First Horse Show

[drmac]

Thank you to everyone for their help with my first horse show. My daughter got third in her class.

Here are a couple from today....

[drmac]

Two more...

[matonanjin]

drmac,

All I can say is I hope you don't start up an equine photography business in my area. :(These are well exposed, great use of dof and great compositions.

The first one is what we in the business call a "money shot". Great expression, exposure, use of dof, and composition. Most beginning photogs underexpose a shot like this and lose shadow detail on the face under the hat.

#2 is good. It would be better if the light pole wasn't coming out of her head but, of course, in candids that is difficult to control. Many photogs have a tendancy to over/under crop on these types. You didn't. You need to either have the entire horse in the image, which you did. Or crop tight with just the rider and ribbon.

3) Good emotional "moment" shot. Might be better to see the rider's eyes.

4) On "rail shots" like this it is best to catch the horse showing more motion. It is hit and miss but try and catch a couple feet off the ground in mid stride. Notice how the horse is "strectched out". Most riders want their horses "softer in the face". If the horse is giving to the bit and suppling it will pull its hind legs up him more which looks better. Also the shot is slightly underexposed. Its hard to expose correctly in high contrast situations. But you lost shadow detail in the horse's face. Better to overexpose about a half stop and blow out the highlights. However, yu should be able to pull some shadow detail out in PP.

all in all just a great job.

Ron

[CanadianKitKat]

Nice shots :-) I love seeing little girls riding horses, brings back so many great memories for me....

[drmac]

Thanks for the comments...

On number four the event was walk/trot, so there wasn't much action... I am looking forward to my daughters next event. I will take your comments to heart and post the next series.

Thanks for your input.