Showjumping

A couple of shots from some showjumping a few weeks ago. Shot as Jpeg, minor levels, cropping, burning of some highlights. If anyone wants to have a go at post proccessing them go for it, but run me through what you have done. Im sure someone out there can get a little more from em.

Would love some CC. Also if anyone has some tips for this stuff I would like to hear it, I will be shooting a lot more of it.

Thanks
Daniel

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#1 and #3 could use some fill flash. You'll have to turn on the "Editing OK" feature before anyone can edit your photos on this forum. Pretty nice effort though.

I would pop a flash in high speed synch on your camera, number 1 would be outstanding with a little fill

Could definately use some fill flash, unfortunately flash is not allowed. Pretty much a no no in most sport.

Daniel

How do I turn on the editing ok.

To turn on the "Editing OK" you have to go into your "User CP" area... then scroll down to "additional information" area.

You turn it on by pressing usercp then edit user profile.

Since you asked, I will assume it is okay. I used lightroom to light up the rider. If I had the original, it could be a little better

Number 1 is my favorite! But the whole set is great

Yeah, obviously you want the edit. It's tough to do with the web quality photo, but here's my whack at it... The sharpness suffered from web compression, but you can see the lift on the shadows...

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Just had a quick go at pulling a bit of detail from the face of the rider just using a selection and shadow/highlight. Probably enough to make the shot work a bit better.
What do you guys think? Would still like to do a slightly better job though.

Daniel

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It's better Daniel, but the real lesson here is to expose the shot correctly in camera. If you're not allowed to use flash at the event, you should expose for the subject. Your background sky in the shot is really nice, but sometimes you have to sacrifice the background to get the subject. Particularly, get the eyes.

If you shot this RAW, it will look much better than what we can do with a compressed jpg

jbgeach,
yep RAW would have been the way to go but that was another limitation. The company I was shooting for at the event wanted JPEG so they didn't have to edit, that way they could get the photos up for sale at the event.
If I was shooting for myself I would have definately shot RAW or both. The processing that has been done, was by me after I was given some shots back, the stuff at the event was straight from camera.
But I am keen to see what can be done to improve these shots, for my website.

Johndevane,
Yep I agree, try and get as much right in camera, makes you a better photographer. But I think exposing for the face in this shot would have killed it entirely, one big white blob of a horse and sky, would have lost the shot anyway.
It was no big deal not getting the face exposed better, as I grabbed the rider on another jump so still got a shot, just wanted to push it a little creativly. I think it can definately be saved/improved though, just want to see how others would go about it, I want this one on my site.

Cheers
Daniel

I shoot outdoor horse events. Sometimes, you just can't get away from the high contrast lighting. .. so I turn down the contrast level in my camera (5D) which helps some.. and then, since I shoot on M, I can usually run each class through Lightroom quickly when I've fixed up the #1 photo. (fix 1 and then 'sync' the rest) Because I shoot around 1200-1500 shots per day, I shoot jpeg. The customers still get quality images up to 16X20. If I'm out shooting Ranch Calls (stallions or family portraits), I'll shoot in RAW.

If you don't have Lightroom (yet), then you can use Photoshop .. either Levels or in the Enhance>adjust lighting> shadows/highlights, you can lighten the shadows. Not everyone does the same thing the same way, but with all of this feedback, hopefully, you'll find what works for you. Nice shots, btw.

Playm,

Thanks for the advice, will try turning down the contrast. Shooting manual is how I plan to shoot the next event, just sit on one jump, rather than shooting 2 or 3.
Am going to have a play in photoshop/lightroom and find something quick and easy and batch it like you said.

Cheers
Daniel