Charles T. Low Photography

Two things:

1. Yes I have been a little car-obsessed of late. This feels incongruent with the current and sorry state of the World, of which I remain all too aware, but here it is.
   Also, distractions:
   • I recently made a 3,300 km road trip, which sounds like "travel" and so would afford me ample photographic opportunity, but this was a transit, not a sight-seeing excursion, and there's only so much I can do during long days at highway speeds (even on the passenger-legs);
   • for a while, we have care of two big, energetic dogs, and I often walk them during my otherwise dawn-photography hour — the things we do for love!
2. I have however, since the previous Summer Daze blog, managed to accumulate a collection of photographs of (among a smattering of other things) a specific car. When I converted from practising Medicine to doing photography, one of my goals was to work with cars, and I have indeed been doing that, and would like to do more.
   • Without getting as exotic as the example in this video, about photographing a Maserati, it feels that it is going well, and I'm going to take this opportunity to remind my worldwide fan-base that I would like to photograph your car (or your house or factory, or ...). You know where to find me.

Now, the Mazda MX-5 (formerly known as the Miata) receives close-to-universal approval from roadster-enthusiasts everywhere. The balance is near-perfect, and the consistent reaction, even when pulling away from the curb for the first time, is an immediate smile. Years later: people say still smiling.

Jason of Engineering Explained bought one over an Acura NSX (amazing vehicle though the latter is).

And, the car is affordable. When I was test-driving it, I came across a BMW Z4, also a roadster, and:

1. the BMW looked good;
2. it has 65% more horsepower, as if the MX-5's 155 isn't enough for this exceptionally light car to merge onto a four-lane highway (it is! – and more recent models have 181 hp), and
3. the Z4 has a top speed of 250 km/h (the limit anywhere I drive being 100), and
4. it costs about double what an MX-5 does (and the NSX costs about seven times more);
5. I'm sure it's a really nice car.

My S.O. inspected my new (used) car, and said, Oh look, it has a glove box! We were looking into the trunk; this vehicle has virtually no storage.

That said, another typically-smitten MX-5 owner I know had a long road-trip planned, aborted by the pandemic, but sent around a video of how to load the trunk for a long trip for two, including a tent and two sleeping bags. I.e., the storage situation is only desperate, not hopeless.

Storage isn't what this car is about.

Being smitten enough to send around a trunk-packing video is what this car is about.

(I haven't yet succumbed to photographing inside the trunk ... yet.)

Also, for you photography-geeks out there, note that both of the images above were made at about the same time of day (dawn, of course, for those who know me) and at the same location, but on different days, and the light of course was different. I think that both lights are quite flattering, but they are clearly quite different.

The light here will never be quite the same twice.

Also of note to photography-enthusiasts: the two images above are both monochrome ... mostly.

As so often happens in life: something gained, something lost.

I really enjoyed the Camaro. And it was time for a change.

It came to me with 11,000 km on it, and left at 80,000, so I did drive it! That included use as my daily driver for eight months a year, and two track days (which were amazing and mind-expanding and about the most fun you can have in a car).

And it had a back seat (sort of).

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Automotive Photography

I have so enjoyed my recent, self-assigned project of photographing my own new car.

Audience Participation

So that leads me to ask two things of you:

1. if you have a vehicle or anything else which pleases you and which you would like photographed, then that's called a commission, and I would love to work for you;
2. if you have a property with a great view, then I would love to work with you; I'm looking for new vistas for landscapes or art-scenes in general, and that would be at no charge (but then I will be working for me, although of course you will get some complimentary digital photos out of it);
   • I'm easy to contact.

Thank you all so much for reading.

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Let me know what you liked in this blog, suggestions for future topics, or of course feel free to ask me anything.

Charles T. Low
Photographer
Blog #69
2021-08-15

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