KBPI 2010 Car Show at Bandimere

I got a pretty early (for me) phone call from one of my best friends asking if I was going to the KBPI car show which is put on by a local radio station.  One of the things I really wanted to do was to this year was go to more car shows so I said hell yes!!  I packed up lunch, put on the sun screen and grabbed my new camera and headed out the door.

We had to wait 20 minutes just to get off of the highway and into the parking lot which told me right away that this was going to be a HUGE car show, awesome!!!  I was no disappointed one bit and we had a ball.  I took over 400 photos and I will be back next year.

Please click on the collage to go to my Flickr gallery to see them all, here's a preview:

How to charm a couple of Cobras

This weekend I had the opportunity to do a photo shoot with 2 rare snakes.  I'm putting together a calendar for my local Mustang car club.  I was surprised when I got a submission from one of the members and it was 2 Shelby Cobras.  Unfortunately the pictures were too small to use.  I asked the person if he would have the time to have me come down and get some high resolution shots and he said yes!  I drove about an hour and a half to his location but it was all WELL worth it.





When I got there he opened up his "barn" to uncover 2 beauties just begging for attention.  Both of these cars are original Shelby Cobra's but not built in the 60's, they happen to be built around 2000 by Shelby Automobiles.  We took a few photos inside the barn before wheeling them out onto the pavement.  We found that moving them around was easy at times but harder to get them in position for shooting so the owner fired them up and WOW!!  Talk about waking the neighbors!!



I photographed them for a couple of hours and in a couple of positions and I think I got a few good shots!  We put the red race-ready cobra away and then I heard, " you ready to go for a ride?"  OH YEAH!  Getting in and out of a car that was meant for racing required a bit of finesse and those that know me know I have 0 of that stuff.  Once nestled it's a bit tight but that's the whole idea.  He started up the 427 Cubic inch engine and it roared through every bone in my body.  He needed to get the mail so off to town we went.  I was really surprised how tight the suspension felt and how nimble this engine on wheels felt!  Once we got on the road there's where the car really wanted to GO and go we did, there were several times we hit over 100mph in seconds!    Needless to say I have a permanent grin that will probably last a month!

[vimeo 2138604]

Spooky Night 4x4 Run

In October every year the Rising Sun Toyota Land Cruiser club sets out on a night run to celebrate Halloween.  This is my 2nd year going to this awesome get together and it was such a wonderful turnout!!  My buddy Mike asked me along with some other mutual friends in his newly transformed FJ80.  An unsuspecting grocery and kid carrier turned into 4-doors of Colorado trail pounding fun!





Anyway, we started with a cookout near Rollinsville, just an hour outside of Denver.  There were so many that showed up this year because of the Indian Summer we are having that the cook out turned into a feast!  There were chili's, hot dogs, brats, chips, cookies just about everything you can think of and more than enough food to feed an army!




As dark fell we began packing up the food and jumped in our 4wheeling rigs, this year there were around 20-25 vehicles. We had such a great time, no break downs or problems.  This year was much different in there was no snow.  The first run Mike and I did it was cold and is was very snowy. We all had a great time with a big group of wonderful people.  Hopefully we can do it again next year!!  You can see the rest of the photos here.

Muscle Car Prints

I got some prints today.  It's a bit of a bitter-sweet story.  I belong to a local Ford Mustang club here in Denver and one of it's members (Steve) posted saying that his father-inlaw, Bryan Hardy was in the hospital with something that was really serious.  He is an artist and loves muscle cars and paints them as a passion.  I clicked on the link and instantly fell in love with the quality work!!  Well, I bought a few prints and had the chance to meet Steve and his wife Lisa tonight to pick them up.

Unfortunately Bryan passed away this last Friday after being in the hospital for a couple of weeks, but Steve and Lisa told me how excited and happy it made him to know that people from the club liked his work and bought prints!  It made me feel so good that I could have given a dying man who I never met a moment of smiles and happiness.  I'm sure he will be greatly missed and the prints I bought will be framed and placed in the garage to be treasured!

http://www.classiccarportraits.com/index.asp?page=home.html&top=we

- Ian