The new opening tiles for Andrew Jennings' Portfolio

I’m happy to announce that I recently completed a refresh of this humble website. I actually started showcasing my photography on the domain Andrew-Jennings.com back in the summer of 2005. The five year anniversary just passed, and I figured it was a good time to update it with a new look, some added content, and functionality.

The big news is new portfolios. As you can see from the image above, I have doubled the number of portfolios that are now showcased on the site from three to six, now accessed through a mouse-over menu on the top right. The automotive portion has been broken into four subgroups: Transportation, Motorsports, Drifting, and Auto Shows. To make each worth while, new images from some of my most recent work have also been added (some never before seen on the web!). The Entertainment and Travel portfolios are virtually unchanged, for now. I have plans for both of those in the future too, so keep an eye out for them to grow and evolve with my work.

The other news is a revamp to the blog. The old one had a more stand-alone feel. It was an adaptation of a pretty basic WordPress theme to tide me over as I got used to posting. The layout you see before you still uses the underpinnings of that original Plainscape theme, but has been heavily recoded to fit the overall brand feel that I want to convey. Mobile phone users should also be greeted to the new WPTouch app that I installed on here to make the experience simpler for small screens. There are still some things that I intend to clean up, such as the look of the menu on the right, but nothing that should impede your regularly scheduled programming.

If you’ve had a chance to familiarize yourself with the new site, I would be glad to hear any and all feedback in the comments here. For aspiring web designers, if you are interested in how I did it, let me know that too. If I get enough requests that may prompt me to write some detailed posts about my process, from conceptualizing, to coding and testing.

Thanks as always for visiting this site and viewing my work. Here’s to another five years of great fun and photos to come.

With all the work surrounding the recent Formula Drift event at Wall, NJ, I didn’t have time to post a ‘From the Archive’ yesterday as planned. So, a day belated, here is a shot from my time at Bates College in Lewiston, Maine. I haven’t shot many sunsets with the intention of using them in black and white. Generally, sunsets have such vibrant colors that it seems like a shame to hide them. On this occasion, I set out to capture one, but the angle of the sun and the light just wasn’t cooperating as planned. I didn’t want to give up outright on the photograph though, and gave this monochrome look a try. I like the way that it brought out the texture of the clouds surrounding the sun as it descended, a texture that was otherwise invisible in the original image.

As I gear up for this coming weekend’s Formula Drift event at Wall, NJ I decided to take a look back at the first year that I shot the event in 2007. Not a lot has changed in terms of the track, but the driver lineup sure has. Anyone in attendance that year will recall the exciting battle between Chris Cook and Samuel Hubinette. Samuel was trying his luck in a Dodge Charger that had been fitted with a V10 V8 engine, while Chris Cook was still getting used to the V8 V10 power of a Viper. What unfolded was a tandem fight too close to call after just one round, and shockingly in the second runs, Cook sped away from the crazy Swede, something that not many can accomplish. It was one of the best races I have ever seen in the sport, so who knows what might happen this year.

Happy Memorial Day everyone.

I normally don’t have a chance to break out my 85mm fixed lens during motorsports events. Things are constantly moving, and switching lenses can lose valuable time down in the paddock. I decided to go for it during the Formula Drift event at Road Atlanta and came away with a few interesting portraits while the drivers were doing their autograph session. Have a look after the jump and let me know what you think.

Continue reading Portraits from FD Atlanta »

As mentioned in my From the Archive post a few weeks ago, I was recently down in Braselton for this year’s Formula Drift event at Road Atlanta. My coverage is up now at Auto Import Craze, so be sure to head over there to see the full set. Below are a few of my favorite shots from the weekend, but I plan to put up others in the coming days, including a behind the lens how-to post. As McNally would say, more tk…

Astute readers will recognize the angle used for this shot of Samuel Hubinette and Darren McNamara. Did I nail it like I planned?

I must confess, I’m a fan of RX-7s, and Ryuji Miki’s FD is no exception. The new-age Hankook livery is also very cool.

Later on, Miki got the car a little bit off track, and managed to rip off parts of his front splitter and rear bumper/quarter panel. In the shot below his rear fender conveniently caught some air and was lifted up, exposing the full tire so I could see the whole thing being cooked. Makes me wish some of these guys ran without fenders on purpose.

Speaking of burning Hankook rubber, Robbie Nishida debuted the team’s new Nissan GT-R in Atlanta. You may be wondering how a car that is normally all about grip with a stunning AWD system can pull off that kind of drift. Under its skin resides the same engine and drivetrain that he ran last year in a 350Z. Hankook has plans to keep tuning the car’s original motor and play with the diff in the AWD setup to put the power down in the rear, but for now Robbie looked right at home in the longer bodied Nissan.

Flames erupting from tailpipes are not a common sight in drifting the way they are in other forms of motorsport. That hasn’t stopped Matt Waldin from letting his 350Z run a bit rich though.

Ken Gushi is in his third season running a Scion tC that has been converted to RWD. It’s also his third livery, and probably my personal favorite to date – though I wish they had kept the fierce red halo headlights from last year. He put on a strong showing in Atlanta, and I expect bigger things from him in New Jersey where he placed 4th in 2009.

Normally I don’t photograph drifting with this slow of a shutter. It exaggerates the motion, and in reality the cars are not moving this fast. Every now and then it can be fun to mix things up though, so I’m glad that I experimented when Matt Powers was doing his final qualifying run.

Aside from the angle in the second shot above, this a view from my favorite area at Road Atlanta to photograph the tandem battles. It positions the cars close together in the frame (and in reality), while keeping a good view of the fans in the background. Below, Tyler McQuarrie puts pressure on Forrest Wang’s G35.

Having said that, there is another location from which I’ve always wanted to get shots in Atlanta. Below is an example of what happens when I can be in two places at once. I set up another camera in harms way only a few feet from the screeching racers. Luckily, my camera lived to tell the tale. I’ll share how it was done from the technical side of things later on.

Tanner Foust and Matt Waldin go at it in the first round of 32. Engine trouble caused Matt to retire, and allow Tanner to move on to the top 16…

…where he would face his Scion brother Ken Gushi. Gushi edged out the win in that round, so Tanner will have to wait another year before he challenge for a podium in Atlanta.

I won’t go through what happened in the entire main event’s battles (that’s what the Auto Import Craze coverage is for), but suffice to say that Dai Yoshihara in the Falken S13 was on a roll. In the top 8, he had contact with Darren McNamara’s Saturn Sky, and lost his whole rear bumper. This meant that the trunk and rear wing could no longer be supported, so his car was converted to something that more closely resembled an El Camino. The lack of rear downforce didn’t seem to make a different though as he continued to light up the tires nicely.

I enjoy photographing the podium for each race. I like the emotion that the drivers have built up and how they let it all out ceremoniously with the champagne spray. I wanted to do something different this time, so I went around to the side instead of straight on to photograph the uncorking. Unfortunately JR turned away from me, so I only got his back, but I still like the way the lights caught all of the liquid in mid-air as he and Forsberg doused the winner.

That’s all for now. I hope you enjoyed this set. Be sure to leave some comments after the fold to let me know what you think of them.

During my short time residing in sunny California, I was privileged enough to have a 350Z to drive for a weekend. The car was a fairly new 2006 model, with all the options one could ask for – including the navigation system. And, being new to the LA area, I decided to ask some friends where the good driving roads were. A few carefully placed taps on the navigation and I found myself in the spaghetti-like strings of tarmac that make up the hills just North of Pacific Coast highway. Somewhere between Stunt, Las Virgenes, and Mulholland I pulled off to admire the scenery, or more the billows of fog that were piping their way over the sides of the cliffs. It was there that I found the unique view for the shot above, and another that astute readers will recognize from my automotive portfolio. The shot was done originally in color as all of my work is, but the mood just seemed to work better in this monotone. It feels very still, with only the large highlight by the top of the headlamp drawing your eye closer, making you remember that this is a photograph of a car, and not a landscape. A car that was quite a lot of fun to stomp on through what are still the best curves I’ve ever experienced.

Oh, and a quick P.S. for this week. Make sure you tune into tonight’s season finale of House on Fox (preferably in HD). The whole episode was shot using a Canon 5D Mark II. Being a Canon user myself, I’ll be interested to see what they have been able to accomplish with this next step forward for the medium.

From the archive is a series that I plan to run every week on Mondays from here on out. It will help to fill the blog when there is some down time, and also allow me to reflect on past photos or events. I thought I would start things off with a short reflection on Formula Drift at Road Atlanta as I gear up for the upcoming 2010 event this weekend. Unlike ALMS style racing, you have to pick your vantage points wisely when it comes to drifting. If you are at the wrong spot, you’ll catch the car as it transitions, wheels facing forwards instead of slanted at full lock the way they are above. You want to look for the areas that give the car time to build speed, and with it a nice smoke trail. Drifting is all about style, and the courses are setup to allow the fans a clear view of each lap. As a photographer, we have to put ourselves as close as we can, exaggerating a still image into something that is mobile the way spectators and youtubers alike will relate.

The above, and below shots were taken at the 2007 FD event. The angle of Tanner Foust’s now retired 350Z car carried on entry into the horseshoe was always a sight to behold. To capture it like this took the longest focal length I had at 280mm (the EF 70-200mm f2.8L lens with 1.4x extender), and maybe a slight crop for good measure. The idea is to compress the car’s overall length, getting it pointing head on to really see how the front wheels are pointing. It’s an angle that is typical of the Long Beach Formula Drift event as the cars launch into the sweeping left-hander past the crowd. With any luck, and a little recollection of where I stood to take this, I should be able to edge out a few more on Friday.

The second shot below is one of my other favorite areas of Road Atlanta to photograph that the general public is not allowed to see. This is the staging area at the top of the hill which leads down to turn 10, where cars start and end each run. Here you can see Ken Gushi’s old Ford Mustang lining up for one of the last practice runs for the evening. This area is different from many of the other tracks on the calendar because of its seclusion. At Wall Speedway in NJ, fans can see the cars just to the left behind a barrier as they change tires or the driver grabs a drink of water before the battle. In Atlanta it’s private, a restricted space that breeds both excitement and tension. The only sounds are the rumblings of exhausts, and the periodic burn outs the cars do to break in a set of rubber.

Stay tuned for more from the track this weekend, and keep your feeds locked in here for future ramblings in the archive series.