Beyond The Lens is a monthly blog looking at some of Melissa’s favorite photos and what motivated her to take them. Interested in scheduling a photoshoot with Pyrois Media? Email Melissa@PyroisMedia.com for more information.
I make no secret of my love of Autumn – the colors, the perfect temperatures for someone who hates both hot and truly cold weather, and the beginning of fireplace fires season – it’s truly the perfect time of year in my eyes. If you know me, you also know about my quest to get the perfect Autumn photos – so this time of year always gives me the chance to knock off a bucket list item.
I am fully obsessed with the color of the fall leaves and how they combine with horses to make truly gorgeous photos. If there’s a horse around colorful trees, I will almost definitely be taking a photo. Some of these photos turn out as I imagine they will when pushing my shutter button and some of them don’t.
In mid-November, I achieved a rare feat – a photo that looks even better than I imagined.
November is great in Kentucky because not only are the leaves changing but many of the stallion farms in the area host Open Houses during the November Breeding Stock Sales. That combined for what I feel is one of my best Autumn photos ever, taken at Lane’s End Farm.
Coming around the corner of a barn, the first thing that struck me was how brilliantly yellow their leaves were (fitting since yellow is a major part of the farm’s color scheme). It took three more steps to see Twirling Candy surrounded by them in front of the breeding shed and I was in photography heaven.
I was waiting for our next stallion and he was waiting for a breeder to finish inspecting another stallion before it was his turn, giving me plenty of time to take photos from multiple angles (something you don’t often get to take advantage of with horses when it’s not a scheduled photo shoot). While many of the photos from those few minutes go in my “favorites” pile, the one below was the one I felt was the winning shot.
The majority of the editing in this photo was just pulling down the shadows a bit so you can see some more muscle definition with a little cropping as well but no color correction. It was shot at an ISO of 400 and shutter speed of 1/1000 with what you’re seeing here almost exactly how it looked in person.
