I Love It When A Plan Comes Together

It can sometimes be difficult creating fresh locations when writing about and photographing cars, especially the more collectable ones. Unlike Press Cars, who’s objective in life is ideally to be driven far and wide, written about and photographed as often as possible, all too frequently, owners of the rarer, collectable cars don’t want to travel too far away for photography. And that’s perfectly understandable. As while they’re eager to have you drive the car to convey an accurate impression for readers of what it’s like to experience these machines, they don’t want it returned covered in stone chips and gravel rash. This can occasionally result in the same old, repeatable, generic pictures in the publication. I’ve commented in the past, I’m convinced that at some popular Yorkshire locations, there are tripod marks in the ground from the previous day’s magazine.

In recent months, I’ve made it a bit of a mission to create a list in my Evernote of possible photo locations, so when Lee at Total 911 called to talk about Porsche 911 features for two beautiful rare Porsche 911 lightweights, I had some ideas in mind. Teaming up with photographer Chris Wallbank, I managed to arrange access to 10,000 feet of airfield runway based upon an idea I’d had myself a while ago. Chris and I have similar ideas on what makes a good photo shoot, so I knew that if we could get the cars there, some favourable weather in place and some time on our side, it would work out.

Both of the cars were not only collectable Porsches, but also already sold. I assured John at Specialist Cars that we had no intention of a land speed record attempt down the vast expanse of runway and he allowed us to venture further afield than we normally might. Returning home, my work commences as I take my notes and begin creating 2000 words and associated boxouts that will give readers an idea of what it’s like to drive two iconic, lightweight Porsches.

The results have been used as the lead story on the front cover of Issue No 118 of Total 911 and I’m pretty pleased that everything worked out with the feature looking as we had in mind in the final layouts.

One final added bonus was the presence of my friend and colleague Lionel Fern, practising some drone photography with his latest creation, designed to lift a Sony NEX camera. I could hear and see him right at the far end of the facility, so a quick phone call later and his Octocopter drone was angrily buzzing overhead to create probably one of the best Behind The Scenes car magazine shots I’ve seen in a long while. To see the drone image and the feature, head over to Total 911’s store here for a print or digital copy

Thanks to Lee at Total 911 for going with the ideas and Chris for the hard work behind the camera capturing the cars at their best, plus of course, Specialist Cars at Malton for venturing out with the Porsches. I love it when a plan comes together, pass me a cigar.

Issue 118 at the Total 911 store here