So here’s a little initial info: 99 Acura Integra GSR, Bilstein stance (both shocks & springs), Rota Grids (polished chrome lip, gunmetal blades) and a ton of random internals. I shot this shot with two Paul C Buff AlienBee AB800′s and one Nikon SB-800. No modifiers were used, all 3 light sources were bare.

First and foremost, I wanted very little ambient light reflecting off the car. I could have parked a bit more to the right and got sort of a golden rim from the sunset but I knew I didn’t want much ambient on or around my subject. I found a nice lot with a huge lazer tag center that just went out of business a few months ago. The sun was at about a 30 degree angle and pushing a huge shadow off the lazer tag building which almost covered the whole parking lot. Perfect!

When I first pulled the car up I immediately set my lights up and worked on getting a correct exposure just to see what I was sitting at. I always do this before moving my subject around. As you probably already know, when shooting at a time like this, your exposure will change often and fast. Always keep in mind that shutter speed controls ambient and aperture controls flash. ISO is your middle man. I could have metered off the sky but I already knew I would want to be at/around 1/250th of a sec, which was my max sync speed. I set both lights up and started off with just one light to see if I was getting any unwanted reflections or hot spots on the car or ground. I ended up happy with my first light about 4ft. to the left of where the shot was taken, on half power (1/2), bare and pointed directly at my camera (much love for lens hoods!) The reason I did this was to not let any excess light wrap around the left side of the car and to make the ground on that side black out. This is a technique called feathering.

When I was ready to start adjusting my second light I laid my camera down on the crack. Oh and don’t worry, she likes crack… I pointed my second light directly at the first one to once again feather the light. This light was approximatively 3ft to my right. I ended up happy at around a quarter power (1/4). After setting the lights up I wasn’t completely happy with how the car was sitting. I adjusted the angle at which the car was in the frame without moving any closer to or from the bees. Once I was happy with my angle I worked on positioning the front wheel. Once I found a happy place for the wheel to sit I noticed that half of it was being attacked by shadows.

I grabbed my SB800 and set it on the ground right next to my bee and set it on full power (1/1). I aimed it directly at the wheel and that fixed my problem. I couldn’t get enough road into the shot so I just laid my camera on the ground and started shooting that way. A couple of shots later I ended up with exactly what I wanted. f/7.1, 1/200th, ISO 100.

Yes, I could have placed one of my lights at the rear and really popped the car out of the scene. I just didn’t want to do that for this shot. Don’t feel refrained to shooting one exact way, always move your lights around, always experiment and go outside of your comfort level. I guarantee you will learn a lot more this way.
Until next time, I’m Scott Rohe and this is how I took my shot