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Arabian Horse Photographers In Focus
Kelly Campbell by Mary Kirkman
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“This was at Royal Jaafar, and we had just taken shots in the barn. The background was shaded, so these two grey mares provided contrast. They just looked at each other. It is all about the connection of two horses.”—Kelly Campbell
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Kelly Campbell has been a professional equine photographer for six years, a respectable start on a career that is gaining momentum at a dizzying speed. Her biggest challenge, she reflects—apart from recalcitrant horses, inclement weather, and wildly talented competitors—has been her own age. She laughs when she recalls a shoot she went on near her Vacaville, Calif., home. The horse owner, who knew and liked her work, had booked an appointment online, but when Campbell arrived for the early-morning session, she couldn’t get in without a gate code. Finally, she managed to wave down a few people she spotted in the distance. “Are you lost?” one asked her. “No,” she replied. “I’m Kelly, and I’m here to photograph your horses.” “Oh my gosh!” the woman exclaimed in surprise. “There’s a high school on the street over, and I thought you were looking for that!” The quality of her photography rapidly dispels anyone’s reservations, but she still smiles. There is not much she can do about it except turn out good work. She has known that
she would work in the horse industry since she was a child, and has had a passion for photography since her teens; this is where she is meant to be. Campbell was born in Fairfield, Calif., 26 years ago, to a family with no ties to horses. Her father was a contractor and her mother worked in healthcare; she and her older brother, Casey, got into riding when they accompanied friends to a local barn for lessons. She was 5, and the expansive facility, which accommodated nearly 100 horses and hosted shows in three arenas, offered a variety of breeds and disciplines for experience. As they grew up, she and Casey leased horses and showed in local shows, grooming and cleaning stalls to pay for their fun. Quarter Horses, Warmbloods and Thoroughbreds, western and dressage and jumping provided an eclectic background that eventually led them both into a lifetime commitment to horses. While she took up equine photography, Casey became a nationallevel trainer in Miniatures. Campbell’s interest in cameras began when she was a youngster, as she fired off endless
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successions of Polaroids for her parents to develop, but her formal pursuit waited until she was about 16, when high school classes unlocked the world of art photography. She fell in love with the black and white genre, secluding herself in the dark room to manipulate the images. The courses also expanded her knowledge of equipment, as students worked with a variety of cameras, including the 4x5 large format models, which produced stunning
Casey Campbell, Kelly’s brother.
results but were heavy as lead and highly manual. She remembers having to duck under a black sheet to shoot her subjects. “You do one click,” she says, “and then you take the slide out and take another photo. I think learning on those kinds of cameras and working with film really taught me the technical side of how a camera works.” As a counterpoint, digital cameras were introduced around that time, and she was equally captivated. By the time she was ready for college, it was clear where her future lay, and she opted for a double major of photography and business. The next component to fall into place was her focus on the horse industry. She had been studying the photographers whose work attracted her most, such as Stuart Vesty, Gigi Grasso and Glenn Jacobs, dissecting how they treated angles and curves, and translating the techniques to her perspective when she peered through a viewfinder. When her brother Casey became a professional trainer, that sealed the deal; her hobby evolved
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into support of his marketing effort, and his clients liked her work. In 2007, she sent out a flyer announcing her professional debut, and her first booking came from Tina Fisseler, of TF Miniatures, in the Netherlands. “Of course I was ecstatic,” she recalls, “but when I hung up the phone, I think I had a nervous panic attack—it was, ‘Oh my God, what am I doing?’” Fortunately, a trainer she knew named Mike Rosauer also booked a job, and it came first on the calendar. “I shot about 20 of his training horses, and he really taught me that I was the director,” she says. “I learned to communicate what I wanted on the shoot. He let me know that they were there
to set up the horses and have them go where I wanted.” By the time she headed for Europe, she was comfortable with the process, and her career exploded from there. Even though Miniatures were vastly different from the other breeds, they provided the unique experience that most developed her eye. “Many people’s opinion of them is that they’re dwarf horses,” she says, “so the whole thing in my mind was that I didn’t want anyone to see one of my photos of a Miniature horse and think ‘that’s a cute miniature horse.’ I wanted people to see a bold, beautiful horse, so I went for a different perspective. I would lay on the ground and shoot up at them—work so hard to get the best angles for these horses that are three feet tall. I wanted them to look five or six feet tall.” Breed standards, she adds, are moving the Miniatures toward a more Arabian type. As she picked up work, Campbell experimented further. She would shoot the standard conformation and sales shots, and then black and white shots for herself, which she manipulated
“This shot is an example of my intent when I’m photographing Miniatures: I want to make the viewer see the horse, not the size. This stallion had a rock star attitude, and we tapped into it. I shot from a low angle, and kept the background simple, and then used a vignette to darken the edges and further draw the focus on the stallion.” —Kelly Campbell
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on the computer to create extreme effects. “I just wanted something a little different,” she offers. “I liked to have a horse with little to nothing in the background; it just made your eyes go straight to the horse. I like a lot of black backgrounds or white backgrounds, or just a real simple landscape with no fences, no buildings.” At the same time, she drew on her photographic education. In school, her professors and friends had urged her to do wedding photography, and living near the popular wedding destination of Napa Valley, she investigated further. But it didn’t inspire her as horses did. “Photographing horses is a challenge,” she says, “but it’s very exciting, because everything has to come
together and be perfect in that split second. I can capture the moments and the love at a wedding, but I’m not inspired. And I wouldn’t want to hang creative wedding photos in my house like I do with my equine photos. I think I can make art with horses.” Nevertheless, she still keeps a finger on the pulse of the wedding industry to stay abreast of the latest in evocative imagery. When she reached beyond her comfort zone in Miniatures, it was to Arabians. She credits David Cains with giving her the boost she needed to break into the market when he allowed her free run of Stonewall Farms, with its classically beautiful horses, to “play around.” Then he went through her photographs and helped her evaluate her work. “I would see the things that he liked,” she says, “what angles his eyes gravitated to, what little perspectives.”
