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Living in Dallas/Ft Worth, most weekends serve up any number of car shows. There are charity events, car club events, shows sponsored by hot rod shops, restaurants and even local festivals. But a show I discovered early on, and one of my favorites was Cars and Coffee.

Owing its origins to the Southern California event by the same name, Dallas Cars and Coffee was a Saturday morning gathering of car enthusiasts where like-minded owners swapped stories over a cup a Joe. No trophies or judges, just a fun way to spend a Saturday morning. You could catch anything from a Model T Ford to the latest Pagani Supercar and your only investment was a Saturday morning and a little shoe leather. It was a monthly event hosted by Classic BMW of Plano. December 2018 was the final show held there. Classic had run things for 9 years and word had it that Gas Monkey Richard Rawlings was taking the reins, but as yet, nothing doing. Sure there have been other local shows to pop up sporting the Cars and Coffee branding, but nothing close to what we had in Plano. Let's hope that changes soon. I miss those early Saturday mornings with camera in hand and cars by the acre. Oh, and I take mine with cream; no sugar.


All the best,
Doug

The Corvette is known as America's favorite sports car. Low, fast and sexy, many of us grew up with dreams of owning one. Well, recently one of my friends got his wish. The kids now out of the house and some extra room in the budget, he found a deal on a well maintained 2013 and pulled the trigger. I'm a Corvette lover too, so with a little arm twisting, I was able to arrange a photo shoot.

Parking garages make interesting locations for car shoots, so we decided to meet up on a rooftop lot at the airport. Since we would be working after dark I had a couple of ways to go to get the results I was after. This time I chose light painting. The idea is to set up your camera on a tripod, set the shutter to remain open for 10-15 seconds and illuminate the car with a flashlight, LED or some other light source. I use an LED light wand. You want to make sure you capture all parts of the car, so several passes are often required. I like to make sure I have everything I need, so for this image I had 19 different exposures. Overkill for sure, but that's just me.

Back at the computer, the fun begins. I have to choose the images that best illuminate the car and blend them into a single image. Photoshop is the tool of choice here. Each exposure is carefully arranged as a layer in a stack, making sure that everything lines up perfectly. The final result is a composite of the all the layers in the stack. Then you edit the image as if it were a single exposure. It's a lot of work, but the results can be amazing.

All the best,
Doug

No, I'm not any of those, but I have been called Chief a few times. Most of us wear quite a few hats in life, and I'm no exception, so I thought I'd kick off this blog with a bit of my back story.

If you're a child of the 60's, you may remember a small camera by Kodak called the Instamatic. The film came in a plastic cartridge and there were flash cubes for low light situations. Not much of a tool for creative expression, but we crawl before we walk. One of these showed up under the tree one Christmas.

Once photography went digital, I grabbed a Power Shot S10: two megapixels with 2x optical zoom and a sleek design. I had a lot of fun with that little guy. Going digital meant you were freed from the expense of film and no more penalty for being creative. It came bundled with some post processing software too. Now you're talking.

As digital photography has evolved, so have the tools available for artistic expression. I now shoot an Olympus and do my post work in Photoshop. While I have no formal training, I wouldn't say I'm self taught. I have a shelf full of books and hundreds of hours logged into YouTube to back me up.

I started shooting car shows in 2011. I'm not a true petrol-head, but who doesn't love a 60's muscle car. Once I saw how much work the owners put into prepping them, I was hooked. Figuring out how to turn shots from cars shows into “wall hangers” came later. In fact it's an ongoing process. Many purists frown on heavy-handed post processing. Hats off to you, but I'm not in that camp.

So there you have it. I'm a camera totin', car shootin', Photoshopin', God fearin' son of a sailor-man. Thanks for dropping by and please leave a comment.

All the best,
Doug

What is it that sets a photographer apart? Can you recognize who took a shot just by looking at an image alone? Developing a signature style is something that most photographers struggle with when first starting out, but as they get a better handle on their craft, a recognizable style will usually emerge.

Fledgling photographers have plenty of questions that need answers. What do I shoot? How will it be lit? What camera and lens combination best captures what I'm after. Do I shoot in studio or open air? Black and white or color? These and a hundred other little things play into creating a signature style. At some point the questions get answered, we find a way of working that suits us, and as we log more time behind camera, a style starts to take shape.

When I first picked up a camera I was all over the map. I would take my camera to a weekend event and go exploring. No sense of direction really, but I was getting comfortable with my gear and developing an eye for composition. It didn't take long to find subjects I loved: cars. I'd show up at a car show and shoot anything and everything. After a few shows and more time spent reviewing my shots, I began to develop my own taste and soon discovered that I was shooting with the end result already in mind. More conviction.

The same holds true for the post processing side. First off, get familiar with your tools. It could be Photoshop, Lightroom or any other photo editing suite; no matter. They all come with a learning curve, but don't be put off. There are so many expert instructors on YouTube and other platforms, it's well within reach of most people. Follow along on a few tutorials and begin doing some experiments of your own. After you get past the “paint by numbers” stage, you should find that what happens in the digital darkroom influences your work behind the camera. Again, more conviction.

There will always be new cameras and/or software that claim to be able to turn your photos into the next masterpiece. Maybe. I love new gear as much as the next guy and try to keep up with the latest techniques and developments in photo editing. But at a certain point in life you already know what you like. When I walk into an ice cream shop, I don't struggle with all the choices. I'm good with Rocky Road.

All the best,
Doug