edit is of a high quality. The dog’s head tilt is framed perfectly by the door and those paws hanging over the edge of the step are super cute!”

Challenge 9 in Embark is Say What? Here the goal is to capture a head tilt. The judges are looking for an engaging expression, personality, and ideally eye contact - plus the head tilt of course!

With my trip to Iceland, I was scrambling to find time for another session, but I remembered Hitman having some fabulous head tilts at the beginning of our UGA session from an earlier Embark Challenge. I went back to the archives and spotted this photo.

Originally, I’d wanted to use this door for Composition 101, but ended up finding a better spot later in our session. I’d kind of scrapped these images, but then I remembered his head tilt at my crazy noises.

Technical Details:
Nikon Z8 ISO 800 33mm f/3.5 1/500

RAW: The primary goal was to preserve details in the white fur, so it’s intentionally exposed for the brightest area of his face.

PROCESSED: White balance set, shadows & whites lifted, blacks down to maintain contrast, vibrance up to bring life to his coat, slight tonal curve, and calibration adjustment.

FINAL: Leash removed, tongue cleaned up, slight transform of the door so it looks straight, and a couple distractions cleared.

3 more challenges to go!

10/11/2026

I have to give a shout out to the incredible dogs and amazing owners who brought their dogs out to the sessions in Iceland. Not only did they brave the wind and the cold and the rain with their dogs, they were also so willing to try just about anything.

Játning the German Shepherd wasn't concerned at all about the water, which was MUCH deeper than it looked - and neither was his dad! What you don't see in this image is Játning's dad standing just out of frame camera left thigh deep in the puddle that had formed between these two rocks.

In this image, I love the way Játning's head is framed against the closer rock and the way the water leads you up to him while the rock in the back brings your eye down towards him. I feel like he looks like a bear that I've captured in the wild while he was hunting for salmon.

10/11/2026

Back to Iceland. And, no your eyes aren't deceiving you, that's sunshine you're seeing!

Our first day was spent at Rauðhólar - the lava fields. It's most well known for it's striking red cliffs that are remnants of a cluster of pseudocraters. But, one of the most interesting textures is created by the thick quilts of delicate volcanic moss and lichens.

You have to be very careful not to disturb the moss because it takes decades to recover if damaged, so we were very careful to stick to bare areas of the rock when moving ourselves and the dogs around. Mason here was an absolute pro at staying precisely where his mom placed him. He was like working with a little perfect doll. Once his mom set him in place he waited until he was picked up to move.

Rauðhólar started with some drizzle, but just before we left the sun peeked through the clouds giving us gorgeous soft light where I was able to use some backlight. I love how Mason's pose shows off his spectacular full coat & adorable waterfall of a tail.

I just thought having Poppy meant a lot of hair to maintain!

10/10/2026

Next up in the Embark Challenges is Front Runner. This challenge is all about capturing action. Little Bennett was perfect chasing her tiny Chuck It ball.

We photographed this at a new to me section of the UGA North Campus and the grassy lawn with the late afternoon light filtering through made a beautiful backdrop.

Technical breakdown:
Nikon Z8 ISO 1250 f/3.5 140MM 1/1250

RAW: Mr primary goal here was a fast enough shutter speed to stop motion, managing the highlights, and a slightly deeper depth of field to get most of her face in focus.

Lightroom: Cropping Bennett’s mom out put Bennett’s eye right on the top left third intersection and lined up the ball on the top right third. I also upped the exposure without blowing the highlights and fixed the white balance. I also used masks the paint with light to bring all the attention to Bennett.

Photoshop: I removed a few distractions and bright highlights. I bright the light back into Bennett’s eyes and finished with a little contrast, levels, and saturation boost.

This image finished with a Top 20 placement!

10/08/2026

Did I mention we had a as lot of rain during our retreat in Iceland?

Our session at Brúarhloỗ canyon was the most intense downpour. Poor little Mimi the silky terrier was absolutely soaked just a few minutes in. She didn’t get to stay out long before the cold & wet had her headed back to the car.

10/07/2026

Three Wet Weenies 😆

This wasn’t the rainiest shoot in Iceland, but it was still raining and VERY wet after spending an hour at the base of the Kvernufoss waterfall. I’d gotten images of each dachshund individually, but I still really wanted one of the three of them together. So even though we’d “finished” the session, I stopped us on the hike back out of the canyon to try one more all together on the rock.

Luckily Betty gave me a great head tilt which revealed the waterfall way in the distance, and Eyja & Lotta both looked right at me for a moment (although not in the same frame, so a little head swapping happened). I love the way all the lines coming in leads you to the dogs and the being up on the rock makes them the clear stars of the image. You can also see all the raindrops falling which is a little extra atmosphere.

Follow for more photos of dogs from my Iceland adventure.

10/06/2026

I've gotten behind sharing the Embark Challenges, so let's start catching up!

A little over a year ago, Poppy came to me as a two-week-old foster puppy, alongside her mom, Dolly. Dolly found her forever home in Virginia, so when she came back to town for a month this summer, I knew I wanted to photograph them together under the rainbow umbrella alley in Old Town Conyers.

What you don't see in this photo: four dogs, zero stays, questionable sits, treats nonstop, and both Michelle & I sweating profusely trying to keep both dogs in frame while wrangling the waiting dogs. What you do see is the joy that was there the whole time, underneath all of it.

I entered this one in City Slicker and it received a Top 10 placement! The judges said: "This adorable shot is beautifully sharp on both dogs, perfectly matched with the same floofy charm and expression. The umbrellas above leads the eye down beautifully, while the bricks below add lovely leading lines from the bottom of the frame."

The technical breakdown, if you're interested in that kind of stuff:

RAW: I slightly underexposed to keep the detail in their white fur and a hint of blue in the sky. I lined up the center umbrella to run from top center right between their ears, and shot a few frames to nail that classic Pomeranian grin with direct eye contact on both.

Lightroom: I corrected white balance, then adjusted exposure, highlights, shadows, whites & blacks to keep the full range, from the white of their fur to the black of Poppy's nose.

Photoshop: I cleaned up background distractions and little doggie faces, gave Dolly a face swap for the right eye contact, gave Poppy a b***y swap so her back foot wasn't sticking up, and did my usual eye adjustments to make their expression come alive.

Back in Lightroom: I masked to "paint with light" so the frame pulls you right into those smiling faces.

I love their matching smiles and ballerina feet with the left foot turned out. And how it shows the differences: Poppy is maximum fluffy while Dolly is kept shorter, Dolly has a little snow nose and Poppy's is black.

Next challenge: Front Runner, results share coming soon!

10/06/2026

The glacier was one of my favorite places we photographed dogs in Iceland.
Sólheimajökull is absolutely stunning. And you could not ask for a more fitting dog than Uki Valkyriu the Siberian Husky.
Sweet Aurora Reykjavik

Address

Watkinsville, GA
30677

Opening Hours

Tuesday	8am - 5pm
Wednesday	8am - 5pm
Thursday	8am - 5pm
Friday	8am - 12pm

Telephone

7066889138

Website

http://www.cmbryson.com/

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