This summer has been great for the weather, but I have been away from automotive photography; I have been busy with other things, mainly travel. And with our limited car season, I haven’t shot anything automotive-related since the fall of last year. That’s almost ten months! That’s a long time to be away from my primary photography subject. With this hiatus and some upcoming shoots, I wanted to scout locations with the BMW M2.

Over more than ten years, automotive photography has allowed me to capture a diverse range of vehicles of different types and values. Whether an expensive exotic or an everyday commuter, I believe each car deserves the same attention to detail to showcase its unique character through photography. With thoughtful planning and strategic execution, virtually any vehicle can be a captivating photographic subject.

I’ve written numerous posts discussing automotive light painting. That includes the techniques and tips I believe will make your light painting most successful and the tools I use for light painting cars. Most of my light painting tools, including the Westcott Ice Light 2, my primary light source, have been in my repertoire for years. With the imminent release of the Ice Light 3, I thought it would be a good time to look back on the current Ice Light 2.

Spring is just around the corner, and if you live in a cold climate like I do, you will realize that car owners will be anxious to get their prized possessions out of storage and onto the open road. With a new season comes new opportunities to photograph. It’s a perfect time to review tips for successfully light painting a car for a successful photoshoot.

There are many reasons why people buy cars, as they mean different things to different people. Some consider cars utilitarian, a machine that can transport people from one place to another. To others, they can be regarded as art pieces, much more than only a means of transportation. A vehicle can be nostalgic, a symbol of status and success, or something to appreciate for the hundreds of hours spent creating it.

I work with several car dealerships locally. During the warmer months, I can take the vehicles off-site for photo shoots around the city utilizing various backgrounds and lighting conditions. Sometimes, this is the only option as some vehicles are limited, some are new arrivals, and many are in high demand. That means keeping the kilometres low.

In car photography, light painting is a technique that involves using a light source to create illuminated images of your vehicle. Light painting can be utilized both outside and inside the vehicle’s cabin and offers a unique and creative approach to capturing the essence of the car’s design.

This Range Rover Velar is the latest photo shoot for a listing for Turo, the car-sharing marketplace. We had a great location and what was forecasted to be an amazing sunset. I was looking forward to spending some time with this vehicle. Here are a few photos from that shoot. The Range Rover Velar arrived in the Summer of 2017 and was the fourth model in the Range Rover line.

I use various techniques in my car photography, both during the shoot and in post-processing. My workflow has always included both Lightroom and Photoshop. While I find that some processes are best performed in Lightroom and others in Photoshop, some techniques are necessary in Photoshop, including the Pen Tool. This tool is one of the most essential tools to learn for car photography.

Since it debuted in 2003, the BMW X3 has become one of the most popular models in BMW’s lineup, but it wasn’t until 2018 that BMW introduced the M40i variant of the BMW X3. The X3 M40i offered the utility of the X3 with higher performance, courtesy of a turbocharged, six-cylinder engine that delivered 355 hp and 365 lb-feet of torque.

As we are getting into the warmer (and longer) days, the car season is beginning to take off, and last month, I had the opportunity to photograph this 2019 Mercedes-Benz SLC 300 for a listing on Turo, the car-sharing marketplace. The Mercedes-Benz SLC-Class debuted in 2016 to replace the SLK-Class that had existed since 2011. The name change coincided with the 20th anniversary of the original SLK.

The Hyundai Ioniq 6 is the newest electric car from Hyundai, and with it arriving at Canadian dealerships now, I had the opportunity to take one off-site for an evening photo shoot. Thank you to Steele Hyundai in Halifax for allowing me to capture photos of their newest arrival.