The Sharpe Image

I really like Drag Racing, problem is, I just do not get to shoot enough of it.  It is always either too far away, or it conflicts with something that I already have a commitment too.  So when the NHRA comes to zMax Dragway here in Charlotte, I am ALL over it!  Some of you may know that I shot Drag Racing on a pretty regular basis back in the early 90’s.  I got my motorsports start with a small racing paper called Inside Motorsports.  Inside Motorsports was a great little newspaper, but made the mistake of trying to cover too much “grass roots” racing with ignoring the big Series such as Sprint Cup, NHRA, IRL and some others.  They skimmed over these Series, but never made any real attempt to cover them in the way that they should have been covered in order to generate cash flow.  When they did cover them, they sent me.  That is really how I got my start in all this crazy stuff.  Anyway, least I digress.  This is about the Carolina Nationals.  I LOVE this event.  I am so glad that NHRA has put it on the schedule twice next year.  What a great move!  But enough of that for now, lets look and see what I came up with……….I really wanted to come up with more than just cars “launching” off the starting line for the weekend take.  It is just soooo damn easy to sit at the line all weekend and shoot cars taking off.  I certainly did do my share of that, but I wanted to capture the kind of images that showed a different side of the competition of this sport.  Things that occur all around us each weekend, but somehow never seem to get captured.  I hope that I was able to accomplish this to some degree.

Shooting in the garage area of a Drag Race is just so different than the garage area of a Cup race.  These guys are actually really glad to see you coming!  They really don’t mind if you take pictures of the cars or the motors, it is all an open book.  In the above shot, the thing that really cought my attention was the big images of Cruz Pedregon on the side of the hauler.  This was just so powerful to me.  I had to shoot it.  I shot this with my Nikon D300, my 10mm~17mm fisheye lens, at shutter speed 100.  I was at f3.5, and I under exposed this by 1/3 of a stop.

I really wanted to get some good portraits of these guys getting ready to race.  They are way more laid back that the Sprint Cup drivers when it comes to taking a picture of them.  I shot all of these with available light.  Those of you that know my work know that I am big on available light.  I HATE A FLASH!  It just looks so unnatural.  And with these guys, you better not even think of using a flash.  Not much makes them mad, but that will.

In the above image, Cruz Pedregon puts on his Nomex.  This was shot with my 70mm~200mm lens, f2.8 at a shutter speed of 125.  It is under exposed by 1/3 of a stop.

The really cool thing about these cars is the way the body lifts up for them to get into.  This creates endless possibilities.  In the image below, I really liked the way the window in the body created a light source.  It is just something different that you do not normally see with a race car.

Getting in and out of these cars is not an easy trick.  That is why they have an escape hatch on the roof.  When John Force suited up in all of his Nomex, it seemed as if it was very awkward for him to move.  Here he is getting into the small cockpit of his Funny Car to do 300+mph.  Things are really tight in these cars for these guys.  It almost reminded my of when I was kid and I watched the Astronauts from the old Apollo Space Program get ready for a Moon Shot……the image just had that “feel” to it.   This image was shot with my 17mm~35mm lens.  It was shot at f2.8, shutter speed 160.  The exposure was straight up.

In this next Image of Tony Schumacher, I was really thinking in my “commercial image” thought process.  I wanted to capture his eyes, as well as the “Go Army.com” on his helmet.  I really liked this image.

In the next image of Schumacher, I was thinking more along an Editorial line.  I included his name on the side of the car.  This seems obvious, but if you do not know Drag Racing all that well, it is a way for the Driver to be recognized when seen in a magazine, news paper article, or on a website.

Enough about portraits.  Like I said earlier, I just did not want to sit around and shoot cars launching off of the starting line.  But the truth is, you have to do it to some degree in this sport.  So when I do this, I want the shots to be as spectacular as possible with a lot of fire………here is what I got.

The thing that I like about these shots is that I caught flames coming from both sides of the car.  I think the flames make the shot way more interesting if you can catch the “launch” with that going on.

Both of the above images were shot at night.  ISO 2500, Shutter Speed 1250, f4.  I used my 300mm lens with my 1.4 converter on it.

In the shot below of Ashley Force Hood, I was thinking along the lines of a commercial photograph.  I wanted the focus to be on the Castrol Logo on the hood, with room for text in the right hand part of the frame.  I also liked the fact that I caught the fire coming out from the opposite side of the car.

These next 2 shots are of Top Fuel Dragsters taking off.  I do love to shoot these things.  They just look so frekin cool…..different than anything else in Motorsports.  I love to get down the track and shoot them with long glass.  These two shots were amongst my favorite for the weekend.  I really like the shot of the Budweiser car.

In this next shot, I wanted to show the launch, but I left room for text in the shot.  I tilted the camera slightly…..I think that it worked out well, especially with the car pulling the wheels off of the ground.  I shot this at ISO 320, f2.8, shutter speed 1600.  I really like the “JEGS” billboard in the background.

I got board with the traditional launch shots, so I went hunting for a different angle.  Something different to set things apart.  Having shot round track racing for years, I am used to getting up on a tower and shooting over the whole event.  So my instincts took over and I looked for something to climb.  Here is what I came up with.  In this image, the car itself is not out of focus, but suffers from the heat waves coming off of the engine.  I think that it is way cool looking.

