I started to take an interest in photography back in 1980 on a three week trip to China with a group of horticulturalists. That was back in the days of film. It came in handy little cannisters and you had to load it into your camera. On that trip to China I mastered the art of changing the film in the camera while walking. No time to stop and fiddle around with changing film. But fast forward to the age of digital .
In 2015 I had media accreditation for the Pan American Games in Toronto, when I was writing for a British horse website. I had a Canon Rebel camera and two lenses: 28-50 and 50-250. I took lots of photos and some of them were ok . In 2016 I started my own blog website Horseaddict. I was primarily taking photos of horses in competition and they are moving all the time. I knew I needed to take better photos. So I enrolled in an online course offered by the Equine Photography Network. When I took the course there were six weekly lessons focusing on various aspects of photographing horses. How to focus, meter, set shutter speed etc. When you had taken the photos for a session you submitted them to the instructor for critiques and assistance with improving your shots. I used Biasini as the subject of many of the photos. The shot below was for the assignment of spot metering using a doorway or other dark background. I was amazed with how well it turned out.
We also were assigned action shots. For this I got the pony Penelope to be my subject.
Another assignment was a horse in silhouette. This is my coach Belinda Trussell on her horse Tattoo.
In 2018 I got media accreditation for the World Equestrian Games in Tryon NC. For this I got a bigger long lens a 250-600mm and a monopod as the lens is quite heavy. By now I also had a second camera body another Canon Rebel. I knew as accredited media I would be at the ringside but that does not mean close to the horses and riders. The media center had easy access to the arena. I liked to stand at the railing behind the 3 judges booths, at the end of the arena. You can see them in the photo below. I could move back and forth to get the horse and rider in various parts of the test. I was familiar with the Grand Prix tests and so I knew when the good movements like the extended trots and half passes were coming up. I also took an online course in editing in Adobe Lightroom.
Here is my coach Belinda Trussell competing at the WEG, for the Canadian Team, on her horse Tattoo.
Here is Isabell Werth and Bella Rose. With the help of my EPNet course I had learned the precise timing of when to click for a good canter shot.
For the medal ceremony the entire media contingent assembled at the side of the arena just below the stadium seating.
We were all there to photograph the Gold, Silver, and Bronze medal winning teams.
Since then I have had media accreditation for the Winter Equestrian Festival and the Adequan Global Dressage Festival, in Wellington Florida during the winter. I was there last winter, before the Pandemic shut down the shows, photographing and interviewing Canadian riders who were competing for qualification for the Tokyo Olympics. Here is a photo of Canadian Megan Lane.
This is another Canadian rider, Naima Moriera Laliberte.
I hope that once the Pandemic is over I will be back to these competitions taking more photos of horses and riders. Thank you to Amy for this weeks Lens-Artists Photo Challenge “My Photography Journey”. This has been an interesting trip down memory lane for me. My final photo is of me taken at the AGDF in 2018 by fellow photog Queca Franco.
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