This Blog Has Moved!

OK, so while my new blog is big and beautiful and hoppin', I failed the launch in one respect: I forgot to announce the new website here! So for the few loyal readers that I have here who are not fans of Liz Stabbert Photography on Facebook (you really ought to be ;-) ) you can now find my brand new beautiful blog here:

http://blog.lizstabbertphoto.com

Although you're a little late to the party, you haven't missed out on the festivities yet! I'm giving away a $100 gift certificate to your favorite tack store! Click here for more information and to enter! Entry deadline is October 17th 2010.

See you at the new blog!

This Blog Has Moved!

This Blog Has Moved!

OK, so while my new blog is big an beautiful and hoppin, I failed in one respect: I forgot to announce the new website here! So for the few loyal readers that I have here who are not fans of Liz Stabbert Photography on Facebook (you really ought to be ;-) ) you can now find my brand new beautiful blog here:

http://blog.lizstabbertphoto.com

Although you're a little late to the party, you haven't missed out on the festivities yet! I'm giving away a $100 gift certificate to your favorite tack store! Click here for more information and to enter! Entry deadline is October 17th 2010.

See you at the new blog!

This Blog Has Moved!

Big changes coming to the Liz Stabbert Photo Blog!

I've been working behind the scenes on the Liz Stabbert Photo Blog and soon will be unveiling some awesome improvements! Here's some of the awesomeness you can expect to see:

• A new location! The new blog will be a part of my website!
• A totally new design! One that matches my site and doesn't have a broken nav bar. I know, it's crazy!
• Easier navigation and searching of old posts
• More frequent/consistant posting- what?? Its true! My current plan is to post twice a week on Mondays and Thursdays, I might even post more!...maybe.

That last one is a big one and deserves a little more discussion. For the most part my blog has just been a place to post teasers from sessions and events I've recently photographed. I'm going to expand my posts to sharing older images and the stories that go with them, various photography related things that are on my mind, and other fun randomness (accompanied with photos of course!).

The new blog is not quite ready for unveiling, but it will be very soon! Heck I may even have a relaunch party!* Stay tuned!!

(*relaunch party may or may not just be me with a hat and party blower)

Big changes coming to the Liz Stabbert Photo Blog!

Miles City Bucking Horse Sale: Match Bronc Riding

The Match Bronc Riding on Sunday is the last day of the Bucking Horse Sale, its the day for the pro broncs and pro cowboys to show what they've got. Last time I talked about the power and athleticism of the pro broncs, and since I'm way behind on my blog (and its the writing that takes me forever) I'll just let you take in some of that power and narrate for yourself ;-)

Miles City Bucking Horse Sale: Match Bronc Riding

Miles City Bucking Horse Sale: The Sale

The real action in the Miles City Bucking Horse Sale is, of course, the sale. There were over seventy broncs bucked that day, ranging from experienced buckers who had seen the NFR, to outlaw saddle horses looking for a new career more fitting of their talents. The majority were somewhere in the middle, youngish and/or inexperienced broncs.

For me the broncs that are the most fun to shoot are the big time pros, like Grated Coconut and the like, and the rank young untested broncs. Experienced broncs will come out and buck rhythmically, gracefully, beautifully really!

Inexperienced broncs, on the other hand, pull things like this:

And occasionally they do things like this:

I looked at this photo probably two dozen or more times while picking it out for the blog and editing it, but it wasn't until I was totally done editing it that I realized that the horse wasn't wearing a bucking strap. Show 'em how its done Pali!

The young and the rank: There was also a handful of futurity broncs bucked like this handsome "born to buck" colt.

The one thing that has really struck me about broncs, both the young rank horses and the tried and true pros is actually how they're the same:

They're athletes. Plain and simple.

Coming up: The BHS match bronc riding! Friesian colts! And (it's that time again)... HELIX!

Miles City Bucking Horse Sale: The Sale

Miles City Bucking Horse Sale: The Bulls

Friday was a day of heart pounding excitement!

People who know what happened can stop rolling their eyes now. For those who don't I'll fill you in and then you can go back and roll your eyes. For those of you who don't care just scroll down for the rodeo action shots ;-)

Friday morning, just after breakfast and for no particular reason, my heart started beating out of my chest. So I took a visit to the lovely Forsyth MT hospital where after a few (probably expensive) tests they informed me that, for no particular reason, my heart was beating out of my chest. Luckily it righted itself shortly and I got to leave with a "take it easy/stay hydrated/avoid caffeine/alcohol/doing anything fun at all". Al asked the nurse if it was a good time to mention that I was going to be in the arena with the bulls later. She laughed because she thought he was joking.

