We’ve seen hundreds of pictures of your 2014 calf crop on social media, and there’s some lookers out there. Time to break out your cameras and picture those babies!
It’s contest time folks! Many of you have already began thinking about your upcoming junior nationals and the accompanying contests … one of our favorites is the photography contest of course!
We thought to ourselves, why not host a practice contest?
Basic rules:
- Scale/crop photos to 8×10″(Either landscape or portrait layout acceptable)
- Photo must be taken in 2014
- One entry per person
- Contest is open to all ages
- Include your name & hometown in the email body
- Entries must be emailed to Robin Kleine, FMG Social Media Manager robin@gotfocus.co
- All entries must be received by Robin on Friday, April 26th at 9pm CDT
Our panel of judges will choose the top 3 entries, and they will win #focusswag! The winners will be announced on Thursday, May 1st.
If you need some help be sure to like Hereford Breeder or Angus Breeder on Facebook, every month or so, Kyla shares photography tips on their page.
Here’s the first installation –
“Cattle Photography 101 – By Kyla Copeland (Focus Marketing Group, Inc.)
Getting to know your camera / Basics
Knowing your camera – its lens(es), flash and its settings is the first step in taking good photos. You need to know your camera and what settings to use in different situations/weather (sunny day vs. overcast day, indoor vs. outdoor photos) and knowing your camera and its settings is the only way to achieve that.
I like to shoot in A (aperture priority) mode in most situations. Aperture is the size of the hole where the light comes into the camera.
Given the lenses I use, I am able to fade/blur that background with my A setting by adjusting my F-stop accordingly and in turn I keep my subject in sharp detail (this also depends on your distance from you to your subject and to the background behind the subject). I also pay good attention to my shutter speed and ISO settings. however you feel comfortable to achieve the end photo you desire. Don?t be afraid to read the manual, it?s important to be comfortable with your camera and what it can do. So get to know your camera, play around with your settings and practice, practice, practice!
As far as computer / editing programs, there are hundreds to chose from that fit about any budget, just make sure you know the program and are comfortable with the program(s) you are using. I mainly use Adobe programs for all my processing, basically to adjust lighting if need be, crop photos, re-size and save as desired file name. Keep everything in order and organized, I am a strong believer in organization and folders, folders, folders!”
Good luck choosing your favorite photo of your 2014 calf crop! We can’t wait to see your entries. If you have any questions at all, please send them to Robin (robin@gotfocus.co).