Chinese Insta360 company founder JK Liu recently explained his long-term ambitions by saying this, “One day everyone will forget cameras even exist.”
Not a good long term business plan if you ask me. Think I’ll stick with GoPro and DJI.
Category: Photography Blog
THE BEST PLACES IN SEATTLE FOR CAR PHOTOGRAPHY
I’m spilling the beans, so to speak, although there are hundreds of other locations and geography near Seattle that will work just as well as those listed below.
Let me start out by saying backgrounds are very important, but so is the color of the car, as is the light, which IMO is the most important element of all.
Not all car colors work for photography or filmmaking on a sunny day. Fortunately (or unfortunately) Seattle is not that sunny except for a handful of weeks during the summer each year.
LOOK AT ME VS. LOOK INSIDE YOURSELF
Appearances or integrity? That choice is made every day with the world shifting towards a more superficial “look at me” way of being.
Slowing down, staying on a clean diet, reducing screen time, letting your personal emotions come to the surface, and using those as a base for generating conceptual ideas is a worthier creative goal than propping yourself up with temporary “solutions”.
Here’s a great article that I can recommend for photographers wishing to connect with what they have to say (the most important part of finding your “style” IMO).
SUPER WIDE ANGLES CAN BETRAY YOU FAST
Some readers have asked me to elaborate on the use of a super-wide angle lens for photography.
To master anything wider than a 24mm lens on a full frame camera (like the 20mm photo seen here), requires a lot of practice, especially in automotive and architectural photography. The real risk is to unwittingly insert distortion where you don’t want it, in the corners and edges of the frame.
INSIGHTS TO CONSIDER FROM THE INTENTIONAL ARTIST
1. You can’t fix what you won’t acknowledge.
2. The truth you’re avoiding is the door to your freedom.
3. Every excuse is a story you’re choosing to believe.
4. What would you change if you got brutally honest with yourself about where you are now?
The above from The Intentional Artist
ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE AND “HUMAN” BOTS
Well, it was bound to happen, a company wants to hire me to train AI bots on how to modify photos of cars and backgrounds. Just when I was making a renewed effort to remain authentic!
AI and Human Bots are oxymorons that make me want to un-list my phone number and email address. However, like most people, I hate contact forms. So, If I don’t pick up, and you need to leave a message, you’ll know why.
DIGITAL CREATOR
This title has recently come into common use on social media. Since I was unsure what this broad category could mean, I went in search of the “real” answer on Google’s AI:
LATEST COVER
You never know when the photo you make might become a cover on a magazine.
The team at PCA has once again provided me with this gift. It feels the same way every time. A thrill followed by a sense of gratitude. My thanks to them and Lorenzo Strong at West Coast Customs for following me to one of my favorite photo locations in Monterey, CA and bringing along this tastefully modified 1977 911S they built for a client.
This white beauty with blue graphics looks and performs like a 1974 IROC RSR with some exciting modern touches. This is one cool ride. My story and photos appear in this month’s issue of PCA’s national magazine Panorama.
P.S. The trick to making a successful automotive photo using a super wide-angle lens, especially a close-up like this, is to minimize distortion and maximize believability. To master this technique, it takes years of practice with a 16-20 mm on a full-frame camera, along with developing the necessary pre and post-visualization skills. You have to know what the eye sees as normal and make that happen. It’s not as simple as a single Photoshop or AI action.
INEVITABLE CONSEQUENCE MANAGEMENT TIPS
Photography enthusiasts who are considering making it a career sometimes seek me out for advice. I always give them what I think are the most important things to personally manage as a full-time professional:
1. Don’t assume anything. (This rule is also #2 and #3)
2. Have a back up plan. Better yet, have three backup plans.
3. Choose your potential clients and co-workers wisely.
4. Only show your best work. If it’s the work you want to be hired for, it helps. If you have talent and are willing to work very hard to become better, you have a chance. If you have something to say, you have a real chance.
5. If you want to stay in business, don’t work for free and never do anything half way.
6. Establish minimum fees depending on the time, energy and expertise required to do your best work.
7. If the client wants all rights, it’s OK. You just need to charge a lot more, unless it’s work you will never want to own.
8. Never complain, and always make your deadlines.
9. Always believe in yourself, and never stop creating new work that pushes the envelope. Rejection and criticism are part of the business, so grow a thick skin. And learn to say no.
10. Equipment is just a tool. Practice until you don’t have to think about it anymore. Use your intuition instead.
Bonus tip: Shoot for yourself, and don’t fall down.
NEW COVER AND ARTICLE
Thank you for the support from my local Porsche Club of America chapter and to Sydney Tanner for insisting that she write and photograph an article about me and what I do as a photographer. See the January issue of Spiel, my regional PCA magazine, for more. It is an honor to be featured in the magazine.
PERSONAL WORK 2025
Followers of my blog know that at the end of each year I post a series of personal photographs made at a non-assignment single location. Here’s a 4-season composite I made at a local road known for cool photo ops. Enjoy something new this season!
Porsche’s 911 Through the Years
ALEX WEBB SHOOTS THE 2026 LAVAZZA CALENDAR
Having studied with Alex Webb, I can attest that he is the most brilliant color photographer living today. Somebody figured that out and hired him to shoot a coffee brand with incredible results. Congrats Alex!
THE BEST PHOTOGRAPHY ADVICE I’VE SEEN LATELY
As someone who is always willing to learn, even after decades as a full-time professional photographer, here’s the best thing I’ve come across that encapsulates what I have come to know.
SEAT TIME
Seat time is the difference between proficiency and mastery.
Time and energy focused on one goal every day for decades will get you there. Natural talent will make it happen faster. Integrity will make it last for your entire lifetime.
CINEMATIC WIDESCREEN
Framing has an amazing impact of how an image, stills or motion, is perceived.
It can be confusing when describing a stills style as cinematic widescreen. Here is a reference for different aspect ratios. Cinematic widescreen is the widest format at 21:9. Traditional full frame 35mm stills is 3:2, which is entirely different, unless you are shooting side by side panoramas.
MISSING DIANE KEATON
Quirky but irresistible. An actress and photographer, among other things, Diane was a funny, adorable iconoclast who earned my respect. She was an exemplary example for independent women everywhere with her bold ideas, leading fashion sense, and choice in films that she was a part of. She will be missed.
(Self portrait: Diane Keaton)