Thanks Julie, I kind of figured as much. I do understand very well, shutter speed and aperture and ISO and how it all works, but this horse was running between really bright to really dark areas (and dappled areas in between) so I chose to expose for the darkest areas since he was running there the majority of the time.
It was too dark even at ISO 800 and f/2.8 to get the shutter speed up as high as I wanted/needed it to be. So I shot in shutter priority as stopping action was more important to me than having a perfectly exposed image. I have no problems in good lighting getting right on exposure and controlling how fast I want the shutter speed, ISO, etc. That is all second nature at this point. This was just a challenging lighting situation with the varied lighting and some times here it was beyond the cameras capabilities this day even with settings maxed out each way. So I think what I got with the action was the best that could be done that day.
It was the still, posed shots that I think I could have done a lot better on and would like to learn more about natural lighting in that case. I learned from this not to use sun dapples especially on a light horse! I thought it might look neat to have his face in the light (like Jim did with the handler and rottie a while back, and I had done it with a Friesian last year and it worked well with the black horse) but it just blew the highlights and if I had exposed for the light, I think the woman, etc would have been too underexposed. So I would like to know the best way to set up that kind of shot, big contrast between the light horse and the woman's black outfit, where to have the sun, what "kind" of shade to set up in (really dark or very light, etc).
In scrutinizing the photos my thoughts would be I should have had all of the horse and woman under the shade with no sun spots, I like the sun behind and to the left of her as it is making a bit of a rim light on her hair. I'm guessing a reflector would have helped then to add details in the shaded side of her and the horse. Does this sound like the best kind of set up in this case?
I would have liked lighting like your shots here
http://www.nwpphotoforum.com/ubbthreads/showflat.php?Cat=0&Number=9884&an=0&page=1#9884Do you remember the situation here, were you in the shade, using a reflector, etc?
I also am wanting to get a diffuser panel to practice with, although we have many long dark months ahead!
