I recently shot 3 classic motorcycles Hagerty’s Insurance. A Honda CBX, it had 6 cylinders, a Velocette, and 1971 Yamaha. These were living in a classic bike museum and they were beautiful. Simply Spotless. I like bikes, I just don’t want to ride one, but this is a whole nother story. That Honda sounded like an F1 car, I couldn’t believe how compact and refined and tight that motor was, so reliable, so perfect. It was a big bike though, not something to toss around. It was the Velocette that caught my eye, A compact efficent classic look, it looked like it was moving just sitting still, this was probably my favorite out of the three. Vintage stuff always catches my heart. So of course I awoke to rain. Theres nothing like being a photographer with only one day to shoot a story and seeing rain. You awake at 6am, you peek out from behind the curtains, its grey, its wet, you can see the raindrops hitting the puddles, well we said we’d meet at 9am at the museum…and its still wet at 9, but theres hope, the weatherman says a small window of sunshine is expected from 10-2. YES!!  I don’t want to tell you what time I got my first shot off, but it was sunny, it was sunny all day, the rain left and stayed gone. We did car to bike moving photography, pan blurs, and those static beauty shots and tons of details. I must admit, its alot faster shooting the dashboard of a bike than a car interior. We worked very hard and fast, am I happy? oh yeah!

Ok…We have the new BMW750iL, The Audi A8L and Mercedes S550. We have downtown Los Angeles as our playground. What to do? We talked in the office about shooting in the same areas as the movie Heat was shot in, hence the name  ”The Getaway”. I got permits throught the city, a whole downtown grid, booked a couple officers to handle traffic and we were good to go. I decided that the downtown photography should be done on the weekend due to weekday traffic in the city. As I thought about the shoot shot by shot I realized that I must storyboard every shot. We will be a crew of 1 shooting vehicle, 3 picture cars, 2 motorcycle cops. I went downtown, scouted and boarded and photographed every shot, paid very close attention to the “one way” streets and created the plan. We met at 8am by lower Grand. And started with Car to Car. We have 3 cars so we started with all 3 in formation from Fig to Temple to Hope to 5th, changing out the lead car on each lap, it looked great thru lens, good energy, a sense of speed, nice postioning, I shot from inside the Audi looking out, driver POV, out the sunroof, out the back window, all different ways to see the chase, and fortunately not much traffic so things went quick. It’s always fun shooting with cars on city streets, make for an action movie kinda day. Shooting pan blurs from Grand to 5th with all 3 cars in turn, and the Tunnel shot used for the opener. The police held traffic for a moment, I only had 3 passes to get it, that means getting all three cars in formation, on their moving marks, the strobes rigged and ready to go, the shot only works at the tunnel mouth, the camera buffers, the strobes recycle, I got it though. I really like this kind of shooting. We are moving throughout the day. You dont have time to get tired, and capturing movement thru the lens is exciting. The beauty shots went great too, my “free is good” location, it’s funny anywhere you shoot has a quirk, like my free location, great place but surface was dirt, and this dirt was dusty, the type that sticks to the tires and turns them white, sticks to the paint like static, so you spend more time wiping the cars off than shooting them. Where I shot the Maserati was a sulphur facility, yes, everything had to be washed twice before the smell went away, and the list goes on, funny how that works, but the shot is always worth it.

I have been driving all over Los Angeles. No, really, all over searching for good locations. If I were just shooting people that would be easier, but when you’re shooting cars there are only so many places you can put them or get them too. I found an amazing quarry overlooking downtown LA. wow, it was perfect. It had those huge bulldozers, giant mounds of rubble, contraptions to move the stuff, and an open workshop to fix the broken machines. Now I’m only doing static beauty shots, 3 cars, singles, interiors and details, so four hours is all I’ll need. I drive to their main offices, I always like to meet in person the one responsible, as well as they get to meet me instead of just another “can I have” phone call. The offices were near Montecito Heights, I had never been that far east, and it was surreal, rolling hills dry with golden grass and pasty skies. Well as we all know the best laid plans…I entered, we spoke, I offered them my own services for a day to come back and photograph their facility, I gave them free issues, and business cards. I got the phone call on the machine when I got back in…$2500 bucks. 4 hours for $2500!!! They gotta be crazy, CBS shot there not to long ago, they must of paved their palms with gold. Not putting all my eggs in one basket I’ve switched to Plan B, Free is good. I’ve found a cool place thats just perfect, its quiet, no one to bother, and looks like the perfect hideout. So 4 hours in and out…I hope, and there’s always Plan C….

