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Writer's pictureWilliam Clarke

Establishing WJ Automotive Photography



I've two great passions- cars, and taking pictures. Thankfully the two combine seamlessly to leave me with one, enormous mega-passion - automotive photography.

As I've grown up, cars have played a massive part in my life. From a very early age, a Hot Wheels car collection established itself, and continued to grow well into my teens when I probably should have moved on from little kids toys. On long *any car journeys, I'd be gazing out the window scouting out supercars in the oncoming traffic, or naming the model of each car that passes by. Even now I can't help but have a second look when a nice one goes by- despite the fact I'm driving!

Photography's always been close at heart, too. From the moment that I had a device that would take pictures, I've been documenting memories of people, events and objects that are part of my life, knowing that one day it'll be nice to look back over it all. That being said, I can remember 'taking pictures' well before I had a camera- creating a letterbox style shape with my thumbs and forefingers to look through as a plane went over or a nice car went by; often making shutter sounds effects too. Sounds pretty sad, right? It was.

 

Taking pictures of cars started merely because I wanted photographic evidence of some of the nice cars that I saw- a visual reminder that yes, that actually happened, you really did see one of those. Today I still like to have a photo of the supercars that I see to document it, but how the photos look has gradually become very important to me. The first step was getting myself a DSLR camera. I'd always wanted one, but a cameraless carspotting day in London had confirmed the plan. Since then, countless visits to the capital have been made- searching the streets for supercars to photograph. As my 'carspotting' trips developed, I began to get more creative with the pictures that I was taking- incorporating the architecture around the car or exploring exciting new angles to view each car from.

I also go to supercar showrooms when I can; I find that this is often the best opportunity and environment to focus on the photography, because unlike in London, the cars aren't moving, and the lighting is usually pretty ideal. It's a great time to experiment with new techniques, learning new things about my camera all the time.

 

I established WJ Automotive Photography in 2015, running it alongside a logo design service- but as I continued to realise my passion for photography, the two services became one; and now I focus all my efforts on WJ Automotive Photography. The main reason why I wanted my photography to have a physical presence is because, in the future, I hope to be doing automotive photography as a job- getting paid for what I enjoy most! My decision to set up this physical presence meant that it was only right to set up a website. I loved designing the site, and I'm always making changes to try and improve and refine it. In the two years that I've had a WiX site it has changed it's style so many times because I'm constantly discovering new features and design styles that I like.

Still being at school (in my final year!), it's been impossible to focus all my time and effort on this, but nevertheless I have already started to get my name out there, doing shoots for multiple people. Admittedly not all of the shoots so far have been organised by me- I just happened to stumble across the Porsche GT4 Spyder shoot and cheekily asked the photographers running it if I could get some snaps myself!

As my passion for cars and photography continues to grow, I hope that one day I'll be travelling the world taking pictures of cars as my job- but for now I'm happy just chasing after them!

See you soon!

William

 

Did you enjoy my very first blog? I'd really appreciate any feedback that you might have, good or bad!

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