Sleigh Rides in the Sugar Bush

[Manfred M]

We were out enjoying a beautiful late winter day. Yes, I know that it's technically spring, but as long as there is lots of snow on the ground, it really is still winter.

We headed out to Pakenham which is probably the closest major sugar bush to where we live to enjoy some new maple syrup on some pancakes. The sap started running a couple of weeks ago, but stopped because of the cold weather. Sap runs when the days are warm but the nights are cold.

They were offering horse-drawn sleigh rides through the bush, so I had my camera in hand and did a few wide angle shots (24mm on a full-frame camera). The distortion of the horses heads worked out to look rather interesting. I was probably less than a metre / 3 ft away from the horses when I took the shot. I felt that a black & white treatment would work well for this by-gone era event. I used a fairly heavy vignette, typical of cameras of the 1950's, to reduce the effect of the white mass and direct the viewer's eyers.

[Wayland]

That looks cool.

I think I would be tempted to back off just a little bit with the vignette on the lower half. I think it needs darkening a bit but not quite so far.

It might work well with a slight blue tone, very subtle though, like the old cool toned photo papers used to be.

[Mike Buckley]

Everything about the composition works so well -- the driver, the people in the wagon, and of course the horses. I would also back off on the vignette to render a whiter snow.

[djg05478]

Very nice. Great timing too . I have the Nikon 17-55mm and I'm trying to figure out what compositions/circumstances will work best with the lens. Great example.

[Steve S]

A very cool shot manfred, i think it would look better, if you raised the exposure of the horses and people. (they look kind of dark )

[Brownbear]

beautiful shot...

[rudi]

Very nice Manfred.
I would also like to see an image with the exposure a tad raised on horses/man.
Do you know by any chance the type (the breed) off horse ?
Kind regards, Rudi

[Shadowman]

Very nice, wide angle accentuates movement.