Post by dalesnfellfan on Aug 1, 2015 11:37:52 GMT -1
On Thursday Connie and I had a photo shoot for an article in EquiLife Magazine which is a monthly magazine local to East Anglia, there was one of the writers on the pleasure ride I organised in June and when she learned that the ride was my normal hacking she asked if I would be prepared to take part in the regular feature 'My Favourite Ride' I agreed and wrote a short piece about the ride and on Thursday we met up with the photographer to take some photos of us on the ride.
I arranged to meet him at the starting point of the ride for me which is where 2 bridle paths meet and within a short distance there are 2 tracks for canter shots, a stream crossing and 2 green lanes, so I thought he would get all the shots he needed there and perhaps take a dozen photos.
Wrong!! He wanted much more than that and he walked a 5 mile loop of the ride with me, some of it in the pouring rain, and had us stopping to let him get ahead, then coming toward him in walk, trot or canter, whichever he asked for, he would then send us back to do it again, sometimes several times until he'd got the shots he wanted, before moving on. He also wanted to find a suitable place to get side on canter shots with the right background so her dark colour didn't get lost against the hedges, she wasn't that keen on cantering past him while he crouched on the ground, too predator like I suppose. He also wanted some shots by bridleway signs and with pretty cottages in the background for added interest.
This ride usually takes us 45min from the start of the tracks, I had done it the day before, but with all the stopping, starting, toing and froing it took 3 hours, Connie was very good, if a little confused to start with, she did have trouble with all the standing still but a pocket full of Lucie nuts helped immensely, she did say NO a couple of times on the way home through the village when asked to turn around and walk back past a particular spot again, but did it fairly graciously with just a little persuasion. She seemed to thoroughly enjoy belting up and down one particular track to get all the side on shots.
By the time we'd finished both my knees and my ankles had seized up and I was exhausted but it was worth it, as well as appearing in the magazine, he is allowing me to choose 12 photos from the 39 he took, there's some really nice ones there so I had a job to choose, I was waiting until I could download the proper ones before posting but couldn't wait any longer so have copied a few with the photographers watermark for now, you can view them all on his web site 'Chris Doyle Photographer' - galleries and our shoot is the top one, don't know how to put a link on.
This one's my favourite
Connie 2 by Andrea Tyrrell, on Flickr
Connie5 by Andrea Tyrrell, on Flickr
Connie 3 by Andrea Tyrrell, on Flickr
Connie 6 by Andrea Tyrrell, on Flickr
I have also asked if we can include a bit in the article about Dales ponies, as I thought it was too good an opportunity to miss to promote the breed, am I right in saying that now they have gone to critical on the endangered species list there are less than 400 breeding mares in the world? I don't want to get it wrong.
Equestrian Life is stocked at most horsey places round here so I will be sure to get a copy. 
this is brilliant!!! So many lovely photos 
