Porsche 911 GT3

[Drew Phillips]

Have at them!


1. http://www.drewphillipsphotography.com/portfolio/content/1_Automobiles/Porsche/gt31.jpg

2. http://www.drewphillipsphotography.com/portfolio/content/1_Automobiles/Porsche/gt32.jpg

3. http://www.drewphillipsphotography.com/portfolio/content/1_Automobiles/Porsche/gt33.jpg

4. http://www.drewphillipsphotography.com/portfolio/content/1_Automobiles/Porsche/gt34.jpg

5. http://www.drewphillipsphotography.com/portfolio/content/1_Automobiles/Porsche/gt35.jpg

6. http://www.drewphillipsphotography.com/portfolio/content/1_Automobiles/Porsche/gt36.jpg

7. http://www.drewphillipsphotography.com/portfolio/content/1_Automobiles/Porsche/gt37.jpg

8. http://www.drewphillipsphotography.com/portfolio/content/1_Automobiles/Porsche/gt38.jpg

9. http://www.drewphillipsphotography.com/portfolio/content/1_Automobiles/Porsche/gt39.jpg

10. http://www.drewphillipsphotography.com/portfolio/content/1_Automobiles/Porsche/gt310.jpg

11. http://www.drewphillipsphotography.com/portfolio/content/1_Automobiles/Porsche/gt311.jpg

12. http://www.drewphillipsphotography.com/portfolio/content/1_Automobiles/Porsche/gt312.jpg

[Drew Phillips]

Last 2...


13. http://www.drewphillipsphotography.com/portfolio/content/1_Automobiles/Porsche/gt313.jpg

14. http://www.drewphillipsphotography.com/portfolio/content/1_Automobiles/Porsche/gt314.jpg

[Michael Chu]

What a nice car...haha...now on to my thoughts:

1) I like it because it's simple and clean.

2) The reflection on the side window bugs me

3) I'm not really feeling it. I think it might be because the car looks like it'll hit the wall head-on. Maybe if the car was turned around and shot on the front 3/4, it would've been an improvement.

4) Nice and clean detail! This reminds me of those product catalogs displaying the body part, in this case, the GT3 rear wing :)

5) My only complaint is that the wheel and brake are dirty. Otherwise, I like the composition. A little more contrast couldn't hurt, IMO.

6) Cool fisheye shot!

7) Nice shot of the gauge panel. Maybe if you can soften up the bright spot, it would bring out the gauges more. But still a nice shot ;)

8) I think it works

9) Awesome! I like this one a lot

10) I'm not really liking this one. The car looks to be leaning from the turning and I end up feeling like I'm leaning with it too, if that makes sense.

11) Good shot! I think it's a tad too dark though. The car doesn't pop out as much as it should

12) I LOVE THIS!! Nothing I would change about it :)

13) Spectacular! If you could try to bring the car out just a LITTLE bit, not too much, but a little bit so it's more visible, but not so much that you lose the sunset/silhoulette type effect, I think would be better, IMO.

14) Looking at this image hurts my eyes because of the headlights. Otherwise, great clean shot!

Good work!

[Daniel Buck]

that is alot of images to critique!

#1 looks great, nice stance on the car, and I like how the background sets the car up nicely. I like the line on the wall in the background, I think the slant of the line adds a little bit of depth. I would suggest getting rid of the crack on the ground infront of the passenger front tire, that as well as the dark spot in front of the driver rear tire

#2 just doesn't seem to work compositionally. As my general rule, I like to keep more space infront of the car than in back of the car (video folks call it "lead in"). However, I think #11 proves that you cant put 'rules' on photographs, as I think this works quite well with more space behind the car.

#4 through #8 don't really seem to be anything special, I can't put my finger on why, but they seem a little bit boring (this might partially be due to the number of photos presented)

#13 might be a good candidate for double exposures, one like you have it for the sky and background, and another brighter exposure to bring out the car. I don't think it would take to much to bring out the car (white cars don't usually need much, like a darker car does). I think even just an overall exposure boost would help out as well, and you could still keep a nice sunset in the background. If you don't mind, here is a quick illustration, you could go even farther, but this still keeps the darkish feel to the image


http://i95.photobucket.com/albums/l160/drb271/porshe_01.jpg

[Mike Ditz]

I think that it would help the folks who are critiquing to know what the purpose of the shots are. Different clients have different expectations and what will work for one will get you kicked out the door at another. Also any extenuating circumstances like it started to rain or the car owner got bored and left or you had 5 minutes to shoot 13 shots all play into the results. So here's my nitpicky 2¢ with the usual 17% markup.

