I was back in Murragh for the first time in a while yesterday, and over the course of the evening, got the chance to photograph three different subjects – two for pleasure, one as a sort of an assignment. Today’s post is the first of three with those photographs, and this was by far the most fun shot of the day.
“Never work with children and animals”, they say. Well I found this herd of cattle (I believe they are either bulls or bullocks, but that kind of stuff has never been a strong point – I’ve always thought all bulls are black – so I’ll leave the identification of them as an exercise for the reader), particularly cooperative… if a little confused as to what on earth I was doing.
Actually the idea for this shot planted itself in my head a couple of months ago, when I noticed these cattle approaching the fence at the back of my parents house – they’ve grown used to my father depositing freshly cut grass for them to eat, and so wander over in the hope of some food whenever anyone is out in the back garden. For some reason, the thought I had when I saw them was wondering if they would make an interesting photograph if you lit them as you would a human.
And so last evening myself and my brother Conor spent 10 minutes with my camera, an SB-800 fired through a shoot-through umbrella held by Conor, and presumably some strange glances from the next door neighbour, taking this shot.
The set up was simple – the shoot through umbrella is above and slightly to the left of camera. I am underexposing the ambient light to make the sky a little darker, and the grass even more so, and then using the flash to bring the exposure of the cattle back to normal. The umbrella disperses a soft light across the group. I took this with my trusted fisheye lens as an experiment, but with the horizon central it’s hard to tell. I just love the positions of each animal in the group. I’ve thought about cloning out the fence, which the fisheye was picking up in the frame with its 180 degree field of view (and I still might), but it does act as a nice framing element.
When they see this shot (it’d be rude not to show them) I wonder will they will refer me to their friends or look for canvas prints for the wall of their shed? This could be a new lucrative area of photography…
Update: I’m since told that these are black white head bullocks, from a black and white fresian mother and a red white head hereford father.
I love this!