Automotive Photography in the Welsh hills
The other week, with the prospect of some decent weather I headed off to Snowdonia for a spot of car photography. This was a location that I had scouted previously and in fact isn't even on a map and was perfect for a 4x4 such as the Range Rover Sport. Sun up was due around 8 AM so I left the house about 5 AM to make sure I was there in plenty of time for civil twilight.
Range Rover Sport in the Welsh hills at dawn
It was cold, very cold and it was a long icy drive from the main road up towards a quarry in the middle of Snowdonia National Park. Even though I was there with 30 minutes plus to spare, the colour in the clouds still caught me by surprise. I made several bracketed ambient light exposures in a frantic dash whilst the sky turned a lovely orangey pink. Once I had a few frames in the bag and had time to compose my thoughts, I pulled out all the strobes and began lighting the car. Here's a behind-the-scenes iPhone shot.
For the top ambient lit shot, I used my fantastic new Singh Ray warming polariser and a Lee .9 Soft graduated ND filter, and then merged two exposures in LREnfuse inside Lightroom.
The bottom shot required quite a bit more effort. By this time, as you can see, the sun was well and truly up over the hills and very bright. I had to use two Elinchrom Quadras to the left of the car on full power and two SB900s strapped together to the front of the car also on full power in SU4 mode to overpower the bright light of the sun.
BTS Shot of an automotive shoot. Before the eagle-eyes point out that the lights are all wrong - the car had just been moved before taking this iPhone snap!
4x4 off road in the Snowdonia National Parkat dawn