It's funny how life works sometimes. I've seen Dalton and Rachel's Mustangs at car shows aplenty in the past, but they were like most of the other cars in the show: amazing machines, but faceless and without an owner. I could admire and tag photos on Instagram, but I wouldn't have a face-to-face conversation with the owner.
Fast forward to the spring 2016 semester at ASU. One of my friends posts on her Snap story that she's riding in a Mustang; "Oh, ok" I thought and was about to quickly go through the story, until something caught my eye: what looked like an air tank in where the backseat should have been. Sure enough, the next photo was a red Mustang GT, the same Mustang GT I kept seeing at car shows. And that is how I met Dalton and got to know about the man behind the machine. Being a photographer himself as well and seeing my work, both Dalton and I vowed to set up a photoshoot. One day, at least, since we were both engineering students, meaning time was not abundant.
Fast forward again to last weekend, and after enduring our classes, Dalton and I finally got a plan together to take photos. With a date made and a location and time set, it was going to finally happen. Then, Dalton let me know that his friend, Rachel, would also like photos. Turns out she's the owner of the now-Nardo Grey (or as she calls it, Nardo Gay) bagged Mustang that I would also see at car shows. And, I had also gotten to talk to her before at a Pavilions Meet, shortly before the police came to kick us out. My friend volunteered to drive my car so I could take rollers, and we were all set.
We took the rolling shots on the way to the static photoshoot location. In hindsight, we realized we should have dedicated the entire evening to either rolling shots or static shots due to lighting, but alas, it is what it is. The rolling shots were at the perfect time of day, with the perfect amount of reflections and sun for tasteful lens flares and golden highlights. The trip though was short, only around half a dozen miles, and the opportunities to take photos were further reduced by the need to merge behind them to get into exit lanes. Our route was down the State Route 51 from Bethany Home Rd, down to the I-10 West until we exited at 7th Ave. Looking at a map, you can see that it's not the longest of trips. Still though, 3/4ths of my body was out the window of my car, much to probably the shock and confusion of the evening traffic behind us (which, funny enough, didn't dare try to pass any of us), and I got these shots.
Stay tuned for the static shots, as well as more information and detail about the cars!
