I wouldn't be selling it except I'm going overseas...
Well, before you rush me with offers I have to confess that this pristine Rolls Royce does not belong to me. It is in the possession of a chap named Bill. He let me photograph it at Cannington but made me promise not to touch the paintwork in case I left any fingerprints on it.
I can respect that, as I have seen some terrible things done to vintage cars in Melbourne when the Australia Day crowds start fingering the Fords and smearing the Simcas. I would not have the nerve to exhibit a veteran or vintage car in the RACV show in the park because I have seen how invasive the spectators can be.
Well, back to my car shoot for Bill. I scoped out the car the day before the shoot and took some preliminary shots in monochrome - just the on-camera flash tube that pops up over the lens on the
Fujifilm X-T10. I selected the
27mm F:2.8 lens as the most convenient one for this sort of work - I am going to look at the new 23mm f:2 WR when it arrives.
Good shots. Good record shots, but somewhat flat - even for monochrome. So on the shoot day I opted for the Fujifilm EF-42 lens with the new Mag Mode mushroom dome diffuser in front of it. The real secret of getting modelling, light and shadow, was the use of a TTL cord from camera to flash.
I was able to see the car in the tilting LCD screen at a convenient angle, and then use the flash in the other hand to rise up above the scene and let light fall naturally. The roof of the building housing the car was a long way up and would not have been a good bounce reflector so I opted for the hand-held light.
A two handed shoot is not much fun if you have a long lens on the camera - the moment of force generated by the 18-135mm f:3.5-5.6 WR is such that you can hardly hold the camera body steady as you work. But anything that is physically smaller, from the 60mm macro on downward to the 27mm is a breeze. You can also make use of the camera strap braced agains the back of your neck for even more steadiness.
I would also particularly recommend that users of the Fujifilm X system look into the film simulation settings in the menu and seek out the PRO Neg Hi setting, if you have it. I can get it on three of my cameras and I must say it looks as though it is finally the way that I see colour. I still like Classic Chrome for the retro look, but PRO Neg Hi cuts it for nearly everything else.
