Show Photography

[mayhew]

Are there any show photographers here? How did you get into it? Did you do an internship with an established photographer? Shoot schooling shows for free to build up a portfolio? What are the rules of the business? How do you break into that world?

I’m a hobbyist. I have a very good (though not full frame) camera and a wide selection of lenses, a few of which are good for sports photography. I’ve never done any sports photography though. I’m mostly a nature photographer. I don’t work in the summer (teacher) so it isn’t totally out of the realm of possibility to take a summer learning the craft.

Thank you in advance for any advice that you can offer.

[Bluey]

Here is one that handles shows in the TX area:

http://www.waltenberry.com/index.html

Ask them if they take someone along to learn, or who may?

There is much to learn, from where to set to get the best pictures for each discipline, what is in the background, which pictures to pick from hundreds that show horse/human best and why, you have to know what is good in each discipline and what is a bad picture.

Then you have to tweak pictures once clients order them, close an open mouth, move a leg out of the way, change some colors, etc.

The official show photographer generally has the exclusive for all commercial videos and photos for each show.
They have assistants handling much of the work also and keeping the web site with all the pictures for sale and filling orders with special requests for pictures suitable for internet and print ads, etc.

There is so much to being a good horse performance photographer.

[mayhew]

Yes, post-processing is definitely my weak point! I’m kind of an old fuddy duddy and like getting it right in the camera.

[Alagirl]

[QUOTE=mayhew;8716613]
Yes, post-processing is definitely my weak point! I’m kind of an old fuddy duddy and like getting it right in the camera.[/QUOTE]

A photographer friend told me - when I complained about being too stupid to use photoshop - that he and his wife just bought the program and spend a good amount of time on youtube to watch tutorials. His work is quite good!
Although he specializes in portraits and war bids.
I did some digging in Elements. It wasn’t too hard!

[Where_sMyWhite]

Make sure you go in with your eyes open. Many ammy photographers that think with a digital camera they can be as good as a pro (not saying you are in this category; and I would say this applies regardless of the subject being photographed.) Meaning pro photos used to sell but it seems currently not as much as there is a friend or family member who got photos.

As part of your research, find out what methods work best for making your images available for sale without getting them stolen. Find out the feasibility of really making any $$ unless you are more wanting to do this for fun.

Full frame vs small frame I don’t think is a big deal. Much less so than the quality of your lenses.

And yes, as Bluey said, you need to learn to post-process and yes, shoot in raw if you aren’t already and yes, raw requires post-processing.

The above all strictly IMO

[clanter]

Two of our kids are professional photographers, both work for clients not taking photos with the hopes they will sell.

Personally if I were to want to do this these days I would want to work for a specific client to document their day or days at a show… just like wedding photography, start with the preparation through the end (hopefully with a win)

[ecileh]

@Where'sMyWhite;8716776

Make sure you go in with your eyes open. Many ammy photographers that think with a digital camera they can be as good as a pro (not saying you are in this category; and I would say this applies regardless of the subject being photographed.) Meaning pro photos used to sell but it seems currently not as much as there is a friend or family member who got photos.

A partner and I did show photography for three years and the above quote is part of the reason why we stopped.

I literally had a mother tell her husband “Go stand next to her [me] and take the same shots she does–then we won’t have to pay.” I had other spectators get in my way/in the shot trying to grab the same capture so they wouldn’t have to buy photos. Most disappointing of all, though, was the “friend” who was a decent photographer with good equipment who would post all of her photos from the shows online for free.

We would shoot from 7am to dusk every day at four-day shows–in the heat, in the rain, in the dust-- come out with literally thousands of frames to process, spend a week at home processing them, and then have people complain about the cost (which was actually at a loss for us by the time you factored in hotels and food and the like) and the time it took to get photos posted for sale.

It was very rewarding to capture great images and moments and have people really happy with the results, but you really have to love the work.

All of that said…I really like the idea someone mentioned below about working with one client (or two) to capture their day at the show. That seems like a great way to make an impact and also not kill yourself for pennies.

I highly recommend Lightroom for post-processing. It has great capacity for organizing large batches of images, is more intuitive than Photoshop, and interfaces with services like Smugmug and others to upload directly into pre-made galleries. Very handy for coping with the kind of volume you can generate at a show.

[Backstage]

@ecileh;8717238

All of that said…I really like the idea someone mentioned below about working with one client (or two) to capture their day at the show. That seems like a great way to make an impact and also not kill yourself for pennies.

I’ve done some shows here and there, but this has been the only way I ever made money. I would do it at horse trials and have a set number of riders I was following - each rider would pay a flat amount per CD of images and would get 2-3 phases (could not guarantee all three phases but did my best).

Selling individual photos is a tough gig. Unfortunately, you might produce a lovely image that is perfectly timed but the rider doesn’t like her eq or the horse isn’t even in front. Those are things I can’t control! While its frustrating to do my job right and still not make the sale, as a rider, I completely understand wanting a flattering image for my hard earned money.

[ecileh]

[QUOTE=Backstage;8717304]

Selling individual photos is a tough gig. Unfortunately, you might produce a lovely image that is perfectly timed but the rider doesn’t like her eq or the horse isn’t even in front. Those are things I can’t control! While its frustrating to do my job right and still not make the sale, as a rider, I completely understand wanting a flattering image for my hard earned money.[/QUOTE]

One of my favorite stories from shooting shows was a mother who came up to me and said “I need you to take better pictures of [kid] this year. Everything you shot last year makes her look like a sack of potatoes in the saddle.”

