A Horse In A Pan

I think this is Allegra. Awkward, not yet recognizing my mother's horses with a 100 % certainty. It must be Allegra.

Now, camera settings matter here. That's the trick:

Aperture F 8; Shutter Speed 1/125 sec.; ISO 200; Focal Length 87mm.

Tracking focus.

Now, out of all of this, the Shutter Speed and the tracking focus are essential for getting such an image. The rest is needed in order for balance to be achieved. I made the aperture as closed as F 8 in order to have a lower Shutter Speed. No more than...in this case... 1/125 sec. I've written about that before and I will keep showing such examples. You need Shuter Speeds below 1/125 sec. As low as 1/5 sec., yup, I've seen successful shots by master authors. Although a teacher of mine recommended 1/30 sec. to 1/125 sec.

Then, I had to track the horse with my camera, focusing on it and moving the camera horizontally, keeping a steady line even while pressing the trigger and waiting for the shutters to close. Even making a burst series of shots just in case.

It's called panning.

This is how you put a horse in a pan ;) Now, if you want to learn how to put a horse in a pun (and it shouldn't be difficult since horses are natural at it) go and see @improv's Punday Monday initiative. Although, I hear this week's topic is Phones.

Anyway, back to photography...What I could have done better was stand further back and zooming out more so that I had some more space on all sides of the mare.

She was a jumper, by the way. I think she's mostly a dancer now. Whatever floats her coach's boat. Horses don't get to decide much. They listen to you. They run in pans.

So do we, mostly, so do we... ;)

Yours,

Manol