He wasn't, of course.

(this may be me taking the situation too lightly but I found that hilarious)

On to the photos!!

OK so I wasn't quite in the arena with the bulls. Anyone with a scrap of sanity was outside of the small arena that they had sectioned off for the bulls.

If you've been wanting to give bull riding a try I can tell you that this is NOT how you want to dismount a bull (hangups are scary, thankfully he was fine).

My favorite shot from the bull riding and one of my faves from the weekend.

If it looks like these bulls are staring at me its because THEY FLIPPING WERE!! A bunch of bulls who were hunting the fence, just looking for someone to hook, decided that to stop and stare and snort at me. Its amazing how a steel fence seems to disappear when you've locked eyes with a thousand pound animal who would like very much to crush you. Of course they might of just thought I was cute :-)

...and small and easy to trample.

Hey my heart is still working, what do you know.

I may have to devote an entire post (or two) to bullfighting photos I took! Those guys were having way too much fun and it made for some awesome shots! But that can come later, because the next day was the Bucking Horse Sale...

PS: There is a lot of missinformation, misunderstandings, and even outright lies out there regarding rodeo. If you have any questions just shoot me an email :-)

Miles City Bucking Horse Sale: The Bulls

Miles City Bucking Horse Sale: The Long Road to Miles City

To tell any story properly you have to start from the beginning and the story of my weekend at the Miles City Bucking Horse Sale started with approximately 15 hours of driving. Thankfully for my sanity, much of it included scenes like this:

In Montana, if you don't like the mountain range you're looking at, theres another around the corner.

See those white peaks in the back there? According to my tour guide Al, they're part of Yellowstone National Park, a place I have never been and am convinced was created by God specifically as a playground for photographers...but I may be biased. It pained me to just drive by the stomping ground of photographers like Ansel Adams, Edward Muybridge and William Henry Jackson, the man who's photographs of Yellowstone helped convince congress that it should be our first national park (I could geek out on photo history all day), but we had a bucking horse sale to get to.

There were tons of wildlife that I saw along the way! I spotted deer, pronghorn, gophers, prairie dogs, elk, eagles, hawks, coyote, & bison. And also slow elk. Lots of them. I was super excited to see all the Pronghorn Antelope, like the buck above, since I'd never seen an antelope before. Later I found out that Pronghorn are not, in fact, antelope and therefore my entire life was lie.

Ok not really.

Not long after I took the shot of the antelope pronghorn Montana got rather flat and sparse and the hours of driving started to wear on me. By the time we got to our hotel in Forsyth, I was very excited to not be on the road. The next day the real shooting would start :-)

By the end of the weekend I had taken over 1,700 images. I have no idea how I am going to narrow it down to a handful from each day to show you. Wish me luck.

Miles City Bucking Horse Sale: The Long Road to Miles City

Moment of Inspiration: A rainy day at the beach

Moments of inspiration can come from anywhere. Since I've been particularly terrible about updating my blog lately I thought I'd share one of those moments I had recently while looking out the ferry window at a rainy, stormy day. You all might think I'm a tad crazy, but bare with me, I think this is a cool idea:



Imagine a day like the one in the photo and a gray/white horse coming up over a sand dune, the wind toys with his mane and it seems to mingle with the clouds. We lead the horse into the water a few steps and let him splash in the waves, just far enough that the beach disappears out of the photo and it's just the bright whiteness of the horse against the dark blue-gray canvas of sea and sky. Maybe we'll catch that bit of time that always seems to come on days like that, where the setting sun peeks below the clouds and covers everything in a divine golden light. The kind of light that catches the sand and glints off his mane and tail and he just GLOWS.

Any takers? ;-)

Snohomish equine photographer | Seattle equine photography

Moment of Inspiration: A rainy day at the beach

April Desktop Calender- An Easter Bunny!

Did you think I forgot? (ok I almost forgot ;-) )

I photographed this filly (who was playing camera shy) last spring when I was riding at Painted Valley Farms in Poulsbo. She went by the barn name of "Bunny" :-)

Have a wonderful Easter everyone!

April Desktop Calender- An Easter Bunny!

Wordless Wednesday: Blooms

Wordless Wednesday: Blooms

Pheonix (again)

I put the finishing touches on this image after I posted the sneak peek and immediately fell in love with it! So heres one more of Nicole's handsome boy Phoenix.

Pheonix (again)

Port Townsend Marina

Half the fun of a new camera is taking it out and getting the hang of it. I took my "new to me" camera on a trip to Port Townsend and enjoyed the scenery.

