Shooting the moon… behind a Z/28

Photo by Thomas A. DeMauro.

Sometimes odd situations arise during a photoshoot. In this instance, it was the moon. While photographing Matt Barczak’s and Frank Arone’s concours-restored 1969 Z/28 last fall, darkness crept in near the end of the shoot. That’s nothing new for me. I usually shoot until every bit of light disappears, then I try to find some more.

In this case, I decided to break out the remote controlled flashes to get a few more photos with a different look than the daytime shots. Then the moon rose right behind the car and afforded me the opportunity to actually get it in the frame. Though I would’ve liked the moon to loom a bit larger, and I know its positioning relative to the car isn’t perfect—we couldn’t raise the car or lower the moon—it’s still an interesting shot.

This photo was taken with four off-camera flashes arranged around the car to try to even out the light across the Hugger Orange paint. An aperture of F10 ensured the Z/28 was exposed properly with the flashes and the 20-second shutter speed helped make some of the background visible in silhouette just to add some interest in what would have been black areas. Bringing up the ambient light also overexposed the moon, making it look a bit like a shining sun at night, but I didn’t mind that as it added an ethereal quality.

Those light reflections on the hood and corner of the roof are actually of the moon—not a flash—I checked. I tried a few photos with the headlamps on too. They looked good, but I felt the headlamps got a bit too bright with the long exposure.

Though I’m sure the photo could be improved in Photoshop, it hasn’t been. It’s straight from the camera so you can see it how we saw it.

In the next issue of Hemmings Muscle Machines you’ll find an in-depth Restoration Profile on Matt and Frank’s stunning Z/28. You’ll see how they restored it in lots of in-process photos, and you’ll see the daytime feature photos we took at this shoot with the same background.

 

 

from Hemmings Daily – News for the collector car enthusiast http://ift.tt/2duMm8B