Any Day is a Good Day to Photograph a 1957 Chevy Hood

I can't help it. Any time I see a 1957 Chevy Hardtop, Belair, or Nomad I have to photograph the hood rockets with a large aperture lens to blur out the background. I don't know why, I guess I just think they look cool. In the past I have typically taken these shots with my well used 100mm macro but I recently purchased a 40-year-old 70-200mm f2.8 minolta zoom lens that among its other excellent optical qualities, can render beautiful out-of-focus bokeh. I needed a longer large aperture lens to enable me to fill the frame when shooting hood ornaments and while it works well for this purpose, focus accuracy becomes critical as the depth of field is exceedingly narrow, typically 1/8 of an inch at 200mm. This photo was taken at the Riverside Show and Go car show.

This is Not Your Mothers Station Wagon

Kathy and I came across this amazing 1957 Chevy station wagon at the Majestics Car Club show in Norwalk in late March 2023. To say it stood apart from the other cars at this show would be a significant understatement. The paint job on this car was nothing short of spectacular. We both chatted with the owner who told me he orignally wanted to go with a solid blue color but the painter convinced him he would regret that decision and be back to have the car painted in the look it now wears so well. He decided to go for it and wow I'm so glad he did. This paint treatmentcovers the entire car including the roof so I had to hold my tripod over my head to capture the beautiful design on it and trigger off 9 shots, trying to hold the camera steady. 

1957 Chevy Hood Rocket

An extremely shallow depth of field captures one hood rocket while blurring the other into a hazy outline and a few bokeh dots.