How to sell photography to car dealerships
Car Dealership Photography | What does a Car Dealership Photographer do? Dealership Inventory Photo
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hello everyone my name is joe lopez and
this is the story of my job as a car
dealership photographer
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i work at a car dealership here in
ventura california to be more specific i
work at an accurate dealership
i photograph new and used vehicles
i will say this though this is not a
glamorous job but it is a fun job in the
sense that
i almost never get told what to do and
as long as i do my job
no one ever bothers me that's one of the
best parts about this job
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i also get to drive a lot of cool cars i
get to drive a lot of acuras
both new and used i get to drive a lot
of used cars ford chevrolet's
lexus mercedes bmws things of that
nature
i'm not a huge car person myself i drive
a truck nonetheless it is fun to drive
all these cars
on a regular basis
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the question is what does a car
dealership photographer do
take pictures of cars of course
but there's more to it than just that
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obviously
all right so every morning or every day
when i come in i clock in
and then i get on the dealerships
inventory website and i see which cars
need photographs
and i write down the stock numbers of
all the cars that need photos so i would
write down the stock numbers of the new
cars and use cards donated photos
as soon as i had the two separate lists
one new one was used i would go to the
keyboard and i would get the keys to the
cars that needed to be photographed
this is what you do when you're trying
to find a car amongst a huge lot of cars
you take the key
you take the key you press the alarm
button and
voila find it just like that all right
here we go
turning it off so if the car needed to
be washed before being photographed i
would watch it really quick
it was almost always the case with new
cars because i've been sitting on the
lot for a while
before i can get to them as soon as the
car was ready to go i will take you to
this golf course parking lot and i will
begin the process of photographing the
vehicle
the first thing i would do is get out
and take a picture of the stock number
on the windshield
and i always ensure that the iso is set
at the lowest setting we have the iso
set at 100.
then i will get the driver's side three
quarter shot a front shot
a passenger side three quarter shot side
shot number one side shot number two
rear three quarter shot number one
straight rear shot rear three quarter
shot number two
then i will continue with the driver's
side door
then the rear driver's side door
includes an suv or minivan i would open
the rear door and photograph the rear
compartment of the vehicle
if it had a third row seat i would take
a picture with the seat up then i would
stow the seat and i would take a picture
with their rear seats so down and then i
would take a picture with the second row
up and then the second row stowed away
i we'll go around to the right rear
passenger side
open the rear passenger door and put the
heats up again
now photograph the rear seat and then
we'll move to the front we'll open the
door
i'll get a shot of the passenger seat
make sure it's properly exposed
close the front door get in the back
seat
if there are any controls on the rear
part of the center console
always always try to get it
i close the door close the sunroof oh
this is the part where the alignment of
the front seats comes into play because
you want
most of the seats to be as level as
possible
in the front there that way it doesn't
look messy
in the photos all right that looks
pretty good
make sure the steering wheel is leveled
out as well
the way i do it is i simply put the
camera at the highest that i possibly
can
and i lower the iso once again to the
lowest possible exposure where
everything is properly exposed
looks pretty good and i try my best to
use the grid lines
as guidelines to make sure where the
camera is evenly
leveled out and do a close-up of the
center console once again
using the grid lines to make sure the
camera is properly leveled out
and then i move behind the driver's seat
and i stick the camera in the front of
the headrest try to get pov shots so
that whoever's seeing these photos
more or less gets a feel for what they
would be like they'd be sitting in this
front seat
and i try to get all of the controls in
the front from this angle as well
and then i get another zoomed in shot of
the steering wheel and the center
console
once again with most of the controls in
the shot
all right i take all my camera back put
it back in the front seat
getting out of the vehicle go around to
the front of the vehicle
lock the doors and if the vehicle has a
map i make sure to
navigate the menu now that we have the
map hold up zoom in all the way we're
gonna photograph it
i never usually have an issue with
reflections except for these particular
vehicles and then put it back in park
then i photograph the steering wheel
with my legs out of the shop probably
and i try to do it as evenly as possible
then i get another photograph of the
dash
and i open the door i get a photograph
of these controls here on the left side
of the vehicle
up the iso however needed open the hood
take a picture of the door panel and
then
go around to the hood open it up
take a picture of the interior of the
hood and that's it
call it a day
pretty fast car i'll give you that okay
so at the end of the day
i would go back to the dealership and i
would upload the pictures to the website
i wouldn't edit them i wouldn't do
anything to them straight from the
memory card
to the computer and that was it nothing
to it
for the camera i use a canon 70d i use
three lenses when i'm photographing the
vehicles
for the exterior shots of the vehicle i
use a canon efs 18 to 55 millimeter zoom
lens when i photograph the exterior of
the vehicle
the lens is zoomed all the way in for
the interior of the vehicle i use a
canon efs
10 to 18 millimeter lens zoomed all the
way out it's a wide angle lens
and for close-up shots of the interior
controls i use a canon efs
24 millimeter macro lens and i honestly
have
zero complaints about this particular
setup
sometimes not all the times vehicles
needed to be jump-started if a vehicle
has been sitting on the lot for a while
and no one's touched it sometimes the
battery will die
once you jump start it it'll be fine
again but luckily for me at the
dealership they had several jump
starters nothing would let me use
but i can take it out to the vehicle
jump start the car and leave it running
for a bit
the battery died or the battery is dead
on the honda pilot
so you can to get the jumper box to be
able to jump it
the hood is already open on this vehicle
i opened it as soon as i found out that
the battery was dead
so i wouldn't have to deal with it when
i came back and put my head inside real
quick
that was it so once you jump a vehicle
one thing you want to do
is leave it on for a while keep it
running
always make sure you're wearing glasses
or some sort of safety goggles
because sometimes sparks will fly out at
you or will jump out
and you don't want those sparks standing
in your eyeballs because that would not
be a fun time
all right looked up ready to go
keys this shouldn't be the reason why it
won't start
just like that good to go
in the meantime we're gonna keep the
jump box with us just in case
it does decide to die on us while we're
out there again
you got to deal with these things from
time to time as a car photographer
uh well i used to be a quarterback in
texas i used to deal with that all the
time
batteries tend to die a lot when or tend
to run out of juice or whatever
a lot when they're just sitting on a lot
or they have a light that stuff turned
on somewhere
all right we're looking for three used
cars
the keys are not in the keyboard so
they're coming back here to check and
see if they're getting cleaned
so i can wash them real quick this is
alonzo this is alonzo
hello mr alonso what's up guys i'm
shooting a video today
awesome dude well huh the end of life
with your well a day in the life of a
carpenter from leadership
awesome dude all right here's the deal
we're going to get this car off the curb
so i can go photograph it but
i either take all of these cars off and
get out of this way or
i'm just straight off the curve it's not
that part of a drop
steven here steven here is going to take
the risk
you got this sir
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just seriously just like walking
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keep going really really slowly
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there you go you're on the very edge
keep it coming you're good
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sexy
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oh
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me
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one
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so i worked the jar for about three
years roughly
it was a really good job it was a very
good learning experience and by far
one of the funnest jobs i ever had but
it was time to move on
a
chat
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i find it hard
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uh
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my
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that sounded pretty good cut