The Art of Seeing a Car through FDL.

When we came to the United States, one of the things we wanted to do was photograph cars.

That sounds simple enough, but, after spending years photographing automobiles, we have discovered that finding a beautiful car is only the beginning. The real challenge is to see it differently — to look beyond the badge, the engine, the rarity or the value, and to see the design itself.

America has given us an incredible opportunity to do exactly that. During our travels, we have been fortunate enough to photograph cars that we could never have accessed at home in South Africa. We’ve visited museums, collections and private garages, met other photographers and car enthusiasts, and spent time looking at some truly remarkable automobiles.

And the more cars we photograph, the more we realise that what interests us most is not necessarily the car as a whole.

It is the shape. The line. The curve. The way one surface flows into another. The tiny details that a designer introduced almost unnoticed, but which give the car its character. A beautiful automobile is really a collection of carefully considered design elements. The sweep of a fender, the line of a roof, the tension in a shoulder, the negative space around a wheel. These elements are what make a car instantly recognisable.

Automotive photography is very different from photographing a person or a landscape. A car is essentially a collection of reflective surfaces, and those surfaces can behave in completely different ways depending on the direction, size and quality of the light.

A highlight can describe a curve. A reflection can emphasise a line. A carefully placed shadow can make a surface disappear. And sometimes darkness can be just as important as light.

This is where our experience with light becomes part of the creative process.  We don’t just light the car. We paint with light. Our FDL — Focused Diffused Lighting — technique has evolved from this way of thinking. Rather than flooding the entire car with light, we work deliberately with individual areas and surfaces, controlling what the light reveals and what it leaves hidden.

More recently, we have also been experimenting with our light-painting rig, which has opened up another way of interpreting the shapes and surfaces of an automobile. It is fascinating to see how a small change in the position or movement of a light can completely alter the character of a car. The camera hasn’t moved. The car hasn’t moved. But suddenly the car looks different. And that is the part we love.

One of the things our journey through the USA has reinforced for us is that a great car really is a form of sculpture. It has volume, proportion, rhythm and balance. It has positive and negative space. It has hard edges alongside soft curves. It has surfaces that reflect light and others that absorb it.

We have learned that we should think like designers and sculptors. Where does the eye travel? Where does a line begin and where does it end? Which shape should dominate? What happens if we allow part of the car to disappear? How can light make a particular curve feel almost three-dimensional? These questions become part of creating the image.

And sometimes the best photograph isn’t the one that shows the most.

It is the one that reveals just enough……