Shooting the GTS for Motor Trend

The weatherman called for rain. 90% chance, thunderstorms possible, starting tonight and getting heavier tomorrow. This is what I read over and over again before falling asleep. There’s nothing like shooting in the rain…I’m being sarcastic. Everything gets wet and heavy, the strobes can fail, and the camera itself is in danger. Even though the rain looks awfully darn cool…..So I planned ahead with lots of plastic and umbrellas. As fate would have it there was no rain, not at night nor during the shoot, it blew right over, we did get some pretty amazing clouds. I shot at a Sulphur factory, giant stinky mounds of yellow sulphur. I must say it looked really cool. It was a small location and I spent extra time doing beauty shots, did 2 rig mounts as well, car to car, interiors, details and so on. The car to car looked tremendous, there were giant shipping containers parked next to the entry road and I took full advantage of them. I wanted this feeling of a giant shipping boss heading down to the docks in his Maserati, like Enzo would of done, the cars are made to be driven and commanded on the road, none of this wimpy car might get dirty stuff. The road was dusty and the sun was diving back and forth behind the clouds, big tanker trucks shared the road as we shot. It was cool!! One thing that struck me as we shot was the motor. Everytime we started the car, and we started it with a key, no buttons or wierd key fob’s, just a good old fashioned key, as you twist the key the motor erupts with a race car like growl or should I say “snarl” that sends goose bumps of fun. I think if I had one of these my neighbors would eventually get pretty upset with me starting it 3 or 4 times just to hear it. A long time ago I had an MGB with weber carbs, velocity stacks and straight exhaust. I lived in Westwood while working on movie projects, in the mornings the webers were grumpy until warm and that first key twist always made me smile….until the elderly couple with their windows close informed me that they would prefer if I could start my car somewhere else…I guess they weren’t car lovers at 6am. Thats ok, I’ve moved since then, but my Alfa is just as noisy!! Now, would I own a Maserati? Sure, the details are beautiful and that motor, just like the 8c…why not?

Hanging at the shop is a male ritual. Its a thing we just do. Of course this was the third time the head gasket blew. It wasn’t the head as suspected but the block, and while we had the motor apart we really should change the rings since three are broken and how bout some new pistons, and that lower timing chain is really loose, and that motor mount..and lets not forget the girl friend who keeps complaining how loud it is, so, okay, it only has the resonator, and it growls really loud, and while the cars in the air we should put a rear muffler on…. And for some reason I like all this. Now I didn’t just watch, I worked. I’ve got stains on my jeans, dirt under my nails. I smell like gasoline. Benny turned the key and it started. First try, it sat there and ran for 30 minutes, it got all warm and comfortable. Then it sat, cooled and I took it around the block, don’t go over 3000, don’t go over 3000, I wanted to, but we had just spent 2 days working on this thing and I’m not gonna break it. Now over the years I noticed how our relationships always include the shop. This is Benny’s shop. This is the best Alfa shop in LA. For 17 years I’ve been coming here. My Dad’s been here. He was visiting from Atlanta and “asked’ to go there. Where do our girlfriends pick us up from. 3 past girlfriends still ask “How’s Benny?” So I tell my current love she has to meet Benny, it’s just right, and she answers “What for? I don’t drive an Alfa”.

My friend Eloy and I took our Alfa’s down to Palm Springs for the Desert Concours car show. Eloy’s Alfa is a beautiful 1991 in a rich wine red color. He’s modified it a little, like the chassis stiffener, mini lites, and a free flow exhaust, and there’s my little silver model. We chased each other the whole way there. We cruised between 80-100. It felt great to let the cars stretch on the open road. Now what we discovered was that….my car is faster than Eloy’s. I’m not bragging or anything but he has the motronic system with high compression pistons putting out about 135 horsepower. He said he was struggling to keep up with me. I’ve recently been running mild race cams which start to come on at 4500 rpms, then at 5000 they just explode with power, at 100 mph the front end lifts and the cars just starts pulling, it’s such a great feeling with a little car that’s 30 years old.
The show was Sunday morning, we got there around 8:30am. What really made this fun was the ability to park on the golf course with all the other cars. Alfa was the featured marque and there must of been 50 Alfa’s. We all lined up with our shiny cars in all their glory. Sort of that proud parent feeling.
TZ’s, GTA’s, GTV’s, Berlina’s, you name it, it was there.
Aside from all the Alfa’s there was quite a collection showing. Dan Gurney’s race cars, a very early Lancia from 1926, A pair of Honda’s first sports cars from 1969. The usual 300sl’s, Aston Martins, and yes Ferrari’s too. Chad McQueen was there judging, and he had his Dad’s 911s.
I gotta tell yah, a great crowd, very low key and wonderful hospitality, will I be going next year? Absolutely!

I have sooo many video’s from photo shoots and TV commercials I wanted to put them in a group for everyone to enjoy. So if you like them let me know!!

