Ever wanted to know what goes into a car photoshoot for a magazine feature? We’ve created a short video of a behind the scenes car photoshoot on this Mk7 Ford Fiesta ST.
There’s an awful lot of work that goes into shooting a car for a feature in our magazine. First up, it starts with selecting a feature car. The next thing is to review what said feature car is all about, that will help determine what sort of background you want. Whether that’s an underground car park, a derelict factory or even a race circuit, certain cars suit certain backgrounds. The hardest part of a shoot is often finding a location. On occasion you can find one within 20 minutes, but if you don’t know the area, you could be searching for well over an hour.
Next up is positioning and actually photographing the car. This now varies from photographer to photographer. Some prefer to spend a good amount of time on one angle, perhaps for a cover shot, and others will take a basic image and create a cover shot in Photoshop or Lightroom or something similar. As a result, car photoshoots can vary from around 2 hours right up to full days, even across multiple days, depending on the size of the feature.
Want to know what angles to shoot? Typically, the first few you want to cover are: front 3/4, side profile, rear 3/4, rear shot and front end shot. Next up you want details, perhaps carbon ceramic breaks, or air ride, then you’ll need interior and engine shots. It’s good practice to also snap a rolling shot, whether that’s car-to-car or the photographer stood statically while the car drives by.
Once it’s shot, all of the images are processed through editing software and sent over to both the editor and designer. The designer will then select images based on how well it sits on paper before the editor approves, or suggests changes.
There’s more to a car photoshoot than you think…