Lady…I can only take a picture of what is in front of me.

[Where_sMyWhite]

ecileh, maybe you should have gotten some photos of a top eq rider and just photoshopped her little darling’s face onto the rider

[Where_sMyWhite]

In this day and age, I totally admire photographers who try and can make a living at photography.

I could never be a wedding photog (way too much pressure for me).

Horse shows would be fun but as discussed, very risky if you are counting on cash flow until you are really tied into a few clients for the day or show or event (so becoming the “friend/family” but with much more professional equipment and, more importantly, experience).

Me? Landscape type stuff and that is a rough place to try to make $$ out of as well and I don’t do it for a living. Even in this market, you need clients that you can work for rather than just being an ammy taking pretty pictures and hoping they’ll sell.

Oh, and a late thought. Check with the venue, and in this case horse show, you might be shooting at and find out what their policy is on selling photographs. Just because a place is open to the public doesn’t mean that you can waltz right in, take whatever photos you want and then sell them.

[ecileh]

Another thought:

My partner does private photo shoots with horsey clients…whether it’s just the horses at liberty, or with owners…sometimes farm shoots, too. It’s only a couple of hours’ work, you have more control over the situation and weather and light…and if you can get two or three clients at the same barn on the same day, it can be pretty lucrative.

She is very good at working with people, so she always does these sorts of shoots and I sometimes come along to wrangle horses, try to get ears up, etc. I am better at the sort of “photo journalistic” candid shots and standard show type shots.

I’ve also thought about offering a service to take sales photos. I cringe just about every time I see a sale ad…people take terrible photos that make conformation flaws look WORSE. Give me $50 and an hour and I’ll get you nice ones.

[AprilKisses]

A good friend shoots many of the Ontario A circuit shows. A part of their business model is “sponsored days” at the shows.

For a certain price a company can cover the sponsorship of the photos on that particular day at the show. The photographers guarantee X number of select photos, try to cover all the rings and then the photos are available to competitors free for social media use. These photos have a logo for the the horse show with the sponsor’s logo beside, tastefully placed in the corner of the image.

I think this helps to cover the costs of the day of shooting/all the work after the fact.

All other photos from that day are available for purchase. If you would like one without the logo, or a different image from those that were sponsored, you would be required to pay for those.

I think it’s a very smart way to make sure you’re not leaving the show with empty pockets, and so far I’ve heard great feedback from companies who have chosen to sponsor. It’s great exposure for them, as most people at least check out their show photos.

Maybe if you are looking to make some income it would be something to consider?

[pologirl27]

My favorite product to buy from the horse show photogs is 15 digital photos (on a flash drive or emailed to me) for $75. They are not edited/cropped that I can tell, but I get pics of me going over the jumps (and occasionally a cute gallop picture) for $5 a piece. Once I found out about that offering I started spending way more money at the photo truck.

[mayhew]

Thanks for the advice, everyone! I do shoot in raw and then use Photoshop for post-processing. I just need to get better at it. I shoot one card in raw and one in jpeg, then use photoshop for the raw and Apple’s Photos for the jpeg. Photos almost always comes up with a better product than my own attempts in photoshop.

[Where_sMyWhite]

[QUOTE=mayhew;8721450]
Photos almost always comes up with a better product than my own attempts in photoshop.[/QUOTE]

Then it sounds like you need more practice

You should be able to produce the same or better than the JPG produced by the camera.

FWIW, I use Lightroom for cataloging and most of the initial post on my raw photos. Doesn’t do quite as much as PS but IMO much easier to use once you get the hang of it.

[clanter]

[QUOTE=ecileh;8717445]
Another thought:

My partner does private photo shoots with horsey clients…whether it’s just the horses at liberty, or with owners…sometimes farm shoots, [/QUOTE]

another closely coupled sideline is shooting for real-estate sales … daughter has expanded into doing the staging shoots for multiple real estate companies on-line marketing campaigns

[Where_sMyWhite]

clanter, I bet there is decent $$ in this as well. The photographer shot my house (prior to putting it on the market) with reasonable equipment, tripod and HDR which she said helps the rooms appear more 3 dimension when they’re posted.

If you could get hooked up with a few good REAs seems like a decent revenue source and not quite the risk of “loosing” income because your photos are ripped off on the internet. More flexibility in personal scheduling as well.

[clanter]

[QUOTE=Where’sMyWhite;8721646]
clanter, I bet there is decent $$ in this as well. The photographer shot my house (prior to putting it on the market) with reasonable equipment, tripod and HDR which she said helps the rooms appear more 3 dimension when they’re posted.

If you could get hooked up with a few good REAs seems like a decent revenue source and not quite the risk of “loosing” income because your photos are ripped off on the internet. More flexibility in personal scheduling as well.[/QUOTE]

daughter uses a strobe flash to eliminate dark corners… my son makes sure she has better than average equipment

the more interesting continuing documentation she is doing is Birth photos… which got her a job documenting the inception to birth of a surrogate parent for the adopting parents… she followers the surrogate parent, photographing the progress… all paid for by the adopting parents (rich adopting parents).

The stuff my son does, I never hear much about until afterwards because of the confidentially agreements … but he did spent two weeks in France teaching Yoko Ono and son Sean Lennon the techniques of film and digital photography… they had a rented a chateau working from there

---

believe me I look at what he does and with whom he works with and just shake my head… and he does it will ease

I would have never ever thought he would be flying around the world doing what he does