Back once again

I will be starting, or I should say 'restarting' the Equus ferus Blog - I had one of those password moments and kept forgetting to change the password and write it down somewhere I'd remember... So we are up and running . We just returned from Spring Creek Basin, Salt River and Little Book Cliffs. It was a wonderful trip- we met up with our friends Karen McLain and TJ Holmes- you'll see photos shortly. In the meantime, check back from time to time...

Meredith

Myself and my daughter Abby who is also an Equus ferus- Wild Horse 

photographer at Spring Creek Basin, Colorado 

February 2014

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How to be a mustang photographer...

What do you need to photograph mustangs?

1. A job- This may sound like an oxymoronic statement but unless you are wildly successful, you won't make a living solely upon your mustang photos. Most of the successful photogs in the mustang industry also do non-mustang horse photography. Horse shows, gymkhanas, private photo shoots, animals other than horses (pet portraiture) etc.

I have a wonderful job I adore outside of photography that allows me to pay for camera equipment, software, advertising, traveling to the horse management areas, printing... Plus my job also gives health benefits so when I cut my leg open on rusty barbed wire in pursuit of mustang photos, I can go to the Emergency Room for a tetanus shot.  

2. Mustangs- another no-brainer. Use this book to find the mustang sites and I can offer suggestions for good hotels nearby. There are a lot of Horse/Herd Management Areas (HMA) in many states- some closer than you think. Also Google BLM, mustang, wild horse, management areas and you'll find a lot of information, once you know the name of the HMA, try to Google that and you will be amazed at the sheer quantity of clubs and rescue groups affiliated with the mustangs!

http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/the-american-mustang-guidebook-lisa-dines/1004453038?ean=9781572234031

3. Car with high clearance- four wheel drive is not necessary if you are absolutely 100% positive it won't rain (being a weather psychic is useful too). High clearance is the most useful feature for your mustang-finding-vehicle but four wheel drive comes in handy and will offer you peace of mind. My husband loves to drive all over the place looking for mustangs... Four wheel drive is also good and I won't go out to some of the sites without it...

4. SLR Digital Camera-like a Photoshop below, you need a DSLR camera (digital single lens reflex)- Canon, Nikon, Olympus- whatever is most affordable, start with used if finances are an issue. Lots of megapixels are great but beyond 10- the photos are just taking up space on your hard drive-unless you specialize in posters which require large files for the clearest printing but for most people, 10-12 megapixels or less is fine. Should you include video? Some of the newer SLR cameras come with video. I am a bit of a purist and I bought a GoPro camera so I can shoot video and photographs separately. When I am in the groove taking photos, the last thing I want to do is stop and switch my camera to video and waste tremendous space on my memory card for video... Save it for photos and find a friend with a sense of humor to shoot video for you. Try B&H Camera and Video in New York City- I have been there many times, they have excellent on-line used cameras and lenses and you can search by price. They are very knowledgeable and if you decide to visit, let me know-I will treat you to lunch.

5. Adobe Photoshop- Don't accept substitutions. This is the industry standard in photography and if you want to be taken seriously, you need Photoshop. If money is tight, then you might consider buying it with a student license. There are restrictions with a limited student license but it is substantially cheaper. It is a rather complex program and it will take a while to learn Photoshop but there are plenty of books you can buy to learn this program as well as thousands of free lessons on line. Even video tutorials at Adobe's website or You Tube. They have a new way to buy Adobe products called Adobe Creative Cloud where you pay a nominal fee each month  and you have access to ALL Adobe products and they have a vast library of programs for web design, video, photography and graphic design.

6. A spirit of adventure and professionalism- being adventurous is critical to mustang photography. When it is the fourth herd, located well over a mile away and it is 90F and you are already hot and sweaty...having that "okay, let's hike through the sagebrush for the fourth time in the hot sun and photograph the mustangs" attitude is key... It is ALWAYS worth it. As for professionalism- be polite, respectful, avoid profanity both on your website, Facebook fan page and your personal page. People can see some of your personal page (regardless of friend status) and having questionable photos/content won't bring people to your photography site in droves.   Utilizing your computer's spellcheck and grammar are also pluses though I have been known to post some humorous comments when typing on my phone- granted the comments are spelled correctly, the just don't make any sense grammatically.

Other non-essential but useful 

A friend- driver, video , companionship

External hard drive-always, always, always back up to an external source before you even look at the photos!

