Table portraits 2.

Here comes the second half of those table portraits with the ugly kind of bridle. Though, the bridle itself is different than in the previous batch.

I already explained what's going on in the previous part, so let's not mumble too much this time. I started the whole thing with color photos...

The horse is Verdades on the Salinero mold. I named my model "Rispetto".

...and switched to black and white, because that is what I eventually will do with photos like this. It's partially about getting fed up with how colors in photos will usually not match with the reality, and also to be able to focus entirely on the contrast.

I think I also got to use the manual focus with these. It is often awesome, but it is also difficult to use when you can't use a tripod. I generally keep the serial photography setting ready all the time, too.

The sad atmosphere is my thing, and I do not know why. Here I see I tried to make it look like the horse was rollküred by an ignorant rider. Fail. No reins...

This repetition of the nearly similar angles and closeups could be annoying in dA, but that is why I blog them instead. I can pick the best shots for dA then.

Here the focus could rather be on the hackamore noseband's buckle...

After trying to focus on some buckles, eyes, or whatever other details I try to find interesting, I often find the bits and shanks. The bit/shank options in my photos matter a lot, so do in drawings.

Because the horse heads and tack easily gets over-photographed, I can move my focus towards smoother things like the muscles of the sculpture and how my possible reflecting tools make the light behave on them. And when I get fed up with the greyscale photography, I start adding color, but still keep it monochromatic - my most prefered colors are blue, sepia and red. My camera doesn't give many options for honing the tone, so sometimes I may do that in the editing program afterwards.

I am happy this tone is possible right in the camera's settings - turquoise blue is among my favorite colors.

Soonish after - or already while - this photoshoot was taken, I may have started to make bridle buckles with moving tongues. I'm not sure about when it was, because I kept using some older bridles with outdated buckles at the same time with those. (That is a gone thing now - I can say I have updated the buckles to all the old bridles I feel worth doing so for, minus some which I will keep as is for sentimental reasons and as time capsules. I'm not a big fan of altering one's old work, even if the idea is very tempting.)

Table portraits 1.

Here comes the second bunch in the photo bunch/table portrait series... I wish I could just call all of these "table portraits", but how could I when they aren't always taken on a table? Yea. I will split some bigger photo piles into a couple posts. 

So this bunch was taken somewhere in the late October 2019.  I of course can no longer remember what I was trying to achieve with this situation, but at least I had a gorgeous Breyer horse on the table and he had an overly complex bridle on his head. I wanted to photograph it just because. 

I kind of think a Valegro model doesn't deserve any negativity, but then again, no horse does. I happen to be a pessimist and I know way too much about the rotten eggs which are going on in the equestrian world, and that is what I often draw and miniaturize. And the Valegro mold simply has a fitting expression for scenes which include weird tack or poor riding. Enough said? 

The bridle seen in these photos is a mess which I have decided to name "fightmore", because to me it looks like something an impatient, abusive and selfish rider could want to put on their horse, instead of taking their time and effort to get along with the horse and to become a better rider... And in fact, unfortunately, we have seen photo evidence of these bridles existing, and often the rider has wanted to take a shortcut... I definitely call it a fightmore, but some call it hackabit. Maybe there are even more names for this monstrosity?

Though, in theory it is possible for a fightmore to be humane. It's just a normal bridle with a bit, a hackamore, and two pairs of reins. It can't do harm just sitting on the horse and nobody yanking from the reins, could it? I am sure, in theory it is technically possible that a good rider knows how to use one gently.

Well, even a properly adjusted noseband can cause harm. So can any bit. And so can any hackamore. I think this is a dilemma which can't be solved with just decisions like "this tool is yes" and "this tool is nope". I do not have a real horse life and I lack the experience to really know how to comment on these things, but I try to use my common sense and empathy. Horses can smell your feelings, and I'm sure they also smell if a rider doesn't care about their wellbeing. Pfff. 

I sometimes feel like I don't know what I should think or how should I explain it when I publish these horror bridles. Why do I make them? I couldn't like to cram that much stuff on any animal just to give it some exercise. (A harness, a reflective vest, a collar and a LED collar seemed too much at some point when we had our dog... I can't even imagine how some horse people can cope with all the strap adjusting every time they exercise their horses, since especially trotters often have very complex tack.) 

I also don't think it looks good if a horse is totally covered in tack... But for some reason I like to draw and miniaturize exactly that. Maybe it's the detailing which the model horse hobby is so crazy about? It must be that. I also simply like to design the complex mechanisms of hackamore shanks and related, and then try to make them in miniature. It must be that! Some people in this world make scary horror bits which, I have understood, are just pure art and not meant for actual use. And what else is the model horse crafting about than art? In the hobby we see a lot of tack which nobody uses with real horses.

What a rant. But that is what my rotten egg stories and drawings and - seemingly - mini crafts often are about. Plus, I want to say, I think it is important for people to add some explanation to why their photos or crafts look like what they look like. To add a backstory for it. The saying "let the viewer interpret it how they want" does not apply to my works, because I often want to say something specific with these. I do NOT want to take the risk that someone could severely misinterpret especially these rotten egg works. 

The second bunch will also be about a fightmore!

Art photo pile: Lanttu from 2018

So here should come the first photo bunch of what I mentioned in the previous post. Hmmm! I need to be self-critical and realistic, and not to try to post every pile... Because that is not what I planned to do.