1. White cars are hard to shoot, cloudy days don't help. there is something at the base of the wall that you could have hid by moving the car forward a foot. The front right tire looks like it is 2 feet wide. On the back I might belive it but not on the front...
The angle is good as it shows everything. But doesnt really bring anything to the party, a clinical shot of a zippy car, with a bunch of trees reflected in the windoze.
2. Again a nice angle, maybe a bit tto much side for my taste. I'm flip flopping about the wall but I know I'd work on the concrete wall base that is infront of the car but not behind. either extend it or elimidate it.
1 and 2 could both benifit fron a clean horizon and nicer light.
3. Looks like the owner of the warehouse is workinig on a Saturday.
4. Much better use of the color of the bg, fwiw I think the angle is too low, why are we looking under the wing...?
5. Nice detail shot, but Michael is right about the dirt. that's why they invented Q-Tips and car prep guys ;^)
6. Cool and different detail interior, but if you are going for a perfectly balanced mirror image symmetry, the belts need to be positioned the same too. The white is a little BRIGHT, so maybe drop in the color of the background wall.

SIDEBAR COMMENT: A good habit to get into is to shoot pavement, backgrounds walls, without the car so you can drop in these elements when needed. I try to but sometimes am so wrapped up in getting the shot that I neglect to do so...

back to your regularly scheduled critique.

7.YOu are getting weird color shifts either from the tinted windshield or the extreme overexposure on the cowling. maybe take more time to set up the lighting or do a blended exposure with layer masks to tone it down. (unless that was the effect that you wanted). Reflections in the gauges (or is it gages?) It sometimes looks better to have the car running so the needles aren't at 'zero' Close up of the tach at 5k is always fun too.
8. For some reason this shot looks like it's up in an attic...Isn't there a cooler or more powerful / interesting place that they put GT3 than on the carpeting?
9. Nice running shot, alittle flat but that be perked up in post.

are we done yet?

10. Again the contrast could be boosted, maybe PSing out the reflector sticks along the gaurdrail would make it cleaner, but they do give an indication of speed.
11. Nice canopy of trees, but the light suffers, maybe convert to BW?
12. It's going, going, going...but it curves foul...Almost a homerun except for the stupid telephone pole. (nice place to put a pole, I wonder how many times that's been hit?) Nice use of long lens. A ;ower angle would get the road arrow in at the top of the frame.
13. If you were lower, the roofline and maybe the wing would have extended above the mountain range and been really cool, Right now it's an almost there.
14. Lights too bright, maybe really tone down the bg (not the best choice, but everybody in California has shot with the same bg) to make it look like he'd actually need the lights to be on in the first place. The car just looks like it's sitting there...kind of a so-what shot.

See, no ego biscuits here.

[Drew Phillips]

Great critiques! Better than what I could have hoped for.

I think a lot of what it comes down to is being able to consider EVERYTHING that goes into a shot including lighting, reflections, composition, and all the little things that will affect a photo...and then there's post processing. There's many times when I see something but just don't care enough to fix it. An example is #2 - I saw that the car was angled too much to the side, but I didn't want to take the time to compose again and get it right. To be fair, I was just having fun with these photos, and I'd probably be much more careful if they were for a paying client. Overall I wasn't completely satisfied with all the photos, although there are a few I liked a lot. I guess the good thing is they are an improvement over what I was doing 6 months ago, and that matters a lot.

[Daniel Buck]

Great critiques! Better than what I could have hoped for.

I think a lot of what it comes down to is being able to consider EVERYTHING that goes into a shot including lighting, reflections, composition, and all the little things that will affect a photo...and then there's post processing. There's many times when I see something but just don't care enough to fix it. An example is #2 - I saw that the car was angled too much to the side, but I didn't want to take the time to compose again and get it right. To be fair, I was just having fun with these photos, and I'd probably be much more careful if they were for a paying client. Overall I wasn't completely satisfied with all the photos, although there are a few I liked a lot. I guess the good thing is they are an improvement over what I was doing 6 months ago, and that matters a lot.

not to sound mean, but maybe only post up your best? If you know you were being a bit lazy and didn't take the time to compose again when you didn't like the shot, why bother posting them? :)

[Drew Phillips]

I still like them, but I wasn't going for perfection. I took around 300 for the shoot, and those were the ones I liked the best.

[Mike Ditz]

This sort of goes back to what I said in my post. What is the purpose of the shoot? If the pix are for your neighbor who just got a new car it's different than if you are shooting for a manufacturer or magazine.

I would rather take my time to critique pictures that were striving to do your best with rather than spending a half hour going over series of shots that you didn't really care about. Maybe shooting less quantity and more quality? not that these are bad, but none are 'finished' IMHO and if you already knew that, what are you looking for in a critique. Since I don't know where you are in your career, it's hard to judge quality, maybe these are the best you've ever done, or maybe you are coasting I don't know, so I just figure that these are your best efforts.

