A Weekend in the Sky!

The Horse Trials and 3-Day Event at the Colorado Horse Park always makes my assistants and me work really hard for three days. The hours are long, the weather isn't always co-operative and the sleep is scarce after getting all the images downloaded, backed up and the batteries recharged every night. This year was no exception, however the skies were glorious. Every day brought a new sky.

Saturday afternoon's sky decided to cancel some of the last of the cross-country in the way of throwing down a bunch of lightning mixed in with some rain, hail and thunder. Once it was determined that the storm wasn't going to just go on by like most do, arrangements were quickly made to run the last hour and a half of the cross country phase in the morning before stadium started which meant we all got another crack at a glorious morning sky.

Unfortunately, I did have to wait to do most of the processing on the almost 10,000 images that we took over the weekend. I had a date for another horse trials in Vermont. While I could sort them I really had to get to the home computer to do much of the actual preparation... not like I had much time around the the second event anyway. More long hours and driving time and airplane rides, some rather extended from their intended schedule due to more storms at every airport my plane had to visit. Either way, here are some of the skies from the CHP event. Many thanks to the wonderful event managers, Deeda Randal and Kari too for another great event and to Amy E. Riley and Lynne Glazer for assisting me in making all these wonderful images for the competitors.

What was I thinking?

I photographed two large horse trials back to back on consecutive weekends. I don't know what I was thinking!

The first one was my event, Colorado Horse Park's 3-Day event and Horse Trials with over 200 competitors. I had 2 assistant photographers and together the three of us shot over 9,100 images! Lucky me, I get to sort and process all of them.

Afterwards I spent one whole day at home and caught a plane to Massachusetts where I borrowed a car and drove to South Woodstock, Vermont to help Joan Davis of Flatlands Foto take pictures at the Green Mountain Horse Association's June Horse Trials. This event was only 2 days but had 250 competitors. I shot over 2500 images there. Thankfully I only have to sort and process what I shot for GMHA. Joan is on her own! Thank you Joan for inviting me out to shoot it with you. I enjoyed all the green!

For those of you waiting on the proofs to all get up, hang in there. I'm preparing them all as fast as I can. The cats have me chained to the computer. (They are pretty happy to have me back after being away for almost 3 weeks with only a feeder, not a petter, to hold them over.)

Belle

Prince Shawn

OKC Memorial

A few images from the OKC Federal Building Bombing Memorial. It's a sobering, beautiful and peaceful place now, very unlike the violence that preceded it's existence.

Cadillac Ranch

Cadillacs just don't grow on trees... Apparently, they grow in fields in Texas carefully cultivated by many different human travelers.

A Hoof and Hair day

When I woke up Monday morning I had nothing specific to do for the day except get my pearly-whites polished at the dentist. By the time I got dressed, my day was full. First, I was asked by my farrier to help him find some images I had taken over the last few years to illustrate a piece he was submitting to the American Farrier's Journal. After my dentist appointment and he came over and we found the images he needed.

I am very, very fortunate to have such a talented and passionate farrier who understand equine conformation like no one else I've met. With his 40 years of experience he's seen just about every hoof and conformation combination out there. He is also one of the rare farriers that has no issues with working with a veterinarian to get to the desired goal: A sound horse with a true as can be hoof flight pattern. He understands wholly and fully how important hoof balance is. Not just the toe to heel balance, but also how critical the medial to lateral balance is as well and that getting that balance requires one to understand conformation thoroughly. Every horse is an individual with individual needs based on the way they are built and the tasks required of them.

Next on the roster was an impromptu photo shoot. I rarely have to get the photos taken the day I was booked! So later that afternoon, I headed out to a small farm to get some nice images of some Gypsy Vanners that were going to be put on the market. I was excited, like, OMG! Hair! Lots and lots of hair! Nice horses under all that hair to boot. Three of the four go under saddle and in harness too. The fourth was a youngster, not yet a year old. A mellow & agreeable sort they all were too. I arrived just as the grooming was coming to an end. Perfect timing!

First I took conformation pix of each of them and some head shots, then it was just about time for the really fun part... galloping in a field! But, alas, the sprinklers came on! No worries, the groundskeeper was still around so we requested that he turn them back off for a little bit. First I had 2 turned out together and after a a few shots the other two joined in to make a herd. There was flyin' hair everywhere! I didn't get to send them around too many times. It was their dinner time, they weren't yet allowed to be on fresh grass for too long lest they eat too much and set themselves up for a bout with laminitis and it was long past the barn help's time to clock out. Fortunately, it didn't take long to get what I wanted because they are darned photogenic, even more so as a group.

After the shoot, of course I had to go home a prepare the images for the client. That is always the most time consuming part of the job. By the time I got done with that, the day was long past over and I was about done too.