Cintiq board/tablet- I bought mine at B&H and this handy graphics tablets comes pre-calibrated for print. I never have to worry about my prints looking different than what I see on my monitor because of my Cintiq. If you don't have a a graphics tablet, try calibrating your monitor so that the print will look similar to what you see in Photoshop. Also when doing fine work on a photograph, the pen is more comfortable to use than a mouse.

Telephoto lens- most cameras come with a 35-110 or 200 mm lens as a package deal. I love my 18-200mm. For mustangs, you will probably want to invest in a 100-400mm and IS is best. (Image Stabilized). I had a 500mm Canon lens- it was a moose, weighed a ton and was utterly useless in the field. Great for photographing hummingbirds at my feeder at home but that was about it. You want the most portable lenses you can carry- literally.

Digital watermark- this is a process that places an invisible 'digital watermark' on all your image (you choose which). It tracks these images throughout the Internet and will find if your image is being used somewhere else even if it has been altered. I use DigiMark.

Nik filters for Photoshop - amazing filters I can't live without!
Alien Skin Filters- also phenomenal 
 

Adobe Lightroom- an amazingly useful program to preview, catalog and do minor editing- also will upload to a website as a gallery- very cool!

Monopod- like a tripod, this handy item comes as a single cane-like support for your camera. It has only one leg but if you find your images are blurry, try using a monopod or tripod. I find them cumbersome and I have learned how to steady my camera but I carry a monopod in my uber-cool photography vest. Once in a while they are great for panning a running herd or if you find yourself parked next to a waterhole... 

Photography vest- a slightly dorky but rather useful article of clothing. It has about 15 pockets of varying sizes. Make sure, if you don't have a driver friend, put your car keys in a very safe place- zippered pockets are nice and secure. You don't want to search through sagebrush for your cars keys. The nice thing about the vest is it holds extra lenses, water, monopod, memory cards and lens cloths without a backpack. Useful for hot summer days especially when you have to hoof-it for a mile.... 

Memory cards- I use smaller cards, about 32 MB and switch frequently. If I manage to get an amazing series of photos, I will remove that card, stash it someplace safe and continue with a fresh card. This way you don't ever run the risk of losing precious photos. My cards are labeled 1,2,3,4,5... And A,B,C,D,E... This way I remember which are used and which are blank. All cards are reformatted after each day. The photos are uploaded to my laptop. Then they are backed up to my external hard drive which I carry on the plane with me. Only then do I allow myself the pleasure of looking through that day's adventures in mustang photography on my MacBook.

Cell phone with car charger- this is an obvious one

GPS- might be useful, I have never needed one myself - most phones come with some sort of location function. Try that before you buy a Garmin

Water- especially in the warmer weather

Have fun and be safe!!!!
-Meredith

Sandy makes landfall

Equus ferus -Wild Horse Photography would like to wish all of our Eastern US and Atlantic seaboard fans a safe journey through the storm.

A special shout-out to all the emergency workers, our government, police, fire and EMS, all NYSEG and Con-Ed peeps & state electrical authorities, and all the hospital personnel who will work through this storm- many of whom will have to sleep in the hospital and be separated from their families!
Stay safe friends!

Hurricane Sandy and the ponies

We are hoping that the hurricane is slow enough so that we can get some photos in tomorrow morning. A little light rain is okay but anything heavier would be bad for the cameras- sometimes the ponies are close enough so that we can shoot from the car but we'll see.

We got some lovely shots in today in two sessions- one in the morning from 6:30am to 11:30am and then 3:00 to 6:00pm. My backup battery failed so I thought returning to the hotel for lunch and a swim would allow me time to upload the photos and recharging my battery- it worked well. And I ordered its' replacement already!

The Park Rangers were perhaps the only unpleasant thing we encountered and I'd like to think they were simply "doing their job". It would have been nice to be informed before you get reprimanded for something you didn't actually do... But if that is the worst thing we dealt with- it was a successful trip. Many thanks to the kind hunters who not only dug our SUV out, towed us through the deep sand, escorted us to the main road and made sure our tires were properly re-inflated to 32 PSI- they were so wonderful, kind and sweet- it made up for the grumpy rangers.

