I’ve been to a lot of horse shows over the past few years at the Addison County Fair and Field Days horse arena. Both of my daughters and my wife ride, so I take pictures while they ride and everyone's happy. Taking photos of horses can be a real challenge though because of what little is in my control. None of us can control the weather, the riding arena might be a dustbowl, and I have to be careful of where I take the shot to eliminate all of the interesting things behind the rider that show up in the photo. I'm also particular, so I have a certain expectation I'm looking for when I shoot. This will explain my thinking and how I arrive at a final image that represents professional quality.
Let's start with Ashley and her horse Spy.
Champlain Valley Horse Show, September 2023. f/5, 1/800, ISO1600
If you’re familiar with the riding arena, I am located to the right of the entrance shooting between the top and middle rail of the fence. I am lucky today to shoot from this angle, as often the wind will blow the dust towards me, but the ground is moist and dust-free. Having spent $400 to remove something from the inside of my lens at Canon’s repair facility, dust is my mortal enemy. I am shooting up at her, accentuating her height on the horse to give you the sense that you too are also looking up at her. You'll notice behind Ashley there is no significant clutter or unsightly and distracting elements (besides the chain link fence) that take away from where our focus should be – the portrait of a rider on her horse. There are a few other places around the arena that I can take photos without a lot of background distraction, but most places always have something that you don't want to see – the spectator stands, telephone poles, an old semi trailer or people generally milling around. As Ashley comes down the arena, imagine a bright red focus point through my viewfinder over her face in the middle of the photo near the top, where my camera follows her in auto focus continuous, ready to take the shot when the background is clear.
This image is straight out of camera, meaning that I have taken the raw camera sensor data and converted into a final image without doing anything to it. If you were buying this photo of yourself, would you be happy with it as is? You might be, but I’m not, and I wouldn’t sell it to you because the photo isn’t done - it’s not developed. But it’s a candidate.
Why keep this one? This photo will go on for development because there are some key things I am looking for when I first review an image. I check for focus at the rider’s eyes, proper exposure, and whether there are pleasing elements. Those pleasing elements include a horse that looks athletic in its stance, with the left front leg extended, a nice tail swoosh giving a sense of excitement and movement, and the horse’s eyes are open. Ashley's eyes are open with a wide smile, looking straight ahead and an unusual rose colored jacket that matches her rose colored cheeks, and the white teeth matching the shirt. I also asked myself how I feel when I look at the photo, and in this example, I smile too, my mirror neurons responding to someone who looks like this is exactly where she wants to be. The angle is pleasing, shooting at about a 30 degree angle to her left, capturing the full extent of the horse without a broadside capture, and the fence leading us to our subject from both sides. The lighting is also flat - the sun being diffused through a giant shoot-through umbrella that is the cloudy day, which means less squinting and harsh shadows.
We have a photo to work with. Then what is it that needs work?
Compositionally speaking, the photo is boring. She is dead center in the photo for logistical reasons. Because the calls change frequently from walk to trot to canter, keeping a tighter crop on the subject means little space between the sides. At speed, that means the horse and rider can bounce out of the frame. Losing part of the horse out of frame means the photo can lose its excitement. Three main places on a horse give this sense of excitement - how many hooves are in the air, and the mane and tail that begin to swoosh in canter. Cut the tail and feet out, and the photo goes flat. Here I've kept plenty of room on all four sides to crop in close later. Using the rule of thirds, I crop the photo so that she is in one third from the right, giving distance between her and the left of frame, as if she will canter right in. It also gets rid of most of the sky, leaving some in the upper left corner for perspective. Dead center works better if I am shooting broadside to the rider, at a 90 degree angle. To put the subject broadside in the frame at 1/3 of the frame in, the subject would seem small to the available space.Ashley is slightly overexposed and the background even more so. I am shooting this photo at ISO 1600, f/5 at 1/800th of a second at 235mm using a Canon 100-400L, and I want to keep my shutter speed up, hence ISO 1600. If I’m introducing sensor noise in to the photo at higher ISOs, I want to at least be slightly overexposed to capture more data, and bring down the exposure in post processing. Underexposing to increase shutter speeds means making the noise atrocious once you lift exposure in post, and even more so when you crop, as you’re essentially magnifying sensor noise. I will use software to reduce the sensor noise, then bring the exposure of Ashley down just a tad, but bring the background down even further. That brings some lushness and depth into the colors, makes the dirt look loamy and moist, the yellow flowers in the background pop out more, and provide more subject/background separation.
With those two things done, I now remove some dust or bugs (can’t tell which), that have shown up around her head, visible to the immediate left of her face in the first image. That cleaned up, I’ve added a little color saturation for extra pop, and some subtle vignetting that darkens all four corners. You can’t tell I used vignetting really, and that’s the point, but it gently reinforces moving your eyes to her and her horse from darker corners and following the fence to our subject. This image is now developed and what I would feel proud to convey as professional work.
A fully developed image.