Sheep galore

Photography has been a write off since my previous post. I had hoped to get to the English national Sheepdog Trials but was thwarted by work commitments which also scuppered another trial. I could have gone to the second day of that one yesterday but went to the agricultural show I'd been looking forward to instead. I knew there'd be plenty of sheep, and there was a poultry section. Arriving a bit late I missed out on the poultry action and the sheep arrival and primping. But there was lots going on and the sheep judging was soon under way.

 As the poultry marquee was at the opposite end of the show field to the sheep pens I passed the main ring a time or two. When I spotted a woman holding a cow balloon watching the cattle I hoped there might be a picture to be made. For once I stuck around and didn't settle for the first picture I took with the balloon and a real cow in the frame. I got lucky with the eighth frame when the ballon cow floated into line with the real calves.

And so to the sheep. There were some three hundred entered into the various classes, which included a fair few Euro sheep, a selection of minority breeds, and plenty of Blue Faced Leicesters and North of England Mules. The BFL entry was the largest ever at the show. Disappointingly the interbreed champion was a Beltex, although the reserve was a Swaledale.

This time I had gone armed with a wide angle zoom and my loathed 70-200. It wasn't a great combo. Or maybe I need to get used to it. The wide angle I find useful, but the range of the 70-200 bugs me, even though it does produce images which are super sharp.

With the wide angle I made use of the flippy screen on my camera to get low angles without having to bend my knees or kneel down. A touch screen would be a big help for positioning the focus point when there is action involved, but the depth of field of the wide angle often compensates for that.

Even at eye level I found the wide angle a help when it came to getting the large groups of sheep in the frame. I've not seen sheep judged en masse before. How the judge reached his decisions in selecting the sheep to make the final selection from, and how the entrants recognised their sheep when they were indicated, I don't know!

 Finding different pictures is never easy, and sometimes I start taking snapshots of anything that catches my eye without thinking about what I'm doing. Other times I take a snap, try to improve it, and end up thinking the first snap was the best!

Other times I keep on snapping until things work out a little better. maybe not great, but better.

The sheep section at this show is well organised with the officials having their own polo shirts, and there are plenty of trophies.

There is also a strong turnout for the three age groups of young handlers. Not all shows manage to get numbers of entrants for this. The youngest handler this year was just 14 months old, complete with white coat and flat cap. And a little bit of help from a very placid sheep and mum! All the young handlers get a rosette.

This time, partly because I was lacking ideas, I did take a few 'character' shots. Trying to capture a judge pondering is difficult from both the timing and the positioning sides of things.

The low angle approach provided for some unusual opportunities, but the slight delay between prossing the shutter release and the shutter firing made timing tricky.

An enjoyable day out with some half decent pictures made, far too many of which can be found here.

 I still came away wondering what the point of taking these photographs and writing this nonsense is.

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