ZR1 at GM’s Milford Proving grounds the Movie

We tested all the ways you can legally speed in a Corvette

 Land Rockets the Movie

So I drive a 30 year old Alfa Spider, I’ve put all the go fast bits on it, but its got nothing on the 8c. Imagine my excitement when the phone rang, ” Hi Evan, Would you like to shoot the new Alfa?” This is like spending all day with your favorite naked supermodel. Yes it might be a little childish, but so what? We’re boys, and these are cars, thats the way it’s supposed to be. We shot at the El Toro air base, deserted hangers, long, long runways and lots of sunlight. The car presented in a beautiful red, with probably the most gorgeous seats I’ve seen in a long time, reminiscent of the early Ferrari’s, with leather weave wrapped over carbon fiber, in fact the whole car is carbon fiber, every body panel it’s got. This thing is fast, light and very rigid. Full paddle shift, there’s not even a gear stick or lever, and the purrr, more like a snarl, mash on the gas and the beast just leaps through the gears surging with acceleration, I looked down at the speedo and it was already hitting 100mph, of course all I could hear was the lion’s roar….

I started shooting the interior, then onto some testing, acceleration and braking, 0-60 about 4.3 seconds, 12.7 qtr mile I think…and then off to the figure 8 to watch the car slide around. next up was the hanger shot. I put the car inside the hanger, slid the doors closed so you could just see the car, and opened the rear hanger doors to give separation and then lit the car with 4 well placed strobes, did it for both the front 3/4 and rear 3/4. I gotta say we nailed it. I placed the exposure where I thought it should be and shot a test frame…it was spot on. All I did was adjust 1 strobe for a little more light on the nose, perfection. We got that shot off in about 35 minutes, not bad at all. Next was exterior details of the car, a rig mount or two, and then some great car to car on the runways, we tried it faster this time, I brought the car off our bumper by about 3 feet, got up to about 70mph, there was a lot of wind and even more dust, it was worth it though, very powerful stuff. Now we were in a little crunch, I was sharing the car with the video dept. They wanted a couple shots and i had a few more static beauty’s to get, we’re all friends though, and there’s never a problem. And in the final moments of the day we did a few donughts, look at all that smoke!! This car snaked around itself like a monster in heat, wow! Now thats fun. Look for the images in Motor Trend, and I’ll post some soon enough on my website to : www.evankleinfilms.com

It was red, and it was fast. I gotta tell yah, Aston Martin is doing a great job in their design department. From most every angle the Aston looks exciting. We took it down to the harbor and played all day. This thing was putting out 420 hp for about 140,000 thousand. It goes. Now, the only thing I have to say…. quality. We grew up in an era of Ferrari’s and Jaguar E types. When you climbed into the cockpit you knew it. All those gauges, it felt as though you and your car were one. They way it wrapped around you, the rumble you could feel through the seat of your pants, it inspired windy roads. This Aston, seems a little pre fab in the cockpit, the center console seems to be lifted from a Volvo… or is thats Ford input? As I reached down for the hood release, the hood release that reveals the 420 hp, well it felt cheap and flimsy, it showed me that Aston just keeps it on the surface, quality should follow through out, in an effort to save money they always hide the things they don’t think we see, but all these little things add up up. It is red though, and it is fast…so just tell me this, how much is this thing going to cost me when it breaks?

So we’ve gathered up some of the most powerful cars on the road and took them to Chrysler’s test track in Arizona. This is a huge 5 mile oval that allows for top speed testing. So what’d we think? Well the ZR1 is a monster, its low and fast, real fast, and that supercharger!, The ZR1 roars, you know when you go to an air show and those jets fly by and the ground shakes and your ears rumble, this is the ZR1. Its a racing workhorse, its thunderous as you’re passed at speed. You look at the cost of the other cars and then compare to what GM did, the bureaucracy of getting things made or is that approved at a company like GM is near impossible, but they did it. I’ve met these guys, I’ve traveled with these guys, and the engineer’s and designers are true enthusiast, they have had to color inside the lines and on a budget, my hats off to them. Now the 599, yeah another high priced Ferrari, is it nice? yeah it’s nice, full attention to detail, fit and finish, but the nose…it just still looks a little to bug eye sprite to me, Ferrari’s don’t need smiley faces, what happened to the shark nose presence of the 60-70’s. Did the car perform? It did. Was it stable? One of the most stable, and fast? yes, over 200mph, did it shred a tire at speed? it did, it did. Now I must say the Ferrari’s aerodynamics are quite impressive for such a bland shape, the diffuser on the bottom side of the car is so efficient a rear spoiler is not needed, our test driver said that he was doing laps with only one hand on the wheel, the car drove itself. Now that can’t be said for the Porsche, its short wheel base made it twitchy, but it sure looked good. I really liked the seating position, it felt as though I was seated for business, that can’t be said for the other cars, the other cars felt quite large and hard to see out of, and hard to see the corners of the car, I wouldn’t want to go flinging the Ferrari down a country lane…but the Porsche I wouldn’t mind giving it a try. The GTR… people seem to like this car, I have no idea why, its looks like an old Supra, and then you sit in it, yawn, the specs show it’s fast and handles but sooo what, it’s boring, but thats just one guys opinion. Give me the GT2 for everyday driving, the ZR1 for that cross country trip, and if I want to impress the girls at the nite club I’ll take the Ferrari, they probably won’t know what it is…but at least its not a GTR!!