2026 Photography Awards Season Is Here and My Nervous System Would Like a Word

The 2026 competition season is here.

More specifically, the International Pet Photography Awards. The world's largest professional pet photography competition, dedicated to artistic skill, technical excellence, and images that evoke emotions from judges.

It is also a very efficient way to make you question every image you have ever loved.

So. Fun season.

The Mental Game No One Warns You About

This year, my work is stronger than it has ever been. Better compositions. More intentional storytelling. Editing that finally feels like mine and not like I borrowed someone else's photo filter and forgot to return it.

And I have still caught myself staring at my portfolio thinking I have nothing good enough to enter.

Is my brain being dramatic? Yes. Aggressively.

Is it also kind of real? Also yes.

Because competing in pet photography awards is not just about technical perfection. It is about resonance. Whether a single frame lands for someone who has zero context for what happened five seconds before you hit the shutter.

A judge does not know that your dog's fur gets slightly curly when it is wet and that tiny detail completely wrecks you every time. They do not know the backstory, the energy in the air, the moment everything clicked into place. They are looking at one frame.

But for you, it is never just a frame. It is memory. Feeling. The specific way the light hit and you knew.

Trying to predict whether that translates to a stranger is where the real mind games live.

Story Over Perfection. It Is More Complicated Than That.

Here is what I actually believe: story matters more than perfection. And also, enter a slightly out of focus image with all the feeling in the world and the judges will call it out every. Single. Time.

Two things can be true at the same time.

I know that I can lean on my old pal perfectionism as a time consuming, paralyzing crutch. I care about sharp eyes, clean light, and intention behind every edit. Technical excellence matters. It just cannot be the whole point.

The images that stick are the ones where both showed up. Emotional truth inside a technically sound frame. So the real goal is not story over perfection. It is story and perfection, held at the same time, in the right balance, under pressure, hoping a domesticated wild animal will cooperate.

That is the part no one puts in the entry guidelines.

A couple in my portfolio I now look at with the specific side-eye reserved for past decisions I cannot undo, because one of the two did not make it.

Growth is weird like that.

A Small Ego Boost I Was Not Prepared For

Okay, I have to tell this story quickly.

The first time I placed, I genuinely thought everyone received a bronze. Like a participation award that kids get for playing soccer, only this one for adults who showed up with JPEGs and good intentions.

They do not give everyone a bronze.

That was a nice surprise. And a gentle reminder that sometimes you actually did the thing well. Recognition does not quiet the voice that wonders if the next image will measure up. But it does turn the volume down a little.

Looking Back at Two Seasons

This is my look back at two seasons of entering pet photography awards as a Calgary dog photographer. The images that were recognized, the ones that were not, and the ones I would enter again without hesitation.

Some I have fallen more in love with over time. Some I have outgrown. And my personal favorites do not always line up with what scored highest, which is something I have had to make peace with.

Stanley on the red rocks is one I keep coming back to. The year before, I had entered this version below into a photography challenge of that same location, midday light, same dog, same location. The feedback was simple: go at sunset.

The location is four hours from my house.

I went the next year.

And this image is everything. Not because it is technically flawless, it isn't. Every time I look at it I can feel the wind and the warmth of that evening and exactly how he sat there like he owned the whole valley.

Sometimes the judges are right. Sometimes the four-hour drive is the whole point.

Riley’s silhouette jumping in the lake is right up there for because she had the time of her life jumping for those treats in the warm lake water. Something in that image just holds.

Those are the ones that stay with me long after the scores come in.

Not every image that matters will win. Not every winning image will be the one that matters most to you. Holding both of those things at the same time is the actual work of being an artist.

The competition is just the deadline that makes you look.

Curious what it looks like when the goal is story over perfection? You can explore sessions and artwork at aubripoon.com, or reach out and tell me about your dog. That part is always a good place to start.

Aubri is a Calgary-based dog photographer working in the Canadian Rockies and occasionally questioning every creative decision she has ever made. It is going well-ish.