11 Jun 2011
April 2011 – France, St Tropez
This old Aston Martin actually looked more like an American Muscle car than a distinguished Aston. I liked how a classic car was put in front of a classic background which matched its message of luxury… what better place than St Tropez to take an Aston Martin photo :).
The very expensive and new boats in the middleground just emphasize that feeling of luxary.
By the way, none of the owners of those boats had that car, they all had new Bentleys :)
22 May 2011
April 2011 – France, Reims
As I stopped my car to go to a suppermarket I saw that gum which had melt on the road and my tyre… I first walked away but then came back to the car… people must have thought I was a bit weird! (I probably am! ;) as I stood in front of the tyre… looked at it in different angle… and eventually took my camera to take that shot.
Somehow I saw many things in that simple scene… first you always get annoyed when a gum stick to you… so even if it is stuck to a tyre it still has a global message that everyone can understand. I wanted to play with the black and white… the black of the shadow under the car, the tyre and the white of the gum and the white line… leaving a strip of gray road at the center of the photo. In my mind, the gum links the white/black, up and down, tyre/road.
16 Mar 2011
February 2011 – UK, Surrey, Weybridge
That photo is for the geek in me or in fact for any geeks! I used to have and love a Spectrum 48K, that was made by Sinclair… and Sir Sinclair also famously tried to create a new mini car in the 80s called the C5. It didn’t work!
Only 12K were sold and the museum I visited had 3 of them… that was the first time I saw one of those and dare I say… touch one of those! :)
I took a few shots but wanted to find a way to make it more original than just a shot of a mini car… then I noticed that logo and the material of the car very much look like those of a computer. So I thought that shot, of the logo and a hint of a wheel at the bottom right corner was a good homage of both the computer and car. I was not sure about keeping the yellow bit at the bottom, but decided to keep it, let’s call it a pixel! :)
13 Mar 2011
February 2011 – UK, Surrey, Weybridge
Lines, lines, lines… I see lines everywhere :) Not only did I like the colour contrast between the left and right part of the photo, but the overall tone of the photo is harmonious. What interested me the most though was also the fact there is a contrast between the straigth lines of the floor and the curved lines of the car.
7 Mar 2011
February 2011 – UK, Surrey, Weybridge
This is a shot taken from the back of a very old car, a gangster car, where a shot was fired through the windshield and back window. As soon as I walked in front of the car I wanted to take that shot! Maybe having less depth of field could have worked too… I prefered this shot because what is in the fore ground (the bullet hole) is more sugested than visible as it is so blurry… it also helps focusing on the windscreen shot impact.
I had to crop the photo because by focusing on the windscreen from where I was, you could see the reflection of the nearby tree, completely in focus as well! but there was no way not to get them in the shot and keep that required angle… As I cropped the photo I actually preferred the way it is now… it has enough information for the viewer to understand it is a car, an old car, it is intriguing because there is a blurred plane in the background and the most important part of the photo is is circled by that blurry ring. Another thing which may not be obvious straigth away is that I tried to keep the same amount of black at the top and bottom of the frame, because combined with the black line in the middle of the windscreen I wanted to create an impression of filmstrip, to reinforce the “movie” atmosphere.
5 Mar 2011
February 2011 – UK, Surrey, Weybridge
I like to play with vehicule side mirror and this one caught my attention. I wanted to also capture part of the skylight window to create a “third layer of escape”, I had to only show part of it as it was otherwise too bright. I think I will play with that idea another time, just need a better environment to reflect in a mirror :)
13 Jul 2009
May 2008 – London, UK
As mentioned in one of my recent previous post,this was my favorite corner for that race. All the cars seem to catch up before the hill and fight for a better position arriving up here!
17 Jun 2009
May 2008 – Brand Hatch, UK
I can understand some people may find this photo too blurred and it could be taken as a “bad” photos… but that would be missing several points… :)
Those points can also appear quite far fetch, in which case, someone may really hate that photo!! :o)
After watching many cars going through and a few of them narrowly missing getting ejected off the track I decided to focus that photo on what is important, the outside white line, of which a driver must not cross… The background is blurred almost like a painting, which contrast with the outside white line making it appear more real… more dramatic… there is a story t tell, a car coming full beam/full speed, many blurred skid marks, many cars went through the same path here before… I waited for that car to be right at that position, as it then disappeared at the bottom of that small hill for a few seconds… it would not have worked the same, in my eyes, If I had waited for the car to be on the top of the hill, for 2 reasons:
1. It would then have been too big, and not blurred enough
2. There is a green line (grass) coming from the top left corner and tracing a line right in the middle of the first tier of the photo, where the car will appear, at the point when it will have to steer in the turn and avoid that, oh so important, outside white line…
Quite a lot of talking for a simple line and mostly blurred photo indeed :o)
When I think about it… I remember going to some modern art exhibitions and being less than impress by some of the paintings… they were so simple and ugly… all that seemed to justify the price as the non sense the artist was writting about what one should see in his/her paintings…
Well… I am not an artist, I still think those modern art painting are bad (slightly less though now ;)… and I still like that photo! even if not everyone sees why I took it this way! :o)
15 Jun 2009
May 2008 – Brands Hatch, London, UK
Those cars were going quite fast and the great think about that race track is that it isn’t all flat… you can get on the top of a hill and with a zoom good enough you can get some interesting shots! :)
13 Jun 2009
May 2009 – New Forest, UK
As I stopped in one of the many little villages in New Forest I noticed that toy for sell in a shop window… appart from the rather expansive price I just loved that mini “statue” of an indian auto… not only do I like that style but it also reminds me of the madness of taking taxis in India ;)
6 Jun 2009
June 2008 – Bangalore, India.
As I was coming back from Mysore to Bangalore my driver was following a truck for a few minutes. It was a huge truck transporting lot of sands and… and a man on top of all that sand… it was quite windy and I watched this poor old man battling to protect his face with his clothes… it felt as if I was an indian paparazzi!
12 Apr 2009
June 2008 – Bangalore, India
You can actually see this kind of scene on the roads very often. Those workers go and come back to their work in those trucks and there isn’t much room for everyone… I wonder how this would work in the western world with all those health and safety non sense!! ;)
