A Deployment: New Jersey Portrait Photographer

It is not often that I tear up when I edit photos – but it happened when I was doing these.
You probably remember the cutie from the last session. When her Mom (and a pal of mine from high school) had contacted me not only about doing those adorable Easter portraits, but also some pre-deployment shots for her family, I was touched and also thrilled that she was trusting Ray and I to capture those moments. All my love to this sweet family, and a speedy return home.
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Drive.

I am marginally car-obsessed. I want to re-phrase that, I am Mustang obsessed. I spoke in an earlier post about my special bond with ‘the silver bullet’ which is my beloved 2004, 40th anniversary edition, 5 speed convertible Mustang – but now I want to share a bit of my car photography. I only went shooting at one car show, so it’s not something I do all the time, however – I really enjoyed getting and editing these shots. Yes, the title is a nod to what is fast becoming one of my more favorite films. Don’t judge me.

They are all HDR – and the more I work with HDR – I can’t help but think that when it comes to car photography (and in most cases, architecture) – HDR is simply the way to go. You don’t get chrome shine quite the same way unless you bracket photos. Also, HDR gives all the cars a certain measure of personality. Like this:

Now, can you look me in the face and tell me you don’t want to drive the hell out of this vehicle? I didn’t think so. While I was shooting, I had some of the members of the classic car club come up to me and ask – ‘Are you photographing the tire?’ I understand this was well meaning, and that I was indeed contorted in some odd positions. But c’mon folks. I wasn’t taking pictures of the tire – I was taking shots of this car from a badass angle! I would have preferred the hood down, but beggars can’t be choosers. Below, you can see me in the chrome, deftly crouching for the shot:

Now this yellow car was so heavily modified, that I could not discern what model or make it was. However – how awesome are those little webs in the headlights?

I couldn’t do many full body shots of the cars, because they all had American flags on them. Don’t get me wrong, I love being American – but the flags were waving in the wind which was making them ‘ghost’ in my HDR shots (where I have to take at least 3 photos of the same object, and mash them all together). I decided that I would do it anyway, because the art on the side of this beauty was just too cool to miss. When I laid eyes on this gorgeous hunk of machinery, all I pictured was me pulling up to the library in it. How awesome would that be?

See. Librarians are not stuffy.