I was recently commissioned by Global Motorsports, Inc. to update all of the artwork in one of their retail stores. The owners, John Ginther and Larry Thorne have an amazing collection of cars both exotic and classic. I was really excited because this would be my first experience shooting high end cars like John's Ferrari California and his mid '80's Ferrari 308. Sure, I've shot high-end cars before like the 2016 Nissan GT-R NISMO but this a different experience all together. The California is such an iconic work of art and anyone my age that grew up watching Magnum PI is familiar with the red 308 that Thomas Magnum used in the show to chase bad guys.
To say this was an amazing opportunity would be the understatement of the year. These guys gave me the keys to the toy box. Rewind to day 1 - we walk into a small warehouse in Nashville to see the location where I was going to shoot the details of the cars and tucked off in a corner of the warehouse are three Ferrari's, a Maserati, a couple of Porsche 911's, a '66 Mercedes 280SL hardtop convertible and a '60's Austin Healey - all in perfect condition. I was like a kid in a candy store to say the least.
I showed up a couple of weeks later to shoot the details. It was a pretty simple setup. Me, the cars and two strobes. I shot all of the interesting and iconic design cues trying to create image panels for the walls of the retail store.
The second phase of the project was to take a few of the cars and shoot them in motion out on the streets of Nashville. I've been shooting rolling shots of cars for a few years with different booms that I've built. Some of them have turned out okay but none have ever really been exceptional. So I went out on the internet and found a company in the UK called CarCamerRig - www.carcamerarig.com. They have a professional product that is a 30 foot carbon fiber boom with all of the necessary attachment equipment. I took a huge risk and purchased one. It was a large investment for my business.
This is what the image looked like straight out of the camera with the boom attached.
This is an edited version of another image without the boom. I added a sun flare to hide the police officer who was blocking traffic at the top of the hill.
This was a complex shot to get. I had to file a request with Nashville for a photo permit to secure the location. I also had to hire a security company to provide security to protect the $300,000 car. I had to hire off-duty police officers to provide traffic control and close down one of the busiest streets in the heart of downtown Nashville. All of this took weeks to coordinate. I had to file detailed production plans and a production schedule that would be heavily scrutinized by Metro Nashville Government along with their legal department. I had to have Nashville added to my insurance policy. It was all worth it though. In the end I captured one of the best car images I've ever shot. Looking back, I probably should have hired a beautiful woman to be in the driver's seat. Okay, so it wasn't perfect - sorry Nick.
This image is a sequence of images with and without the car edited in VirtualRig Studio Pro 3.