Introduction
Ah, rodeo season—when the whole family gets together to celebrate the great American experience. And as every proud parent knows, this means lots of time for reflexive shutter clicks and selfies galore. Of course, it’s always nice to capture a few professional photos too. After all, what’s a rodeo without photos? Just follow these five easy tips for rodeo photography from my years of experience as a professional rodeo photographer:
Set Your Digital Camera Settings
To get the best shots, you’ll want to use manual mode. This will ensure that the shutter speed and aperture are consistent with every image. Start by setting your aperture at f/2.8 – f/4.0. The smaller the number the more light comes through your lens and the faster shutter speed you can use. The drawback is that smaller f-stops are more difficult to focus with. Then we recommend starting with ISO 100 and raising it if necessary to get proper exposure. Next, find a focal point for your shot (I prefer to use a single autofocus point) and use continuous focus so that no matter how fast or slow something moves through the frame, it will stay in focus from start to finish. Finally, turn off any flash units as they won’t be useful during this shoot. Professional photographers use 4+ high-powered studio strobes to light arenas the flash on your camera will not help you in this situation.
Take Advantage of Continuous Focusing
Continuous focusing is a feature that allows your camera to automatically track focus, even during exposure. This is useful for moving subjects, like rodeo riders and horses. Continuous focusing works best if you have a subject that doesn’t move entirely out of the frame but instead moves through it (like a horse galloping across your shot). Keep your camera moving to keep the subject in your frame.
If you’re shooting on a DSLR or Mirrorless camera, set your camera to continuous focusing in its menu settings. On point-and-shoot cameras, this setting may be called “Motion Detection.” When the camera detects movement within its field of view, it will automatically adjust focus without any input from you.
Time Your Shot
The most important thing to remember is that timing your shot is crucial, and it can make or break your photo. You don’t want to be too early or too late with the shot.
If you’re not quite sure when to shoot, here are some tips:
- When you see something that looks cool, hold down on the shutter button to capture a few shots during the action! As you get more practice you’ll get better at timing your shots but for your first few times you can just fire off several shots. Make sure you’re camera is in burst mode or continuous shooting mode. It can be that easy.
Shoot with a Fast Lens
- You’ll want to shoot with a fast lens. Lens speed is measured in a unit called an f-stop, and it’s the ratio of focal length to aperture size. The lower the f-stop, the faster the lens—and faster lenses are better for getting action shots because they allow more light into your camera which allows for a faster shutter speed. If you want to take professional-looking photos that have depth and texture, there are a few things you can do to get the most out of your equipment.
Are you enjoying these rodeo photography tips? Let us know: info@equinephotoschool.com.
Shoot with a Long Lens
- A long lens refers to the focal length in millimeters (mm). A larger number, for example, 200mm, will bring the action closer to you. Shooting with a 70-200mm lens is common. Professional rodeo photographers will often use a 120-300mm or a 400mm lens.
- While a wide lens like 16-35mm can be great if you can get up close to your subject. Likely you’ll be capturing the action from a distance so go for a longer lens.
- You’ll notice that your depth of field, the amount of your image that is in focus from near to far, is less when using a longer lens. This makes for a more professional-looking photo.
If you want to get even more professional-looking photos, use these rodeo photography tips:
- Setting your camera’s settings: Your DSLR or mirrorless camera will have different settings than those on your smartphone or point-and-shoot camera. It’s important to know what each setting does so that you can adjust it when necessary based on the lighting conditions at hand. That said, there are some general rules for setting up your camera in manual mode.
- Focus mode: This is where everything begins — set your camera to a continuous autofocus mode. This will help your camera track your subject’s movements.
- Shutter speed: This determines how long light hits the sensor. A fast shutter speed lets less light hit the sensor; therefore freezing the action compared with slower shutter speeds where more light passes through which shows motion blur from the subject moving and camera movement. For rodeo, a shutter speed of 1/500 or 1/1,600 should be good. The bigger the number on the bottom the faster the shutter speed and the “more frozen” your action will be.
Conclusion
By using these rodeo photography tips, you’ll be able to take better rodeo photos than ever before. Whether you’re shooting a rodeo event or capturing the action of the crowds at your local rodeo, following these recommendations can help you capture stunning images of the action. We hope this helped!
Thank you!
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