Radnor Concours d’ Elegance 2013 – Where you hope to be!
The nouveau politics of the USA calls rich those making over $250K a year. Gee….. is that really rich? I mean if I made that, would I not have to work? Could I travel the world, develop a curious clench-jawed accent, and wear those funny pink pants? Could I buy and restore an old, elegant, luxury car and enter it into car shows? Gee……. um…. NO! Not even close. I don’t even know where to buy those funny pink pants let alone afford a rusted out old Aston Martin chassis.
I don’t understand politics but do understand rich. What me rich? No way, but I know rich when I see it and I am not that! I also know that rich ain’t $250K a year either. How do I know this? Better, than me telling you what rich is, you can see it for yourself at the annual Radnor Concours d’ Elegance just west of Philadelphia where the toys, affectations, and nostalgic restorations of wealth are on display.
Every September, you can view a taste of the most unbelievably beautiful motorized coaches from the last 100 years gathered together in the lovely rolling hills of the Philadelphia Main Line. To get there, you drive though a wonderland of America’s near-royalty and stare slack-jawed at stone-strong estates hugged by green fields cut with fencing where winged unicorns romp. Ok, they’re horses and not unicorns but they may as well be because this is definitely a fantasy land.
In this endroit de rêve where the horseless carriages of Kennedyesque families and captains of industry are on display, you can dream too. In other words, you can see what big bucks buy and how the 1%’ers live and lived.
Click here for information on the annual September car show.
The light and people were impossible
The sun was out strong with a slight haze high in the sky. This lighting is awful for picture taking where contrasts are beyond digital camera technology. This makes shadows black and featureless while at the same time, the sky is an overexposed pure blown out white. Yuck.
On top of that, everyone is rude. They just don’t know that any photographer carrying a Canon 5D Mk II is there for serious business and they should back off!! No, they want to see the cars. No, they won’t move away so I can get a great shot. Yes, they want to wreck my day. If they only knew who I was… or could have been, they would give me the respect I deserve. If it wasn’t for the fact that I was born in a no-where Western PA steel town, given the curse of slacker motivation, and had a penchant for partying rather than studying, I would own half the cars there! Yes, I was sooo close.
The best way to shoot in these conditions is to use a flash to fill in the darks and limit exposure for the bright sky. I did not. I was not smart. I wanted to shoot everyone else…. with buck shot. I am not happy with the technical quality of these photos. I don’t even like the composition, but man these cars are cool. Just a treat to view and drift into a dream.
I am on my way to being RICH!
I will never own any of these cars. Not only did I miss that boat a long time ago, I couldn’t even find the mooring dock. But I do have the audacity of hope. If the politics of today continue as they have been, those in Washington will define my income as RICH one day and I won’t have to work harder or even earn a dime more. Gee, then my dreams will come true…. or not.
The Equipment:
- Canon 5D Mk II
- Canon 24-105 L f/4.0 IS
- Audacity of Hope
