Tyler's GMC Truck

There is a special place in my heart for rat-rods and classic cars. On my way to work this morning I spotted this spectacular vintage GMC truck in the parking lot. I love the patina and presence of this thing, so I loitered for a bit and caught the owner as he walked out the door.  After some quick introductions, I think I persuaded Tyler, to let me take some better pictures one upcoming weekend! Hopefully you'll be seeing more of this truck soon!

        

Click here to see the bigger version.

The Jetta Experiment

I love creating in Photoshop.  I work it into my workflow as part of the creative process and add some style to an otherwise normal photo. My downfall is that I don't always know when to quit.  Over the weekend, I wanted to experiment with some car photography to alter things in a much more dramatic way than I normally would. 

To start, I chose a clean picture of my buddy's Jetta I took last year.  It's not a bad looking car, and I'm pretty happy with how the original photo turned out.  So, what could I do to make it more..... dramatic? I started simple. Color!  Since the car had a clean silver paint job, changing the color to a bright metallic red was as easy as a few adjustment layers. Now that I had it looking a little more dramatic, I needed to make it a bit more exciting. I've always been a fan of HRE wheels, and found some clean photos of a style I liked online. Big wheels needed a slightly more aggressive body, so I added a much more aggressive front bumper as well. After blending the bumper, wheels and tires into the new red body, I lowered the car to complete the new look.  Now that I was pretty happy with the car, I adjusted the crop, tweaked the lighting and touched up a few odds and ends. 

Normally, I never alter a car this much for a photo, but this was a fun change of pace to push my Photoshop a bit more than I usually do. Ironically, Mike wasn't a huge fan.  Hope you guys like it more than Mike did! :)

        

BEFORE

 AFTER

Rod Steven's Vintage Mack Truck

In February I had the pleasure of meeting Rod Steven's and shooting his 1962 Mack truck for Grand Valley Magazine.  Rod's truck has been in his family for years and he is dedicated to keeping it on the road for many more. Freezing cold February weather and snow wouldn't stop us from getting some nice, gritty shots. Special thanks to my buddy Scott Folsom for lending a helping hand!

        

See the full gallery of photos on my website HERE!

Check out the digital March issue of Grand Valley Magazine for the full article and feature! (Page 92)

Reorganization

I'm constantly tweaking and moving things. A few weeks ago I reorganized some of the galleries on the site.  If you have any bookmarks or broken links, click around the site a little.  I'm sure the image and gallery you are looking for is still available, it just might be in a slightly different spot. Sorry for any confusion. Thanks for looking!

New pics for February!

It's been an odd year so far, and I haven't been doing a good job of keeping up with the blog. I've got a few things in the works I can't share yet, but I do have a few things from last week that I just added to the site.

After a fresh detail, the G35 was just begging for some new photos.  The goal was to take some dramatic, professional quality shots using natural light and minimum editing. The sunsets here in Western Colorado are beautiful, and provided the perfect backdrop for my shoot. There were a few promising shots that still need editing, but my two favorites have been posted. You can see them under the "Individual Cars" tab on the site.

We also did a quick studio shoot last weekend for some composites I've been wanting to do. It's been a while since I've done a crazy complex photoshop work, and I think I'm a little out of practice! I call this one "Wings". The backgrounds for this pic are some great historic planes I shot at the WarBirds museum in California last summer.  I have a few others you might see soon, including a silly self portrait, but I haven't had a chance to finish edits yet!

New site for 2015!

Lots of things going on behind the scenes here.  For 2015 I wanted to start with a fresh, clean look and introduce a few new things on the site.  The "Featured Images" and slideshow image have been removed from the home page to make room for a horizontal slider for new and featured pics. I have also simplified the menu, eliminating the "Wildlife" section.  My favorites from this category have been moved in with the landscapes.  The entire site has gotten a refresh, with clean white backgrounds and thumbnails for all pages. Behind the scenes, I have also switched the fulfillment service for prints ordered off the site. Prices have been increased slightly, but I can now offer more sizes, along with Panoramic options to better fit some of my photography.

Thanks for looking!  Drop me a message if there is anything special you'd like to see in 2015!

Big Willie's Garage

Last month, I had the pleasure of spending some time at a local shop to take photos for a magazine feature. This was a great opportunity for me to shoot something I was passionate about for publication, so I couldn't pass it up. Originally planned as a "run-and-gun' editorial style shoot using natural lighting, I just couldn't resist bringing some studio lights along to help make the cars sparkle and add some drama to the shots.  My buddy Scott Folsom is a pro with years of lighting experience, and after a little begging and a cup of coffee, I talked him into helping out on the shoot. Hope Carlton was my contact at the magazine, and was also there to assist with styling and making sure we got everything we needed for the article.

We started the shoot around James's beautifully restored and customized classic Dodge Challenger.  This car looked great from almost every angle, and was a jewel against the open garage door of the shop. Once we got the obligatory car shot out of the way, we took pics of the crew and shop owners Willie and Kaylie Davis. We moved around the shop, taking pics of cars and machinery. The old-fashioned antique lathe was especially interesting, tho not very photogenic.  I think metal work is a lost art, and anyone who appreciates it and can apply it to customizing cars is a role model in my book.

"Big Willie" Davis and crew do some amazing work, customizing and restoring a huge variety of hot rods and muscle. The shop guys were all very pleasant, eager to share stories of their customized cars and help out any way they could.  I'm a car guy, so this shoot was a blast. James, Justin, Donovan and Willie all were great and very accommodating, showing us a lot of the interesting gear the shop has to offer. Doing at least some fabricating for most of their big builds, they can weld, build or even lathe almost anything you could ever desire for a car.

A big thank you to everyone at Big Willie's Garage and Grand Valley Magazine for this opportunity and a special thanks to Scott for the assist. The entire shoot was a great experience, and I'm really looking forward to doing more like this in the near future!

Several of the finished photos are published in a 7 page feature on Big Willie's Garage in the December issue of Grand Valley Magazine (Page 130). 

Check out all 21 high-res shots from the shoot HERE.