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In the end, it is Campbell’s style as an equine photographer that is making her name. Yes, she routinely does conformation shots for owners and she takes show pictures, but it is her pushthe-envelope shots that are attracting the most attention. They are images that qualify not only as horse photography, but as art too. A glance through a gallery of Campbell’s work now bears that out: there are standup shots, beautifully posed horse and owner memories, records of ring performances, eye-catching advertising shots, and a strong sampling of what she calls “crazy stuff ”— romantic portraits that play with light, sooth the eye with monochromatic palettes, or focus attention with tightly controlled parameters. As her career grew, Campbell expanded into more breeds, notably adding Friesens, Andalusians and Gypsy Vanners to her resume, their signature long manes and tails lending a quality similar to the exotic flavor of an Arabian’s flared nostrils and wide
eyes. In each breed, she researched their standards, both equine and photographic, and then added her own spin. Often, techniques developed for one breed informed another: turning a Warmblood’s head a certain way offered more refinement, and the swirling mane and out-flung tail of the Arabian inspired the dramatic pose of a Gypsy Vanner stallion. Special lighting and simple backgrounds supported the intricate detail of a horse’s coat, and the structure of its face and eyes. Although she is the creative force behind her work, Campbell is aware how important it is to have a good crew to work with—she remembers the day when she was a part of a team, before she turned pro, when she was working with her brother. “I firmly believe I’m only as good as the people helping,” she says. “Sometimes it’s just not the horse’s day, so I understand what it takes to be a handler or the ‘bear,’ or the gofer who runs around and gets anything everyone else needs.”
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“The Gypsy Vanner shots are an example of what can be done with different lighting techniques. We shot these in a dark arena, using studio lighting, and for the full body shot, we added a smoke machine to create the aura around him.”—Kelly Campbell
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The bottom line is that sometimes her results depend on it. “I think patience is important,” she says, “because if the photographer or the people get frustrated, that can translate to the horse, and the horse can shut down. Like
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people, horses can definitely feed off your emotions and how you’re feeling.” And then, when everything comes together, all the work is worth the effort. “All of the sudden, you get that one great shot, that one great look.”
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Anyone who works with show horses knows that an equine photographer’s job is hard work, and the pressure is always on to hit a home run. But the profession also can be a ticket to high adventure. Campbell can testify to that. This year alone has yielded unforgettable memories. One occurred this past May in the UK, when she went on a shoot at Jayne Howell Arabians in Hertfordshire. In the early morning, while Howell dropped her children at school, Campbell took the family dog and headed out on a walk up a nearby hill to look for good shooting locations. “There are so many trees, I can’t even see the fence line, and it’s just gorgeous and perfect,” she recalls. “And then I get out in the middle of the field—and I hear a lion roaring. A lion roaring. You know how you can just feel so scared that your hair stands up and you get this hot feeling? I really freaked out!” However, no lion emerged from the trees— thankfully, as Campbell really hadn’t planned on ending her life as a lion’s morning meal. When Howell heard the story, she didn’t bat an eye (nor, to her credit, did she burst out laughing). “Oh, yes, there’s a zoo on the other side of the hill,” she told Campbell. And as it turned out, that was
nothing compared to what they could hear when it was time to feed the monkeys. Campbell still shakes her head. “There I was, wondering if she was going to believe me or think I was just a crazy American.” And then there was her recent experience at a breeding operation in Jordan. “They have some of the most gorgeous horses I’ve ever seen,” she says, “and the happiest horses, too.” But with the 2013 situation in the Middle East, no one was unaware that somewhere out in the distance was Syria. “I think it was the first day we were shooting, I was really freaked out,” she continues, “first because I wanted to prove myself and provide them with some special shots, and second because I’d never seen any of the horses, so I didn’t really know what I was working with. Once I saw the horses, I was in love; they were the most amazing horses ever. The shoot was going great—we were photographing liberty horses in an open pasture. And all of the sudden I hear all these gunshots go off.” She stopped shooting and leapt up, waiting for the others to run—only to realize that she was the only one with a terrified look on her face. No one else even flinched. Instead, they all started laughing.
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“Oh, yeah,” they told her. “There’s a shooting range down the hill. You’re fine. Don’t worry.” She shakes her head. “The horses didn’t even spook. They just trotted higher and bolder.”
In 2010, at age 23, Campbell formalized her business as Arare Photography LLC. She now shoots all over North America, in Australia, Europe and the Middle East. Some aspects of her life, such as her rising reputation, have changed, and some have not. Her base is still the “20 beautiful acres, with horses both big and small” she shares with Casey. He is a huge part of her success, she observes. Always has been. Now the challenge is just to stay fresh, to stay on the cutting edge of a very creative and competitive business. But that, she will say, is what it is all about, what got her into the business in the first place. It is all about finding new ways to portray the beauty of the horse.
www.Ararephotography.com
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