As many of you know, High Desert Sport Photo is a collaboration of a group of hard-working, like-minded folks created by myself, Amy McCool, and my long-time friend and now business partner, Kevin Reinig. The vision behind the HDSP is four-fold. One, to offer outstanding, timely imagery and friendly, unparalleled customer service to competitors. Two, to support and actively participate in the vision of horse show management, and become an integral and valued part of their team. Three, to offer the photographers creating the art provided to the competitors’ year-round work and a profit share, for without them…none of this would be possible. And four, to utilize resources to create multiple remote jobs (on the back end) for folks out there wanting to work from either the comfort of their own homes or while living life on the road as Kevin and I both thoroughly enjoy doing. We want to thank everyone who has supported our collaboration and who have sent incredibly kind words of gratitude for our art and our process.

Amy McCool

I am almost third generation Bend, Oregon. I started riding when I was 5 and then showed Hunter/jumpers and rode with my parents in the backcountry on the spunkiest little Appaloosa gelding that ever graced the lands. I then graduated high school and through a perfectly perfect string of events, ended up leaving my hometown at 19 to travel to Wilton, CA to a breed farm called Glenwood Farms, to groom for their yearly Sporthorse Auction. It was there I met Kevin, who was still in high school and lived down the road from Glenwood, working after school in the breeding shed. Long story short, I fell in love with the horses there and ended up becoming a working student, living on the property, and buying a weanling Prinz Gaylord filly whom I still love and adore that turns 30 years old this April 27th (and I still regulary trail ride).

The years living at Glenwood were some of the most memorable years of my life. We worked our butts off, we played pranks, and we created truly outlandish mayhem. We grew up and we grew into our chosen family. Kevin and his wife (and my best friend) Ericka, who also grew up working at Glenwood, are not only lifelong friends, they ARE that chosen family. I couldn’t think of a single better person other than Kevin to partner with on this next endeavor of my career.

After many years at Glenwood, and a few more years in Santa Cruz, I moved back to Oregon and graduated in 2001 from Oregon State with degrees in Psychology and Photography. After college, I moved to LA and worked at NBC in the photography department furthering my film and then, at that time brand-new, digital knowledge base. While at NBC, I attended classes in web design to build a website for the career I was strategizing to build. It was then, in 2002, that www.mccoolphotos.com was born and I left NBC to create my career in Equine/Horse Show Photography. I have since been the official photographer for likely all disciplines of equestrian and nearing a thousand horse shows to date, the official photographer for both World Cup Finals and Olympic Trials, and have traveled by invitation Internationally to represent USA media shooting FEI/CHIs.

I currently live both in my hometown Bend, Oregon, and in my ‘91 VW campervan on the road at horse shows.

Kevin Reinig

I grew up in a suburban neighborhood in Anaheim Hills California and was first introduced to horses at my uncle’s dairy when I was young. When I was 13, we moved to the rural community of Elk Grove California near Sacramento where I started as an event rider. At 15 I started working as an auction groom at a local Hanoverian breeding farm Glenwood Farms. After the auction I stayed on, spending that summer working with mares and foals and helping in the breeding shed, working my way up to Assistant Breeding Manager. During my time at Glenwood Farms I learned about breeding, raising, and training horses. There at the breeding farm, I met my best friend and wife Ericka and my partner Amy. Amy and Ericka were roommates and best friends at the farm and the three of us worked hard and played hard.

My interest in photography started when I was young and studied photography in high school and college. I graduated from Sacramento State University earning a degree in Finance. During my senior year in college, I was hired at a community bank that focused on agriculture loans. I enjoyed my work at the bank but I missed the horses.

I decided to follow my passion so I proposed to my best friend and girlfriend Ericka and went back to the breeding farm. When the farm owners retired, Ericka and I started our own dressage training, sales, and breeding barn. We managed a breeding program for a local stallion owner, cultivated business relationships with our partners in Germany importing horses for sale, and started young horses for sale and competition for their breeders. Running a breeding and sales program with my wife I used my photography skills to market our horses.  The owners of the breeding farm retired there and turned their attention to their riding and competing goals. Our training business outgrew the breeding farm, relocated to a training facility nearby, and focused more on showing. I shifted my focus on working with show management and traveled to many shows all over California working as part of the management team at dressage shows.

Our friend Amy was visiting us and shooting a horse show across the street. She needed another photographer for the weekend and asked if I was interested. I thought that sounds like fun, so I stepped up to fill in. I had a great time and it was great to work with Amy again. I started traveling to shows and shooting with Amy and working with her managing her team. We have a common passion for horses and photography. It is our goal to produce epic pictures for all to enjoy.