Equine Photography

You don't need a massively high shutter speed as with practise you can take excellent pictures at 1/30th even for action shots. You need to practise panning but for just standard shots, non-moving ones...horses always look better in profile so try to get more profile shots. But also try to watch horses get unusual shots as the horses play, gallop e.t.c. in their field. Ask people if you can actually go in with the horses (if you are at a private stables) and get usual angels. Most of all develop your own style and practise, practise, practise.

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One thing I have not seen here (and I may have missed it) is to Know your subject. A good shot of a Quarter Horse is not the same as a good shot on an Arabian. Knowing what makes that breed of horse special helps you know how to compose a good image of that breed. Same goes for discipline (I am not as strong here as I need to be). Knowing anatomy really does help a lot too.

For example do a search for Gypsy Vanner horses. There are a lot of great horse pictures that will come up but not as many great Gypsy pictures. Gypsy horses are judged on "feather" so the good Gypsy pictures are the ones where you can see a lot of thick flowing mane and tail. The Lion King and Black Forest Babydoll exemplify the breed.

A lot of great information in this thread. Practice practice practice. Try all of the different techniques suggested and use what works for you. And as the previous poster mentioned, know your subject - meaning the breed and the discipline. Every breed and discipline looks for something different and you need to be familiar with your niche. Nobody wants to see an image of them with poor equitation or their horse in a poor frame.

I personally shoot most jumping events by pre focusing on the jump I am working with and panning the horse on the approach. Dressage and other flat work I shoot in continuous focus panning and shooting where and what is appealing to me. I never ever shoot in burst mode. Ever. Only single shot. Horses really aren't that difficult to time and get the correct point of stride without machine gunning it and wasting shutter life.

Some people recommend shooting in shutter priority for action, but I actually never do. I either shoot aperture priority or manual. I want complete control over my DOF and I adjust the ISO as needed to get the shutter speed I desire.

And there is only one traditional point of stride to capture for each gait in most disciplines. Learn what it is for the discipline you are shooting and use it. There is a reason there is only one point of stride to capture - it's where the horse looks it's best.

Some stuff from me.

This was on a Nikon D300 with the 70-300mm non-is
Kinda artifact-y...don't know why....

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Derek Nickell wrote in post #11307124
Some stuff from me.

This was on a Nikon D300 with the 70-300mm non-is
Kinda artifact-y...don't know why....

From Nov 6th 2010. Shot with a 7D with a 100-400mm L IS

I don't know that I see the artifact. But the last two, with the 7D, you shot at 1) ISO 320, 1/320, F/7.1 and ISO 200, 1/200 and F/14!, respectively.

Why such slow shutter speed and stopped down so much, especially the last one? You need a lot faster speed and need to open up. Outdoors you can easily get 1/1000th if you were to open up. I always go for at least that and even 1/1500th when I can. This is going to provide for a lot cleaner shots and will blur the background. The 7D handles noise so well you could easily up the ISO if need be.

On that last one, you could have gone to 1/1250 and 5.6 at the same ISO, assuming my math is correct:o It would have been a lot crisper and the background would have been out of focus. Compare it to your first one shot at 1/800th and 4.8, which is really crisp and has nice oof background.

Great tips on this thread. Equie photography is definitely a vast topic.

I was participating in a discussion about cropping on another thread and most of the photographers said they tried to get it right in camera. For myself, in regards to equine shots depicting action, I find myself cropping in probably 80% of cases. I use center point only and I prefer it when there's a bit of room in front of the horse so that it gives the impression he'll be able to move forward. To do this I need to crop on at least one side of the horse to give the photo the look I prefer, like this for example:

Pommekitty wrote in post #11320571
I was participating in a discussion about cropping on another thread and most of the photographers said they tried to get it right in camera. For myself, in regards to equine shots depicting action, I find myself cropping in probably 80% of cases.
I was wondering if other equine photographers here did the same or if you successfully managed to bag most of your shots straight in camera?

I try to get it framed exactly how I want it so I don't have to do any cropping, which is hit and miss with action. I would say I end up cropping about 20% of my images in post. This is a recent goal of mine as of about August.

That's interesting. Do you switch to the focus point you want depending on the picture then? Or do you try to keep to the same one.

I shoot using center point only because it's the most reliable but also because I'm not very good at switching the focusing points quickly enough so as not to miss the shot. I've tried but can't seem to get the hang of it.

Cropping only 20% of your photos is quite an accomplishment! Congrats on reaching your goal. I would like to get it right in camera most of the time as well. For portraits and still stuff it's easy to focus and recompose to get the composition I want but I can't do it for action.

I never frame too closely. You have to keep the aspect ratio of prints in mind. Many customers order 8x10's. And the aspect ratio on an 8x10 is such that you have to crop a lot of both sides (on landscape orientation).

Even with only an 8 or 10 MP camera (1DMkII) I have never had a problem with cropping. A guy ordered an 11x14 of this and even with the cropping and blowing up that big it looked great. (You have to crop almost from the sides on an 11x14)

Here is the original

taken at show in gorey ireland

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I should clarify, I try to frame exactly as I want it with allowance for different aspect ratios for different size prints. I keep in mind that the long ends will often times get cropped off, so I try to frame my shots so they fill the frame going across the short side (left to right on vertical, top to bottom on horizontal). I switch my focus point around depending on what I am shooting, but try to stay on the center unless the scene demands otherwise. For jumping I lock my focus on the jump then recompose.

Here are a couple of examples from a jumper night that I shot just last night. All I had to do to the entire gallery was do a batch unsharp mask and load them to the gallery for viewing. There are no other adjustments at all to these two pictures. Only a few in the gallery have any further adjustmemts, and those are slight additional cropping where I didn't frame it on the fly exactly as I wanted. All final adjustments are made when a print is sold. I just want to shoot them as close to exactly as I want them to cut down post processing time.

It can take many snaps to get just the right shot.... Very hard to tell a horse what to do or how to pose......... alot of time it's just the luck of the snaps

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Matonanjin, I just checked the exif of that shot and was surprised at the 1/250 shutter speed. I would never have dared to shoot reining with that slow a shutter speed (and in fact did all that I could to stay above 1/400 or 1/640 last time I shot indoors) but seeing your shot made me want to try it next time to see if I can pull it off.

Bayberry, I hear you about wanting to cut down the processing time. When you have hundreds of shots from a show where you're the OP, it must be necessary to get it right in camera.

^^^
Pommekitty,
It was 1/250 because I used strobes. That is sync speed. Notice the shadow. I would never shoot that slow with out flash.