Flying Muscle Cars: The Photographs of Matthew Porter
January 14, 2013 5:46 AM   Subscribe

“Honestly, some of it came from watching the closing of the remake of ‘Starsky & Hutch,’ ” Mr. Porter said on a recent afternoon in his studio. [NYTimes link] “They do one of those jumps over the crest of a hill, and it froze, and the lens flared over the hood. And I thought, that’s the picture I’d like to make [NYTimes Slideshow], but I don’t have the budget or the resources to actually stage it.” More photos without Flash. His gallery page.
posted by OmieWise (12 comments total) 6 users marked this as a favorite
 
The little boy in me wants pictures of cars doing unfeasible jumps every day on Metafilter.
posted by MuffinMan at 5:52 AM on January 14, 2013 [4 favorites]


Seeing the first one was like, "Oh wow, really cool, suddenly I feel like I'm 7 years old again!"

By the fourth one I was worn down to, "Okay, got anything else?"
posted by ardgedee at 6:04 AM on January 14, 2013 [1 favorite]


The cars are dangled like marionettes from a mechanical arm, carefully lighted and shot, then digitally fused to an image of a streetscape that Mr. Porter has photographed with a large-format camera.

What are people's thoughts on the title "The Photographs of Matthew Porter"? I wouldn't blink at "The Art of Matthew Porter", but calling digital compositions photographs seems kind of off. I know photographic manipulation has been with us for a long time, but are photoshop and photograph now interchangeable?
posted by zamboni at 6:22 AM on January 14, 2013 [2 favorites]


The little boy in me wants pictures of cars doing unfeasible jumps every day on Metafilter.

Hey, I have a video for you (from 2:00 on)...
posted by progosk at 6:51 AM on January 14, 2013


Is that Joe Biden behind the wheel!?
posted by schmod at 6:58 AM on January 14, 2013 [2 favorites]


Heh. I like to take screenshots like this when I use the "flying car" cheat code in GTA San Andreas. #funemployed
posted by Cookiebastard at 7:05 AM on January 14, 2013 [1 favorite]


are photoshop and photograph now interchangeable?
Yes, with the exception of photojournalism, and probably even then, as shooting digital means photoshop becomes your darkroom. I really don't mind if photography looses its aura of objective truth. I do miss the physical photograph as a singular object, and I predict that we might get some sort of return to that. I'd take up daguerreotyping if it wasn't so awfully toxic.
I like this work! It makes me think about the awkwardness of suspended motion in snapshots, and how much the form of a car doesn't imply movement.
posted by velebita at 7:06 AM on January 14, 2013 [2 favorites]


They left out one
posted by TedW at 7:34 AM on January 14, 2013


Is that Toonces at the wheel?
posted by kinnakeet at 7:45 AM on January 14, 2013


I've spotted Nathan Fillion in three of them so far.
posted by George_Spiggott at 10:23 AM on January 14, 2013 [3 favorites]


I guess that dude was right back in 1985: where we're going, we don't need roads.
posted by ricochet biscuit at 11:20 AM on January 14, 2013


TedW: They left out one
Nah, doesn't belong. That's an actual photograph (singular: an image taken with a camera) from an actual car mid-air.
posted by IAmBroom at 11:21 AM on January 14, 2013


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