Shooting a Collection

Hey guys, Just thought I'd consult a couple of the pros here. In two weeks I'm going down to be shooting a very large private collection in Florida. I've seen it before about 4 years ago and I recall it being dimly light, with little natural light. My only real question is could you all share any concepts, tips, or ideas I could use while I'm there?

Btw, this collection includes a couple of GT40s, 917s, Hispano Suizas, Bugattis, I recall a 512 M and a whole bunch of other really interesting cars.

Obviously I'll post what I get here if it all goes as planned.

All I would say if you don't have any artificial lighting of your own, get a tripod and mess with the exposure. Not that I'm an expert.

Tripod is probably a good idea regardless, though a diffused or bounced flash might work well if you want to experiement with some angles and stuff that might not allow you to use a tripod....off-camera flash may offer some interesting effect as well...

Is it the Collier collection?

If you have an on camera mount-flash use that but try to bounce it (Do NOT use the on-camera standard pop-up flash). If the ceiling is too high to bounce off of (And this next part will sound silly but it works wonders trust me) use a paper pie plate rubberbanded to the flash with the flash pointing directly up. This allows you to use the plate as a reflector without it being too contrasty.

[QUOTE=henk4;871567]Is it the Collier collection?[/QUOTE]

It is. Family Friends.

[QUOTE=ScionDriver]If you have an on camera mount-flash use that but try to bounce it (Do NOT use the on-camera standard pop-up flash). If the ceiling is too high to bounce off of (And this next part will sound silly but it works wonders trust me) use a paper pie plate rubberbanded to the flash with the flash pointing directly up. This allows you to use the plate as a reflector without it being too contrasty.[/QUOTE]

Okay, I'll give it a try. I don't have an external flash for either my D60 or the D90 I might use.

[QUOTE=Soloracer;871587]It is. Family Friends.

[/QUOTE]
Great, we have already several of their cars featured on the main page. (Scarab, Gran Sport, Maserati 8C etc)

Don't use a flash on black cars..

My tips, tripod definately. Low light will reduce the chance of decent hand held shots. Flash would be nice although if you have a tripod you can just take longer exposures so no big deal. I find with some cars using a polarizing filter can help, it just clears some of the refelctions but this doesnt work with all cars.

This may sound really elementary but it can sometimes be overlooked, check the surrounding scenery and move your feet to get the best picture you'll have time so you dont have to shoot the first angle you see, and if you do any full car shots shoot wide and get the whole car in don't try to squeeze it to fill the frame and end up missing the bumpers or wing mirrors etc.

I would also recommend shooting in RAW if you dont already, sometimes I take a RAW and several jpegs for each shot I setup just to ensure that I get all the details and cover all the bases so to speak.

Good stuff guys. There's about a 50 percent chance I'll shoot it so I'm rather eager but what ever the case, I'll post the pictures of my trip.