Choose your background first!   That’s what I’ve always been taught as a photographer!  You don’t want to have distractions in the background or around the edges of an image that detract from the subject.  I’m a stickler for this and photographing at a dog show – with all of the chairs, people, other dogs, vendor booths, crates, etc. – just about drives me nuts when I see a great image, but there is “clutter” in the scene.  As a result, I hesitate to photograph ring shots a lot of times when the dog and handler are in a position where there is a lot going on in the background.  If you’ve seen any of my images, you’ll notice that I like frame-filling shots.  Sometimes too frame filling as I don’t leave enough room on the edges for cropping if necessary in order to obtain a particular print size.  I compose in camera – not in software after the fact.  So, this very pretty Vizsla was waiting to go into the ring at the Harrisburg Kennel Club show last weekend and I loved the color of the dog against the pattern of the handler’s skirt.  In this case, a “busy background” was a good thing!