Summer. High noon. Hazy, piercing light. Those are the conditions in the above photo. You can see the disastrously sharp, contrasty shadows on the back of the saddle and the bright flare from the latigo holder. All common wisdom about photographic light should convince you to put the camera in the bag and go fishing. Nevertheless the light is working for this photo not against it.

Why?

Because the photo benefits from another piece of common wisdom with a twist: shoot in open shade. Obviously the subject of the photo in not in the shade, but people often don't understand that shade is everywhere, even in open sunlight, if you simply turn you back to the sun. A couple of years ago, shooting on slide film, this situation would still be problematic and I would probably have wanted a little fill flash, but with the newer crop of digital sensors able to coax relatively noise-free detail from shadows and fill-light algorithms in products like Adobe Lightroom we now have the tools to smooth out reasonable contrast problems leaving us free to work with 100% available light.

With a photo like this the primary concern is ensuring that no direct light falls on the subject's face (no amount of digital manipulation will fix the awful shadows that would result from direct, overhead sunlight). Positioning the camera so the background is in relative shade avoids over-exposed elements that would distract from our subject. Her face is pointed toward the north sky, the same light source coveted in natural light studios. The direct sunlight is working as an intense kicker backlighting her hair and adding a summery ambience to the whole image. I set the exposure for her face, secure in the knowledge that I would have a little digital wiggle room. Only a little though. Because the shot is exposed for the shaded light, anything illuminated directly by the sun will be overexposed beyond the latitude for correction. This isn't always a problem, but it requires careful composition. We expect to see hot specular highlights in photographs, as such areas like the top of the cantle and even the top of the girl's head are not really problematic. Also, since I'm shooting into the sun I used an good lens hood to prevent flare. Once in Lightroom, the raw file required almost no manipulation beyond correcting for the color temperature of the open sky light and adding a little fill light to bring the darker midtones up a little.