The organisers at Xtreme Wheels are a pretty media savvy bunch of people, heck cheif organiser Dan Welberry runs 3t Creative the Design and Marketing company behind 4 times European Top Fuel Champion Andy Carter, so to say he knows a thing or two about media would be a under statement.

Asked to shoot the show for marketing and promotional purposes for next year’s show and to also give them a strong set of picture to push out to editorial interests. Its a unusual way to work but it certainly does hold benefits for all parties!

Anyway enough Jibber down to the pictures

I always like getting up and out early to grab clean images at car shows as its always quite and you get some nice light

The Show had some pretty special guests for a book signing, see how many you can name.

Car shows are often really segregated Vw shows for the VW guys hot rod shows for the Hot Rod Guys and so on, Xtreme really went out to break the mould with a mix of everything

They had Dragsters

Hot Rods!

A lot of hot rods !

Heck even the odd camper

Along with the static show there was also a demo Arena that was busy all weekend again with a real mix of machines

.

And Plenty of Big Burn Outs

Which saw the spectators disappear into a cloud of smoke. . .

Unfortunately the entire weekend didn’t go by incident free, as both Dave Grabham and Vince Gibbs miss judged the conditions

Needless to say the crew were a bit upset

Did a mention that there was a monster Truck? No Well there was one of them too! and it did what it does best crushed a load of cars. . . . . .

. . . . . and generally made a mess

This weekend I was supposed to be in sweden living it large at the Drag Racing, that never really happened which is a massive shame as it sounded like a dam good weekend according to the eurodragster coverage.

Not one to waste a free weekend, I caught up with my good  friend Robyn to throw some light around have some fun and make some cool pin up pictures.

To start with we headded down the road to bristol to The Lanes which is a killer period Bowling Alley and Diner.

After siding around on the polished floor of the alleys we headded over the other end of the building to get a milkshake take some pictures in the Diner.

Lighting for these was pretty dam simple shoot through brolly for fill to the face then a 3/4 CTO gell'd flash from over her shoulders to add in some rim lighting and add some depth. Then ambient was shot at 3000k at 2/3rd of a stop under to give a early evening sort of feeling to the pictures .

Next stop was some really cool period lamp post Robyn has spotted round the corner from hers so we waited for the light to drop and the sky to go a deep blue before heading out

Lighting for this one was super simple, the camera was set to 7200k white ballence to really blue out everything bar from the tungsten lighting, then to match the flash to the street light I threw on a full CTO filter and got the light as high as I could. “Crushing the Brolly” to really controll the light so I could emulate the soft but semi-focused light of the street lamp, all pretty simple stuff really.

Sunday we hit the local Launderette, first a quick example of how just changing the color ballence on the camera can have a massive effect on the mood of a picture

3400k white balance will give you the above. Didnt like this felt the light didnt suit the mood of the clothing so I dropped the White Balance to 6400k and let the kool blue tones rock on!

A quick outfit change to something a little more period. Was really wanting to give it the look of shot from the 50′s that often have quite a yellow tinge inside, so I nocked the White Balance back down to somewhere around 3400k, dropped the hight of the light by about two ft to make it look like the setting sun is glowing in through the window.

Getting the light back up high cooling the White Balance off and moving the light back to give a soft even glow let me get something that you could easily mistake as being from straight out the 50′s

After the launderette we had some time to kill before I had to head off.

The above was pretty simply lit Just kept moving the main light around to suppress any shadows I didn’t want

Just to finish with what has to be the best photo from the weekend, I know I started the post with it but I just gotta show you it again!

Thats it people! I have a couple of posts that I need to catch up on including the film photo’s from the NSRA Nos Nats and a Day with Steve Plater.

Fashion work is something I’ve been interested in for a fair while however I’ve wanted to do it in a more pin up rock-a-billy style.

As luck would have it my friend Robyn was looking to do some photos and as a bonus she’s a pretty dam good make up artist to boot.

We’ve been talking and mulling ideas over since the summer, we finally found a free weekend to get together and get some photos done.

With locations graciosly provided by Wayne at Intergalactic custom shop (01789 450001) and Pete at Chops and Bobbers

The wonderful Robyn Can be contacted via her myspace page, Robyn is avalible for any modeling or make up requirements that you have get in touch with her

Lighting wise I was using 1 light with a umbrella as the main with a silver reflector for a little fill. then i was using another light to add some intresting color to the background. About it I like to shoot fast and easy.

Day 1

Would love to do some more and spend a bit more time on it, was a whirlwind weekend that was no stop. We could of easly filled two days with the amazing place that is Wayne’s workshop.

Thanks again to Wayne and Pete

The sun shone and 5,000 odd people descended on the histroic town of lincoln for the yearly 10k run that takes place around the very scenic Old quarter of the city. Matt Bowser local lad and elite athlete came home first in a blisteringly quick time of 30 minuets 4 seconds narrowling missing out on the track record.

Working as part of a team I was to cover the finish which also was the start for the Junior 1.5 and 3k races. 

The Finish is self is located in the ground of the castle and provides a beautiful backdrop on to which to shoot. 

Shooting between the 16-35 and the 300 gave a nice mix of images. 

Matt Bowser After crossing the line in 30.04 just missing a new track record

The View from the walls as over 2,000 people make the sub 1 hour 10 mark

Four Fire Fighters Ran the entire course in full Fire gear and even helped a Spectator that fainted on route

Thats all Folks!

More pictures at archive.modernpics.co.uk

Besides drag racing another great passion of mine is karting was presented with the opportunity to go photograph at the local PFI track the other day. Had a blast. tried to stay away from the normal angles, do something a bit diffrent.

more images can be found at archive.modernpics.co.uk