This next shot is going to draw a lot of flac to me.  I don’t care……I like it.  And yes, it was never ment to be in focus. I shot it at 25th of a second at f22.  Think of it what you will.

These next images are of some really “cool” moments that I caught. I was really lucky on some of them.

Have a Bud at zMax?  I caught this image from up top when they were rolling Brandon Bernstein out to make his run.  I was really lucky to catch it with no one else in the frame.  I really like this shot.

In the image below, Shawn Langdon’s Car and Crew were waiting in the shadows before his run.  They had just started the car, and you can see the exhaust coming from the headers.  I just really like it.

In this next image, Cory McClenathen’s crew stops for a moment of prayer before the start of the Finals on Sunday.  I shot this with my 300mm lens with my 1.4 converter on it.  It was shot at f5.6 at a shutter speed of 1000.

These next 3 images were shot from the top of the top of the tower.  They are just different angles of things that go on during a drag race.  Here again, I was trying to accomplish something different than just sitting on the starting line and shooting the launch.

I also really like shooting “burn-outs.”  In the next series of images, I wanted to do more than just capture the car with a whole lot of smoke coming from behind it.  I decided to shoot these at a slow shutter speed to try and do something different.  My favorite is the next image below.  It is of Bob Tasca III and the Quick Lane car.  I was really in the right place at the right time for this.  Sometimes it is better to be lucky than good.  I shot this at shutter speed 40, at f22.  I was using my 10mm~17mm fisheye lens.

In the next two images below, I left room for text by making the cars smaller in the frame.  I also did not place them in the middle……this leaves room for the creative guys to operate.  Both were shot at shutter speed 40 and f22.

These next two images I shot with Long Glass.  I wanted to get out in front of the car as much as possible to get the smoke behind it.  On the MACO Tools car below, I wanted the focus to be on the driver and the motor.  I was attempting the same thing in my opening shot of Brandon Bernstein in this Blog entry.  The only thing that would have made this shot better is if I would have caught the whole Sponsor Logo in the frame.  I was able to do that on the opening shot of the BUD Car burn-out.

In the shot below of Tony Schumacher, I used my 500mm f4 Lens.  The only thing that I really dislike about this image is the guy standing in the backgroung on the right hand side…….but what can you do?  It is what it is.

In this next shot……I got lucky again.  I shot this with my 10mm~17mm fisheye.  I actually was screwing with the camera when the burn-out started.  For some reason I put it on Shutter Priority real quick, held it up over my head, hit the autofocus and just let it rip.  This is what I got.  I like the way the word “relentless” appears in the frame, and I like the space between the car that the text. This leaves room for Ad Text in the image.

In this next shot, I used my 10mm~17mm Fisheye lens.  I wanted to catch the car right in the middle of the frame.  The whole point of the shot was to make the Logo on the side very prominent.  Here again, I was thinking “commercial” usage and sponsor visibility.

In these next 3 Images, I caught the Motors blowing during the competition.  In the past 2 years that there has been competition at zMax, there has never been a crash, but there has been a lot of engines grenade.  Here are 3 that I captured.  This first one I shot of Antron Brown’s car, I really can’t decide whether I like it or not.  I put a creative caption on it that kinda says it all.  I sent it in to US Presswire and they posted it, so I guess that it could not be all that bad.  I will let you decide.

This next Image is of Brandon Bernstein as he blew up on the starting line.  It was as if one side of the motor worked, and the other just pulled the grenade pin……….boom!

I shot this last image from the Top End. I like to go up and shoot at least 1 round from the Top.  I usually go up and do this early on Sunday.  If there is going to be a big crash, this is about the time that it will happen.  So I always want to be prepared.  Tony Schumacher won the race, but towards the end of the run, he blew the motor.  I thought that this was a very dramatic image.

In these next Images, I was using my Fisheye to try and capture a really “exaggerated” view of the Top Fuel car.  Something that had a really “large” feel to it.  I love to get these things from behind, it just feels big.

Now I have to say that Bruton Smith, his Son Marcus, and the whole SMI Organization are really masters when it comes to innovation and promotion.  This whole Speedway was built to run 4 cars at a time, and they did it this year!  They ran 4 Top Fuel Dragsters at once, and 4 Top Fuel Funny Cars at once.  These were not “points” passes, but they are taking about using this format next year in one of the Qualifying Rounds.  I have to say that it was really something to behold.  I really do not think that these images do the whole thing justice.  It was such an assault on the senses, you just can’t really make it work with a still shot.  But here is what I got.  I shot it from up top purely for the Editorial value of it.  I knew that these images were going to run everywhere, so I wanted to Document them as simply and clear as possible.  Here they are.

Well that ’s it.  I hope that you had as fun looking at these images as I did shooting them.  Like I said before, I do LOVE Drag Racing.  I want to thank the NHRA for thinking enough about zMax to come here twice in 2010.  If you have never been to a Drag Race, I encourage you to get out and go.  It is really a great time!

Thanks for looking.

Sam