Austin A90 Atlantic

The Austin A90 Atlantic looks to be pretty much what it is - a scaled down 1950s car decked out with the favoured styling cues of the time (whitewall tyres, streamlining, convertible or convertible-look, fabric coated roof, chrome stripes etc) - designed for the export market, particularly the United States. It also features 3 headlights, the central light for beam, a detail that can be seen in a few other cars of the period. It wasn't a particularly successful design and didn't achieve much market penetration in the U.S. We came across this example in a meet-up of car enthusiasts on the promenade at Weymouth, Dorset.

photos © T. Boughen     Camera: Nikon Z 5

Car door sculpture

I'm no fan of cars - nothing would please me more than to see the back of them and then witness their replacement by a comprehensive system of public transport that complemented proper provision for walkers and cyclists. We would gain so much and lose only a little - such as witnessing the work that automobile manufacturers and designers put into making the inside of a car door look like the output of a sculptor. This is a shot I took with my iPhone when I noticed the forms and textures of my car's door.

photos © T. Boughen     Camera: iPhone

Car with longest production run

Which model of car has had the longest production run? Is it the Citroen 2CV? What about the VW Golf or, perhaps the VW Beetle? Or how about the Mini? Well, all of these cars were produced for decades but the car with the longest production run is, I believe, the Morgan PlusFour, a roadster still made today in the Worcestershire town of Great Malvern where it was first made in 1950. I read this information on the owners descriptive note fixed to this 2008 version of the PlusFour. If you'd like a brand new one the factory charge £64,995.00 for a manual shift model and £67,495.00 for an automatic.

photo © T. Boughen     Camera: Lumix FZ1000 2

View in the side mirror

As my son drove us round the M25 I noticed, in the mirror closest to me, the sun tinged clouds of the setting sun. I took several photographs of what I saw, many of which were blurred due to vibrations, and a few that captured the evening scene. This is the best of the bunch. When I came to caption the photograph it occurred to me that we don't seem to have settled on a name for the mirror by the passnger side door. It's not a wing mirror because they are above the wheel arch. Nor is it a rear-view mirror - they are inside at the top centre of the windscreen. Door mirror is sometimes used, as is A-pillar mirror and side mirror. I've plumped for the latter.

photo © T. Boughen     Camera: Lumix FZ1000 2

Shadows and reflections

November is the first of the months in which I relish the low sun and longer shadows. All through that month, December, January and February these two factors go some way to mitigating the darkness of the winter period. Recently, walking past a small industrial estate in Abergavenny, I noticed a car standing in a large puddle, the result of recent heavy rain. The deep morning shadows from nearby buildings accentuated the sunlit side of the car and the puddle doubled the effect. This combined with the sheen of the metal and the red of the light made a semi-abstract composition that immediately appealed to me.

photo © T. Boughen     Camera: Olympus OMD E-M10

An icy Peugeot

We once owned a Peugeot. It was a two seater, three at a pinch, and it had two wheels. It was, as you may have worked out, a tandem bicycle. We had it before we bought a car - that wasn't a Peugeot. Why "three at a pinch"? Because when our first-born came along he travelled on a child seat mounted over the back wheel. On a recent cold and frosty day we passed a parked car that was iced up. It had its maker's name - Peugeot - on what I worked out was the back. The vehicle was an RCZ, a sports design, with the back and the front not quite as differentiated as usual. This section is part of the back wing. The lines and colours appealed to me as a semi-abstract composition.

photos © T. Boughen     Camera: Lumix FZ1000 2

The value of blur

Many photographers aspire to the sharpest photograph that they can achieve, seeking lenses and bodies that deliver the most minute details. There is a place for sharpness and detail, but there is also a place for blur. There are situations and subjects where his can deliver interest whether it is deliberately sought by de-focus, caused by an obscuring layer or is induced by movement. This shot, taken through the slightly smeared windscreen of a moving car on City Road, London, has qualities I like that a sharp exposure of the subject would lack.

photo © T. Boughen     Camera: Olympus OMD E-M10