Aston Martin V12 Vantage Photography

Isn’t this such a beautiful car? I’m a huge fan of this one, from all angles.. and the sound track doesn’t disappoint either! So obviously I was over the moon when asked to photograph this one.

After a day track side photographing the Max5 Racing at Cadwell Park we headed over to the owners house.

On arrival the car was washed and dried, before I took to it with the spanners to remove the front number plate! That was an odd feeling I can tell you, unbolting parts from a car of this stature isn’t something I do often. But it was well worth it, the nose of the car looks so much cleaner without it and this shows on the photos.

The car was then placed on the owner’s driveway and the photoshoot begins. The low sunlight was streaming over the car and through the windscreen giving a nice warm feel to things. These shots were taken with the Canon 50mm f1.4 Prime lens.

The second part of the ‘shoot was done in complete darkness, I couldn’t see the black car from the camera position at all without a torch! It’s lit with a technique called Light Painting, where a constant light source is moved around the subject while the camera shutter is open. I’ll take many exposures on a shot like this, moving the light in different ways until I’ve got the effect I’m looking for.

After the ‘shoot I take the photos away and begin the editing process. Here I’ll layer up the various exposures I want to use in photoshop, and use masks to select the parts of each photograph I want to appear in the final image. After carefully masking the layers the car is then digitally cleaned, or airbrushed. Even a highly polished car needs some cleaning up, and this was no exception. All marks and minor distractions are removed from the car, stray reflections, dust, even the gravel doesn’t escape!

On completion, all of the photographs were handed over in high resolution to the owner, as I usually do. Two photographs were then selected for printing and framing which I also look after (Frames are 21” x 29”). I’m sure these will look excellent on the wall!