Car picture tips

pic 2: It's called flare. The flare from the right might be eliminated with a lens shade since it's out of the pic frame.
"Night" shots of cars don't come out very well. Best to have a broad light source like a cloudless sky that will reflect in the body & bring out the contour of the metal.
Experiment & keep at it.

thanx for the tips

I have a '37 Bentley and a '61 MGA all restored. Try wetting down the cars, at least where they are setting and turn on the headlights. It has a nice effect.

Don in Atlanta

Get close and go angled. Car shots are never straight on and you hardly ever see the whole car. That said, of course there is no "right" way to do anything with a camera...except maybe the right way to put the lens on...but even then...do you turn the camera or the lens?

Wide angles are cool too...but if you have a DSLR with a big crop factor that can be expensive...I'd love to get a really wide angle lens...but right now I only have a 28mm which translates to 44ish on my DSLR. But still, if you get really close it still gives a little distortion.

And always ask the car owners if you can take some engine shots and stuff like that...people who put that kind of money into cars love to talk about them and show them off...especially if you offer to e-mail them some pics of their ride

Sometimes you just get lucky...I attached a pic of a Mustang that I took in downtown San Antonio Texas. I was lying down on the ground with my face to the curb to get the shot of the rims...it was about 2am and I probably looked drunk or something because someone walked right infront of me right when I took the shot.

The result? I got lucky and got a cool shot of a rim with ghost legs...

Just experiment.