The horse in these photos is Lanttu, officially "Lost Wits Of The Halter Creators" refering to how I and some of my friends are crazy takcmakers. And Lanttu has been a good tack mannequin and common in my archive photos since he came to me in January 2018. 

My photos from that era are usually very contrasty, sometimes harsh to the eye. I like contrast, but I also can go blind for the quality, and computer screens vary so much... And too much is too much, even for a contrast enthusiast. I also often like to keep the colors rich, so I set them so already in the camera. I can't know how the end result will look on the computer, of course, and I always edit my photos to some degree. For basic information I have to say the camera is a DSLR, Nikon D3100 with its kit lens and built-in flash. I spread the light by taping a piece of white paper in front of the flash (on the camera logo) and make sure none of this is touching the actual flash part. 

February 2018 was when I already had the three heavy mirrors which I bought entirely just for model horse photography. They really did make an effect in my photos, though I'm unsure how visible it is from these overly contrasty things... Anyway, at least I got some fun shots where the horse looks like as if he was admiring himself from the mirror. 

I see, I also tested if I can take any good shots without the softening paper. Bad idea. 

Softened.

Not softened.

Definitely not softened.

The bridle is one I made clearly in early 2018, I think, and it has always been that bare... And symmetric. I recently updated the whole thing by replacing the old buckles with more realistic in-scale ones and which have moving tongues. The reins are, unlike what I usually do, a part of the set. Not so sure about the bit. In general I feel as if this bridle was almost made for this exact mold and model, although I don't design tack that way most of the time.

What else can I say? I like to take portraits and headshots... They are usually quite easy, but can get slightly boring at times if there's nothing else. That is why I am so glad I now have the big studio option back, no less with the same fabric which served as a backdrop in these photos as well.

To compare these to how I take my photos now: I could have added a doll who could hold a lead rope, or a chain. I use that now even if I never include the doll in the photos! 

Hmm, wonder what the next post in this "series" will include...? As I mentioned, these are not what I usually take, which means the next bunch will be from October 2019.

Photo piles

For a while I have planned to do blogposts of some bigger bunches of photos I have taken over the years. Posting them to dA is fun, but I also don't want to post too many there and I kind of don't keep the bad shots at all anyway... So I only try to post the photos that I think are the personal favorites of mine. Usually it's about posting 2-5 pictures in one go, and then I take a pause, or move to another photo stack. 

Photo taken in February 2018.

But I feel like I don't only have a couple good shots in each stack, so I have wondered why I never post them into my blogs. That way I couldn't need to go so picky and perfectionistic with them, and could post several versions of one photo at once. One photo pile can contain about 20-40 pictures... I also don't like the idea of titling every single photo separately, and in dA I have to make sure even non-modelhorsiers understand what I say in the descriptions, so it's a lot of repeating to do. And, the last, I just can't cook up a ton of words about every single photo and keep them interesting. I try to, but I don't think people read anything these days... Which is lame, because they should. 

These photos I plan to post here are not what I usually take. My average modelverse photos have been taken on top of a shelf with some kind of backdrop, which, in fact, is currently a textile. I got back to using my old textile backdrops after ages of not having it possible. I also normally use the camera flash with these, routinely.

January 2018.

I recently took some art photos on that shelftop as well, but it went mostly lame due to me not being able to reflect the light anywhere with anything, as the only source of light was and is the roof lamp... And the camera flash. I use a tripod these days so I can also leave the flash off at times, but more often than not I simply feel like it is crucial, unfortunately. It is not as bad as everyone says, if you know how to make it work, but at times I could like different light. And the light spreading... I have made some light spreading tools by taping aluminium foil over cardboard and then crafting some metal wire (actually the heavy thing which holds a spool of metal wire in shape) into the cardboard to keep it in the right angle. These work very well when the source of light is very close to the model, like when I take photos on the worktable. I like to play with the angles a lot when so. 

But if I try to use the spreading tools on the shelftop and only have the roof lamp, it's useless... Even if I use flash. Years ago I had a big box which as itself made it possible to prop spreading tools into it. I own some large-ish mirrors I once bought exactly for photography use, and they were great. But I can't place them anywhere on top of a shelf. They are heavy! 

One of the exact mirrors. February 2018.

Anyway... I simply meant to say that I plan to post some "artistic" photo bunches here. That includes portraits. Now I just need to figure out how old these can be. I spotted some less interesting photos taken around 2019, and further digging made me decide that I draw the limit to 2018. Often my photos of that year are okay, but not up to my current standards, and I couldn't be motivated enough to post anything older. But at least we will have some material to compare with newer shots! Most of the pictures will be just horse heads with or without tack, because I often haven't had the space for anything else. Life is lame at times.

I could also have posted these photo stacks into my Finnish blogs, but asked an American friend and it may be more practical (and possibly shareable) to have everything in English instead. Finns read it like nothing so it is not an issue, BUT I could always like to write about the model horse hobby in a less common language and for a folk which does not know so much about the hobby. Here will always be those individuals who don't know enough English.

This is the photo quality I will be posting... a lot. Depressing black and white is so yummy. Photo from autumn 2019.

I also want to mention that I should more or less retake some of the pictures I may blog about. My tackmaking has improved a lot since 2019 or so, and we know how important tack quality is for good scene photos.