Keeping ten feet from the ponies is challenging! They are extremely desensitized to humans and walk right past you (often bumping into you) without a care in the world. Rather different from the mustangs out west! You stand ten to twenty feet away and the ponies walk right up to you and nuzzle your pockets looking for treats. We know horses- Abby, Shauna, Lauren and I are experienced accomplished equestrians and spend much of our time in their company. We know when a horse is likely to bite, kick or strike out and we know is when a horse is nervous or uncomfortable and we respond quickly and kindly by moving to an appropriate distance. We do our best to be respectful and safe.

So off to bed- up early though not as early as this morning... I hope the expected heavy rain stays away and we get some shooting in before we head north- I will be conservative and cautious because the idea if driving through a hurricane for five hours isn't on my top ten list of 'fun things to do'. There are rumors that Mayor Bloomberg is closing Manhattan down Tuesday with regards to transportation -no subways or MTA buses- only emergency vehicles etc... My patients wouldn't be able to get to the office and thus I'd get an extra day off since I have a vacation day Monday! More time to edit the pony pictures!!!

G'Night everyone!
Merry

Fawn

Awwww

Good morning! Hello Ponies!!!

Up early about to go for breakfast! I found out my back-up battery is dead so we might stop at a camera store but we will see how much battery I have at lunch. I am excite to see how Abby does with the new Canon Rebel T3i...

All the cameras are packed and have full batteries and empty memory cards! Breakfast was yummy! We are about 20 minutes from Assateague Island and the sun rises as 7:10am so we'll leave at 6:30 or thereabouts.

Next stop Assateague!
Merry

Rest Stop!

Mmmmmmmmmmmm Nathan's.

Stuck in traffic

We currently are on the New Jersey turnpike stuck in traffic. A little over 2 hours away! We just found out there is an emergency evacuation for in Cape May, NJ. We may end up getting evacuated Sunday morning.

B and H- a total hoot

I love this store. They have everything you could possibly want for your camera. I was originally going to buy Abby the Canon 40lD used but then the salesman Said it would be smarter to buy her a brand-new camera rather than used camera. It did seem to make some sense and now she has a camera that also takes video as well. I'm now waiting for Shawna to pick out a knapsack from the Yellow Rat Bastard store in SoHo.

Assateague Island National Park

We're getting ready for our trip to Assateague Island NP and watching Hurricane Sandy rather closely. The plan is to drive down Friday - up early Saturday morning and photograph until lunch then back for more photos until we loose light. Repeat Sunday except we leave at lunchtime. If the weather turns ugly, we will leave earlier.

We are staying about 20 minutes from the park- the hotel has a pool so that will keep Abby, Shauna and Lauren amused while I spend our evenings uploading and backing up the photos.

Abby and I are mostly packed- we have all the requisite items for 'Over-Sand' vehicles and tomorrow Shauna and I are going into Manhattan to visit B&H to get supplies.

Hurricane Sandy is an impressive storm and we will hopefully be well ahead of her path. With any luck, we will get some interesting photographs of the surf and skies and wild ponies-Meredith

Assateague Island
7:20 sunrise
6:10 sunset

Out West Day Seven- Sand Wash Basin final day

It is 7:30am an we are heading back to the Sand Wash Basin in Moffat County Colorado... I spoke to John ad he gave us some tips in where to find the elusive Picasso. It is 48F but there is no wind so it is better than the Butte yesterday!
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Well it is 12:30p and we didn't see Picasso... However we did see almost everyone else- we estimated we saw 75+ mustangs today. We ended at 90F and a few more bruises and scratches... but it was worth every moment. The gorgeous Corona made
an appearance and I managed only a mere hundred or so photos of him.. I saw horses I have only seen in photos of the Sand Wash horse club on Facebook or John Wagner's page.

My little photo buddy Abby walked with me -every mile up and down the ridges and bluffs, through the gullies and sagebrush. All in all we took over 9,000 photographs between Little Book Cliffs, Pilot Butte and Sand Wash Basin Horse Management Areas. The cameras are cleaned and put away. All compact flash cards are reformatted and stored in their cases and I have transferred the photos to both the laptop and the external hard drive. Currently I have Lightroom making a catalog of the weeks adventures. Just glancing thru the photographs- Abby and I took some very nice ones that we hopefully will sell and make money for the mustang rescue groups. I am so happy both my children were able to see wild horses roaming "free"- that being a relative term but it was a privilege to witness the lives of these magnificent creatures.

Stay tuned,
Meredith