Lexus IS Photoshoot – Two Generations

You guys must be pretty happy to see some content other than my car LOL.

I’m pretty happy with how this set turned out – and yes, you guessed it – still playing around with edits! In hindsight, I’m glad that JC asked me to come out for this shoot. I’m not sure what it was but I was feeling kinda off all day and just super drained on energy as the day dragged on. I was pretty close to not going but Diana asked me “are you going to finish Final Fantasy 7 then?” and anyone who knows me knows that I’m dreading finishing the game. I’ve really been milking it and taking my time trying to explore every crevice and corner to make sure I’m not missing anything and doing every single mini-mission that I can. So once she hit me with that, I was like “alright, I’ll go shoot then”. LOL

Rich and JC were already shooting for about an hour before I got there so I was just third-wheeling at this point… Got some shots at the location they were at and then we just kinda roamed. It was a pretty bad night for having security and police all over the place. I suspect that it’s because us car guys are out and about and just “loitering” if you wanna call it that. I won’t deny that it’s what we’re doing and I can only speak for myself – but I’m typically super conscientious about what I’m doing and courteous to anyone around. I’m not looking to do hoodrat things with my hoodrat friends!

My message to anybody going out to take pics is to please do the same! To anyone other than yourself, people’s first judgement of us/you is that we’re doing something that we shouldn’t be doing and it’s totally fair to think that. We’ve parked our cars where they shouldn’t be parked and we’re just standing around doing who knows what. It’s important not to do anything that might get you in trouble – not because I care if you get in trouble, but because you’ll essentially ruin it for the rest of us. There’s been plenty of times where a cop or security has come through, asked us what we were doing and we politely told them that we were just taking some quick pictures and we’d be on our way. I’d say 80% of the time, they were cool with it and they either went on their way or just watched from a distance. Of course, the other 20% of the time – they just had rules to follow and we just couldn’t stay and so we’d just thank them and be on our way quietly.

The last thing you want to do for us collectively is to leave a bitter taste in people’s mouths – that’s all I’m saying. Be kind, be polite and be quiet.

With all that said, let’s hop into pics. This would be the first official time that I’ve shot JC’s car… Last year was kind of a wash for us because we had just both bought the new cars and we were slowly piling on the parts but it was never at the point where we were ready for pics, I guess. Loving the new fronts of the IS and I know lots of people disagree with the spindle grill, but I personally love it.

Inside – some familiar Junction Produce in pink… As I was editing these pics, I messaged him to confirm that it was indeed pink. I wasn’t sure if the light hit it weird or my eyes were playing tricks on me. He responded with “BLACKPINK IN YOUR AREA” and that subsequently inspired me to editing the photos at the end in a similar fashion.

Ooph that front. So clean.

A rear shot of his exhaust – Rich noticed the sunset behind us was hitting it nicely. Hitting it nicely, it did. LOL

I ended up making kind of an accidental turn into this area… We were trying to make our way to Stephen Ave and I made the right guess LOL. As we were here, a bunch of cars maybe from Daven Motorsports came through and I guess they had the same idea. We ended up not using Stephen Ave anymore because it was just too crowded – surprisingly. Kind of glad too – we ended up finding some better spots as we continued…

Rich and I off to the side…

I have never really shot Rich’s car either and unfortunately didn’t get many shots of his outside of this position just due to location and space. I’m sure I’ve mentioned this before but my favourite colour to shoot is red. It just pops so much.

Me creeping in the back…

Loving the look the retrofits and the hood pins adds to the front. It’s mildly more aggressive, but just enough to not be in your face.

Super clean side profile.

Had to get one LOL

Back to JC’s car…

We went down the street that Holt Renfrew sits on and typically this window would be open but due to the closures, it’s all paper’d up now. This spot that used to house Louis Vuitton but since moving to Chinook Center, they’ve upped outta there and now Chanel is plastered on those same walls.

I knew as soon as JC saw it, he’d want a snap. So there you have it. Chanel.

Meanwhile, Rich and I were off to the side trying to stay out of the way.

As mentioned above – JC’s “Blackpink” comment inspired me to colour grade this a little differently. It’s much different than how I had initially edited my own car here. I know it’s bleh to use the same location twice but JC’s car looked great here and gives off a totally different vibe.

I was really stoked on this shot and the way it all came together.

Another with his lights off. Still a great view – almost looks like a rendering lol – but I assure you it is not 🙂

One last shot…

And my car was in the back corner – where I originally shot my STI. The first shot is below – a very different scene back then lol.

The lighting at this time was interesting – the sun was pretty much setting which caused the back light to have a blue hue while the incandescent lights on the building gave a nice orange/yellow tone. Two of my favourite colours to combine right now. Might have overdone it here now that I’m looking at it again but I don’t care. Looks cool LOL