May Horse Show

[Netskimmer]

Hey everyone, I haven't posted anything for C&C for a while so I thought I'd share these. These are a few shots from a local horse show last month. I'm not doing it professionally, mostly take pics for family and friends at the events. I do a lot of these types of pictures so I would love any feedback or tips on improvement.

 

[imagemaker46]

They are all fine for what they are, any suggestions would be very small, just keep doing what you're doing, nothing wrong with this set of images. I like the last one, looks like a little attitude going on.

 

[Netskimmer]

Thanks. Yeah she has plenty of attitude alright, but she's a good kid, for the most part...

 

[BlackSheep]

Nice shots! A few suggestions from a horse person's point of view:

- for the lead line (not riding) classes, if you have the choice between showing more of the person vs the horse/pony - get the equine. In your first two shots, the ponies are blocked by their handlers, who both have their "I'm concentrating" faces on.

- for the 3rd & 4th shot - both nice, but if you have the ability to get to a spot where you aren't getting all that stuff in the background, try that. Also if you can avoid cutting the legs off the horse, that is better.

I love the last shot The trick with horse show photos seems to be -find one good spot you can stick at that gives you the best background possible, and where you can frame your shots well. Good thing they go in circles, eh?

 

[Netskimmer]

Thank for the response, I will have to try and position myself better. There really aren't many places with a favorable background. If I could get closer and get low enough might be able to avoid some of it. Getting enough DOF to get the horse and rider while blurring rhe background while getting a proper exposure is a bit tricky.

 

[dxqcanada2]

Yes, it is difficult to get DoF ... I tend to shoot with primes with very wide apertures for this kind of stuff ... and get as close as possible.
One thing I always do when shooting a ring is to scout out the best spots BEFORE I have to take photos ... and I move around a lot.
Sometimes these rings are in the middle of trailers, barns, and other people ... so not much you can do.

As Blacksheep was saying ... in the Equestrian world the Horse is more important than the human ... so make sure to get that first.

 

[Netskimmer]

Unfortunately the ring is surrounded by campers, vehicles and spectators so it is very difficult to get a clear background. I shot most of them at f/5.6 for fear of not getting both animal and human in focus. Next time I will open it up a but. I will consult a dof calculator to see what I can get away with. I know 200mm at 2.8 the dof is just over 2ft given the average distance from me to the subject, I don't think that would get the job done. I might be able to get away with f/4.