How to Make a Pet Santa Video for Your Christmas Card

What the pet Santa video looks like

Your pet is dressed in a well-fitted Christmas outfit and sits on a cozy rug by a crackling stone fireplace with stockings, a twinkling tree with wrapped presents, and a window with snow falling outside. Its face, eyes, ears, fur and markings stay exactly its own.

For the first two seconds your pet sits by the fire as the light flickers on its fur. From two to five seconds it looks around at the tree and back at you, and often gets up to come closer. In the last three seconds the camera slowly moves in on its face as it tilts its head up at you, with the tree glowing behind. It is warm and quiet, made for cards and stories.

The costume and the room are added for you, so the photo can be from any time of year. A summer photo on the grass will still end up by the fire with snow outside.

How to make it on MagicTakes

1. 1Open the Pet Santa template.
2. 2Upload one photo of your pet, with its whole head and ears in view.
3. 3Choose an outfit: Santa, Elf or Reindeer antlers.
4. 4Tap Make my take. It costs 40 credits, and your first take is free with a small magictakes.com mark.
5. 5Wait two to four minutes. You can leave the page; the take is saved in your library when it is ready.
6. 6Download the 8-second 9:16 MP4 and send it.

Which photo works best

Every outfit includes something on the head, so the head and ears need to be in the photo.

Close-ups of the face work for the hat, but leave a little of the body in the frame so the suit or scarf has somewhere to go. A sitting pose looks most natural by the fireplace.

• One pet facing the camera, filling most of the photo
• The whole head and both ears visible, so the hat or antlers fit
• The tail in view if you want to see the wag
• Bright and sharp, without filters
• No people or other pets in the frame

Santa, Elf or Reindeer antlers

Santa is a red velvet coat with white fluffy trim and a black belt, and a small red hat with a white pom-pom. It is the classic Christmas card look and the one in our example.

Elf is a green coat with a red collar and a pointed green hat with a small bell. It suits a small or mischievous pet.

Reindeer antlers is a soft antler headband and a red knitted scarf. It is the lightest outfit and covers the least, so it is a good choice if you want your pet's coat to show.

For a family with several pets, make a take of each in a different outfit and send them together.

Ideas for sharing it

The take is silent and vertical, so it works in a messaging app as well as on TikTok, Instagram Reels and YouTube Shorts.

Send the card a few days before Christmas, when people are checking their phones for greetings. A short line from your pet's point of view, written in the message, is a nice touch.

• Send it as a Christmas card that moves, in place of a photo card
• Post it to your pet's account in December
• Caption it "Checking the list twice"
• Use it as a season's greetings message for family abroad
• Make it early in December, so you have time to try all three outfits

When a take doesn't look right

Each take is a new attempt from the same photo and stays in your library, so you can make a couple and choose the one to send.

• The hat covers your pet's eyes: use a photo with the whole head and both ears in view, then make another take.
• It doesn't look like your pet: use a bright, front-facing photo where the face and markings are sharp.
• The tail doesn't wag: use a photo where the tail is in view, or make another take; each take moves a little differently.
• A take failed to generate: its credits go back to your balance automatically.

Whose pet you can use

Use a photo of your own pet, or of a pet whose owner agreed. If a person is in the photo, crop them out first. Uploads are deleted after 30 days, and your takes stay private unless you share them.

Questions