[Daniel Buck]

I agree with the less quantity part Mike! 300 shots for one car? I hardly ever take more than 30! But I don't shoot rolling or interior shots, and I'm a pretty slow shooter (I would keep on shooting if the sunset lasted forever! haha!)

[Drew Phillips]

Most were with the rolling shots. The light was going in and out, the roads were crap, and there was traffic, all of which made it difficult. I kind of had a spray and pray philosophy, knowing that most of the shots were going to have a bad exposure, be blurry, or have something unwanted in the background.

I like a good critique, but I feel like you guys are really laying into me now. I guess like Mike said, they just aren't finished.

[Mike Ditz]

It's not the total number of shots (300 frames is a lot, equal to 8 rolls of 35mm film, but not absurd), it's the number of setups, I just know it's really hard to devote the time needed to get what you want when you are doing 15-20 setups. Sometimes your client wants a lot of different looks, to shoot the crap out of it sometimes they want 1 or 2 really nice perfect shots.
Personally, I am getting tired of the quantity jobs, but they do pay the bills.

[Drew Phillips]

Actually, what you said right there maybe helped me more than anything else. Instead of rushing from one shot to another, I probably need to pick just a few and then really get those down. It's better to have 4 to 5 really good shots than 10-12 pretty good shots.

[John Thawley]

Actually, what you said right there maybe helped me more than anything else. Instead of rushing from one shot to another, I probably need to pick just a few and then really get those down. It's better to have 4 to 5 really good shots than 10-12 pretty good shots.

Golden words my friend.

I stood shooting an obscure shot yesterday for quite sometime.... I made the same argument. I'd rather go home with that "killer" shot than just have 50 of the mundane looks I shot the year before.

Reach.

JT

[John Jovic]

How many shots we take is a bit like comparing the size of our weeners isn't it (but opposite, ie the less/smaller the better!). "I made the killer shot on my 3rd frame and stopped there", who cares...

I often shoot around 500+ images (including brackets) on a job. I know I only need about 15 excellent images. Could I get them in 15 exposures? No, not if they were all action or rig shots. But yes, with absolute certainty, if they were the static and detail shots, any experienced photog could. The number of images you shoot is irrelevant, only the number of keepers is.

JJ

[Mike Ditz]

I really don't know how many frames I shoot on a job as these days it's measured in GB not rolls of film. Running shots can eat up a lot of pixels.

And Drew, I don't mean to pick on you but there aren't many other people posting :D

[Morgan J Segal]

How many shots we take is a bit like comparing the size of our weeners isn't it (but opposite, ie the less/smaller the better!). "I made the killer shot on my 3rd frame and stopped there", who cares...

I often shoot around 500+ images (including brackets) on a job. I know I only need about 15 excellent images. Could I get them in 15 exposures? No, not if they were all action or rig shots. But yes, with absolute certainty, if they were the static and detail shots, any experienced photog could. The number of images you shoot is irrelevant, only the number of keepers is.

JJ

Not entirely true IMO. There comes a point when you are just flat out overshooting it. If you are taking a shot, moving the camera a couple of feet to shoot something "different", you are essentially doing the same thing as "press and pray" in motorsports photography where you machine gun fire the camera and hope you got something good.
Do this in front of a client and you will look like an idiot with no confidence in your work. In many cases, you should have the shot mapped out in your head before you set the camera up.
Additionally, had you been shooting on film, you can't go burn 20 rolls when the budget was for 10.
Part of being good is to know when you have the job in the bag and say "lets go drink beer!"

Of course there is no magic number as to how many frames you should take, but if your frames shot to keeper ratio is low, you have to start thinking more about what you are doing.


There are times when I shoot well over 500 frames when there is a bunch of locations to shoot, but to give you an idea: I just shot a new upcoming BMW, we did car to car (which sucks up a lot of frames) and driving shots on a track, beauty shots in three locations, plus interior shots and details and I took 247 frames (including brackets) and I gave them 25 final images (which I narrowed down from about 60 keepers)



Now I am not suggesting you are doing overshooting, I don't know the details of your shoot, just providing a counterpoint to your post.

[Mike Ditz]

Not entirely true IMO. There comes a point when you are just flat out overshooting it. If you are taking a shot, moving the camera a couple of feet to shoot something "different",...snip


that reminds me of what Arnold Newman said when asked the difference between a $100 picture and a $1000 picture...he said "six inches to the left":)

[Morgan J Segal]

that reminds me of what Arnold Newman said when asked the difference between a $100 picture and a $1000 picture...he said "six inches to the left":)

LOL Of course, he never bothered to really compose a shot in camera, he just cropped in the printing to make it good

[Daniel Buck]

LOL Of course, he never bothered to really compose a shot in camera, he just cropped in the printing to make it good
quite easy to do with large format and some of the larger medium formats :) I wouldn't do it on 35 format though :eek: