Shooting Lowriders with Carlos Valencia

Shooting Lowriders with Carlos Valencia,

As a kid growing up in Austria during the 70’s almost all American cop shows seemed fascinating to me. I particularly remember begging my mother to stay up to watch reruns of “The Streets of San Francisco”. I was visually struck by the huge buildings, huge palm trees, and all of the gigantic cars. Everything was so different from what was so familiar to me in Europe. This was probably the time when I started to develop my love for Americana.

Of course, growing up in Austria and Germany I was very jealous that the legal age to drive a car was sixteen and it completely sucked having to wait two additional years just to be able to get a driver license.

Finally, the day arrived when I turned eighteen and I got my first car. Don’t get me wrong, it was exiting to drive this 82 VW Rabbit (slightly underpowered with 50 horses), however I kept dreaming about driving around in a big 73 Chevy Impala Coupe…

Intruder Car Blub Banner

My love for cars stuck with me until today and my childhood dreams came true after moving to the US. Oh yeah, I got to own and drive a 1974 Cadillac Eldorado Convertible…

Now, my love of cars has found its way into my love of photography.
Last week I was able to photograph the 1955 Chevy 210 Farewell Photo Shoot for a friend of mine… but it did not stop there…

I also had the opportunity tag along and shoot some Lowriders with Carlos Valencia at a gathering of the Intruders Car Club.

Carlos Valencia is a freelance designer/photographer, one of the owners of Studio 8 in downtown Phoenix. You can also see some of his work in Lowrider Magazine.

Here are a couple of frames of the photo shoot I was able to grab while looking over Carlos’ shoulders. Everything shot was made with a Sigma 10-20mm f/4-5.6 EX DC Lens, one light (Paul C Buff – AlienBees AB-1600 through a medium sized white Photoflex Umbrella powered by a Vagabond II) triggered by Pocketwizards.