Port Townsend Marina

Introducing the Monthly Desktop Calender!

Calendars aren't usually something that start three months into the year, but I thought this was too fun of an idea to wait until next January to start! I've created a desktop wallpaper calender for you all to use, for free! Yes FREE! I'll post a new one every month for your enjoyment! This months wallpaper features the Friesian mare Welmoed v/d Goslingawei Premier Friesians

(Click to view full size image)

Now there are three rules for these wallpapers to remain free:

1) It's only to be used as a desktop wallpaper

2) No editing or altering of the image in any way

and 3)...ok I guess there are no other rules so "rule" three is ENJOY!

Introducing the Monthly Desktop Calender!

Hope Springs

The trees and frogs and flowers here have no idea its still February...and I just don't have the heart to correct them.

Hope Springs

Nicole's Shoot Part 2- Hooray For Pugs!

This doesn't count as a sneak peek anymore because Nicole has already seen these photos, but I just have to share these because, really, who could resist that face:

In this photo and the last one they're waiting for a treat, guess what it is.....carrots! And they really were excited to get them too! If Samantha gave me a look like this and I gave her a carrot, a riot would ensue (or at least one of those incredulous looks shes so good at)

Hooray for pugs!

As I was headed back to the freeway I passed the local fire department doing a controlled burn of a building! Of course I had to stop and take pictures! I ended up staying and photographing that for almost two hours, it was pretty awesome to watch. I'll be posting my photos of the fire next time, so stay tuned! ;-)

Nicole's Shoot Part 2- Hooray For Pugs!

Sneak Peek: Nicole & Phoenix

Winter tends to be my slow season for horse portraits, what with Washington weather being what it is and horse's tendency to turn into hairy yaks. That doesn't mean it can't be done, no m'am! Of course creative scheduling may be necessary to avoid getting wet and it helps if your horse has a short winter coat or is kept clipped. Adorable hunt clips are required preferred adorable.



This Sunday, after having to reschedule due to rain last Sunday (which of course was followed by an AMAZINGLY beautiful Monday :-P), I went down to Olympia to photograph the lovely Phoenix.



Phoenix was a bit of a ham! I totally expect a horse that's been stalled prior to the session to do a couple "hooray! I'm free!" laps around the pasture, but Phoenix had been hanging out in this pasture all day. He flew around the pasture at top speed, tossing his head and kicking up his heels. He was absolutely showing off.





Phoenix and his mom Nicole



Phoenix has a buddy named Eddie who is not quite as old as dirt, but definitely older than mud. Eddie's job is to be Phoenix's best bud, get loved on, and eat carrots. Eddie is very good at his job. At the end of the session we brought Eddie out to get a few shots of the boys together.



Phoenix was actually only part of the session, we also spent some time with Nicole's (human) boys and their three pugs. There was no way I was going to be able to pick only a couple favorites to keep this post from being impossibly long, so you're just going to have to wait until next time to see them!

Thank you Nicole for having me out! More sneak peek photos (and the full gallery) coming soon!

Sneak Peek: Nicole & Phoenix

Sneak Peek: Cody & Harley

I've wanted to do a shoot at the river meadow at Lords Hill Park ever since I saw it from 522. I even went there to do a little location scouting this summer and brought Sammy dog along to see if it earned her paw stamp of approval (which it did ;-) ). So when I got a call asking to do a session with two adorable mutts, I jumped at the chance to go to the river meadow! Something I hadn't considered, however, was that it's winter. In Washington. And the creek that was barely a tiny trickle in summer was now a full on roaring creek that had turned the dips in the meadow into moats. Needless to say it was a little wet.

This, however, wasn't an issue for Cody....

And his partner in crime, Harley.

They went crazy exploring the tall grass and creeks! It turned it into a wild game of chase, into the grasses, into the creek, back into the grasses, around and around with Harley leading the way and Cody close on his tail. It was a hoot! I'm so glad they had fun, I know I sure did!

Speaking of their game of chase, if you ever want a challenge, try photographing two dogs running full speed through 4ft tall grass. I got a lot of pictures of grass and a black or tan tail! But every now and then they would hold still and the grass made for some really cool backgrounds!

For no other reason than he's adorable, Cody's dog lips:

I think this is Cody "talking" to me because I won't throw the tennis ball lol!

Cody & Harley's gallery will be up soon. I want to thank their mom Connie for giving me the opportunity to meet these two sweet boys!

Sneak Peek: Cody & Harley

Mustangs, part 3

"For they[the mustangs] really belong, not to man, but to that country of junipers and sage, of deep arroyos, mesas – and freedom."- Will James

Mustangs, part 3