Saturday, June 11, 2011 at 8:45PM | 1 Comment oh fordy! fordy!
been so busy at work, i mean crazy busy. the kinda busy that just makes you want to crawl in bed once you hit the door. truly not enough hours in a day, but i am happy to be up to here with work. keeps me from getting bored. anyway, it does keep me from playing with my pixels here.
i had to meet up with a couple in rialto this fine june gloomy morning at the run whatcha brung show. i actually arrived at 7am, when the cars were just showing up. don't know why i woke up so early, except that i get up before that ungodly hour all week, so it really wasn't that bad.
i'd never been to rialto, or obviouly that show, and wanted to be sure to figure out where to park. and well, i got to shoot the cars before too many people got in the way, and before the majority popped the hoods open. (ya gary, thanks for pointing out that yours was already open– lol.)(hey to your buddy that said i should stop hassling you...you should know that just makes me wanna continue...don't worry, i'll stop soon enough and go back to haranguing richard)
my take on the show: it was pretty good, not too big, only about 3 blocks long with an island down the middle. the overcast made for great lack of strong shadows – giant softbox for pictures, though it does kinda wash the colors out. and if anyone can get a sunburn between the hours of 7am and 10 am, that'd be me. i'd planned on hitting one or two other shows on the way back home, but my lightly toasted skin kinda made me skip them. didn't even stop at ontario mills – never shopped there either, just driven past.
i must say, security is very interested in anyone with a tripod and seemingly professional looking camera. i guess "professionals" need some type of permit if they intend to sell. well, i had to explain twice that it's just my hobby. they let me go on, but they still seemed kinda hesitant to believe me, and i wouldn't know how to prove otherwise if they insisted that i leave, apart from asking anyone whose car i shot if i was being one of those bad photogs. apparently, in past years, that type of pushy, "buy my pictures" photogs invaded, and they wanted to avoid that. that ain't me fer sure. so thanks to the security guys in the golf cart for being diligent in their duties, and to bev, who was also doing her job, and thanks for not making me leave. i do hope you inquired of the other couple with the tripod and the more "professional" brand camera with equal diligence.
a big camera does not always equal a pro, or even a good photographer. check the settings on most, and you'll find they never switch out of program or auto mode...that'll get them average images at best...just people with the buy the expensive camera and i'll get better pictures mentality. doesn't work if you don't know how to use it. <enter the obvious analogy here>
the owner of this car graciously closed the hood so i could take a few shots. said he'd put a small fortune into this old ford, and it shows. it totally stands out amongst the other cars, but he said it's just the color. no. nope. it is really different than the average car, and i am getting pretty jaded after chasing them down for the past year.
oh, and the couple i was meeting, finally rolled in after 9am. but all's well. i had plenty to keep me entertained before then. if only i can find the time to get them posted.
Reader Comments (1)
Nice car. Nice color. Nice shot. Your post reminded me of an experience I had a couple years ago.
I’d spent a weekend photographing my brother-in-law at the drag races in Las Vegas. A pit pass got me down on the track for some good shots of him and the other drivers. The other photographers there didn’t have a problem with me, especially when they realized I wasn’t their competition.
Quite a different story a few weeks later at the strip in Fontana, CA. As soon as I attempted to move into a similar position along the track, the other photographers were all over me, asking where I worked and who I was shooting for. In no uncertain terms they told me get lost. I spoke with track officials who said that they’d had a lot of trouble in the past from photographers near the track so now they only allow photographers with media passes into that area. What a crock. I found out later that, while they might have had credentials, these guys were busy selling prints to the crowd, the drivers and anyone else who was interested. They had a lock on the place and didn’t want to take a chance of having anyone cut in on their business.
I’m a strong believer in capitalism and the entrepreneurial spirit, but a few obnoxious photographers trying to make a buck off their images can sure screw things up for us amateur shooters.