Sandy Black likes horses, especially the powerful draft horses that leave spectators spellbound at events such as the Royal Manitoba Winter Fair in Brandon and the Canadian Western Agribition in Regina.
So it seems only natural that when he left his job as a photographer and news editor for a newspaper in Portage la Prairie, Man., Black found a way to fit horses into a career as a commercial photographer.
“Horses are just something that I’ve always enjoyed photographing. I find the people that are involved with horses to be a special class of people, too.”
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Black lives in Brandon and earns his livelihood mainly by shooting photos for government, community organizations and private companies. Many of his photos are used in brochures and other promotional materials.
But during the past 12 years, he has found a niche taking photos of horses, mainly at big fair events.
He learned what kinds of photos people were looking for through experience. He has spent numerous hours in the show ring with camera in hand and countless more hours building a clientele for those photos.
For Black, a bonus of photographing horses is that he gets to be near the action during major events.
Besides capturing the dazzling image of several draft horses hitched together as teams, he also photographs light horse events such as the western pleasure and jumping classes.
“I don’t make a fortune out of it,” he said, “but I make enough that I can get up in the morning and enjoy going to work.”
His work means knowing where to be in the show ring. He also must anticipate when to take the shot so that it will capture the action at its finest.
He doesn’t use a motor drive in his camera, which would allow him to take a quick sequence of shots back to back. Instead, he strives to capture the moment with one well-timed release of the shutter on his camera.
That isn’t always easy.
Take a six-hitch team of draft horses, for example. An important part of photographing the teams is the posture of their heads and the positioning of their legs as they chug around the show ring.
With a six-hitch team, that’s 24 legs pumping around the ring. Ideally, for a photograph, especially in the case of the two lead horses, the front legs nearest the photographer should be straight while the other front legs should be at the peak of their arch as they reach forward.
The owners like photos where the heads of their horses are held high and proud and the ears are forward.
And there are other subtle things that the horse owners look for in a photograph. If the reins are too taut, suggesting the driver was working too hard to control the team, the photo may not sell.
Or, if the driver was looking into the crowd when the photo was taken, the photo may not sell, either.
“You’ve got to be focused,” said Black, referring to his mindset when in the show ring. “If I’m not focused, then I might as well not be in there.”
Black doesn’t keep his eye focused only through the viewfinder of his camera when waiting for the right moment to release the shutter. He has trained himself to keep a broader view because the viewfinder limits what he can see happening in the ring.
He has an unconventional way of honing his reflexes in the days leading up to the Agribition and the winter fair. He kneels in front of his television, taking pictures of the channel that runs TV listings. The listings slowly move from the top of the screen to the bottom.
Black trains the camera on a particular listing and then follows it to the bottom of the screen, snapping the picture the moment the listing reaches the bottom.
He finds that exercise helps during shows, which often mean spending 12 hours a day behind the camera. In the case of the winter fair, he shoots as many as 40 rolls of film, each with 36 frames on it. That’s more than 1,400 pictures.
Besides taking pictures inside the show ring, Black also will shoot photos on request from horse owners who want static shots of their animals for sales purposes. The shows offer an ideal time to get sales photos since the horses are groomed to look their best.
Outside the show ring, he does freelance photography for several horse publications that are distributed in Canada and the United States.
But he makes no secret of the fact that what he enjoys most is photographing draft horses, the titans of the horse world, as they sail around the show ring.
“They’re a joy to photographers because there’s so much action there.”
