World No.1 Car Photographer: Larry Chen On Ken Block, Gymkhana BTS & Going To Prison

With Venmo Stash, a taco in one hand, and ordering a ride in the other, means you're stacking cashback, nice.

Get up to 5% cashback with Venmo Stash on your favorite brands when you pay with your Venmo debit card.

From takeout to ride shares, entertain anymore, pick a bundle with your go-tos and start earning cashback at those brands.

Earn more cash when you do more with Stash. Venmo Stash terms and exclusions apply, max $100 cashback per month.

C terms of Venmo.me slash Stash terms.

5% off site-wide and free professional installation, rules and restrictions apply.

And then it just turns into this huge dog pile of people grabbing for my camera, punching me, me punching them.

Larry! I'm a car culture and automotive photographer. I've taken 5 million photos in my lifetime.

This is my most famous photo. When Ken came around this corner, he grazed our shins when I spent a night in Chinese jail.

This entire mob chased after me and smashed my camera. I barely graduated elementary school, middle school and high school.

My goal to own Bayside Blue, our 34 GTR.

And that is your art 34 GTR.

20-year-old me would not have guessed that I would be in this position.

The rally driver, Ken Block, who has died in a snowmobile accident.

Did you suffer when you heard about Ken's passing?

It's probably one of the worst days of my life.

I talk about him a lot in this book. He was going to meet with us in two days.

It was terrible. It was horrible. Nobody's going to replace him, you know?

Larry! Welcome to the back of my van studio that just about fitted in your shop.

And that over there is your art 34 GTR.

It is.

That is insane. 20 years ago, could you have ever imagined that you'd be sat here looking at that car?

Can I just point out, I almost feel like this shop that I built is perfect for this scenario.

I absolutely love it.

20-year-old me and honestly 30-year-old me would not have guessed that I would be in this position to be able to own that car.

I have a fun story that I like to talk about when it comes to this car.

When I was graduating high school, when I was 17,

I put like a senior quote because everyone has to put like a, oh, your aspirations or what you want to be,

or I'm going to become a doctor, whatever.

Mine was simply my goal in life is to own a Bayside Blue R34 GTR.

And I wrote that and I was serious about it, right?

Being somebody that grew up playing Gran Turismo, playing video games, being into cars and JDM cars.

That was just such a halo car, right?

It was the one for me that I'm like, I would love to own that one day.

Or it was just so far.

I couldn't even imagine me even being able to see one, let alone own one.

But anyways, the school thought it was so vain that they didn't actually publish my senior quote.

Like they took it off because in the quad where everybody's pictures are up and they have their senior quote below their pictures,

mine was just blank.

Legitimately, I was thinking like, well, I guess, yeah, they just thought it was just too vain or it was derogatory in some way.

And so I just always kept that in my mind, you know, and I always thought maybe one day I'll be able to own this car.

But did you think that they were stupid for that at the time?

Did you think that they were ridiculous for that?

Or in another way, did you just question it?

I don't.

It was one of those things where I just had a moment to think about the situation and then I just brushed it off.

I didn't really think about it more and more until I was in this position to be able to finally afford this car.

And today what we're going to talk about is how you've become to be in this position to be able to not only afford the car,

but also build the life because life is about time.

Time is such a finite asset and how we spend time is so much more valuable than how we spend money.

And the amount of time that I see you spending doing what you love and doing your passion and following it is absolutely insane.

But so many people, when they maybe look at your pages, everything is about the photo.

It's about the pictures, about the story.

So a lot of people will be like, oh yeah, I know Larry, he's a great photographer.

But when I come here and I see the team and I see the mechanics and I see the editing suite

and I see the equipment and I see the love and the care and the passion and the attention,

there's obviously so much more than that.

So if I had to ask you in your own words, who are you and what do you do?

The simple answer is that I'm a car culture and automotive photographer.

But of course that's evolved over the years.

Now I'm in front of the camera and it's something that I never intended to happen this way.

Part of it is because I'm pretty introverted to be honest with you.

I'm very reserved.

Growing up it was really hard for me to make friends, make true connections because I was very quiet.

But as time went on and as I'm really pushing so hard to become an automotive photographer

I realized I had to make authentic and real connections and I had to build these relationships over time.

One of the things I always like to talk about is the fact that the people that I started working with

way back when, all the way almost 20 years or more than 20 years ago

are the same people that I'm working with today.

And we've all progressed in the same timeline, in the same way, right?

So I've progressed as a photographer, as a storyteller.

I'm able to do so many of these grand stories and grand videos.

And the people that I worked with, whether they were a mechanic or they were a producer

or whomever, painter, anything to do with cars or a driver, they progressed too.

And it's great because now I just feel like I'm part of this incredible community

that is growing exponentially year after year.

I'm just so happy to be able to do what I do for a living.

That's simple.

I think most people that look at other people's journeys,

especially when they're in front of the camera, I know you're also behind it a lot.

Especially in your whole journey, you've been behind the camera a lot.

I actually heard a stat when you were talking about your book video

that you take between 300,000 and 500,000 photos a year, which absolutely blew my mind

and we will get into that.

But the person that's usually in front of the lens, people always picture as the extrovert.

They picture them as the kid in class that was the outgoing one that was being sent to detention

that was just the guy, the person that was maybe the head of year.

And in reality, the amount of people I sit with opposite, their story has developed over so many years.

It's taken so long to chip away at that introverted exterior

and gets the bit that's actually comfortable being in front of camera.

So when did the introvert start to become more extroverted in you?

It's interesting. I feel like I did a lot of things, I guess, in the opposite world.

I never went to school for photography.

I barely graduated elementary school, middle school, and high school.

Just really eeked by.

It's funny because I got into this position.

I started doing a lot of writing.

I started doing a lot of storytelling.

And I failed pretty much all of my English classes.

So I was thinking to myself, man, if I actually paid attention in school,

maybe it would have helped my career.

But I think the thing that really I realized later on is

I just didn't find anything that interesting about going to school and studying.

But then when I found something that I was passionate about,

that's when I really put all my heart and soul into it.

And including being in front of camera,

learning how to tell stories, learning how to craft the stories,

making the connections, being personable.

All that is stuff that I just learned over time.

And I would say it's just been a very gradual natural progression since I started.

I started in 2004.

And ever since then, it's just been like a little micro wins every single year.

I'm achieving more or getting access to something or traveling to a new country.

And that's just what it takes.

It's not some one overnight success, especially back then there was no social media.

There was a really long period of time when I was just emailing my photos to people.

Like I had an email list and I was posting on forums.

I would show my photos to as many people as possible.

And that's just the only way because there was no social media back then.

I think to understand anyone's story and you're painting the picture of when you started so well,

but you need to understand the why.

Why is it that that's what they were passionate about?

Why is it that that tree grew and the branches came off it?

So for you, we're sat here surrounded by Japanese car culture.

I'd say you've got so many insane cars, but also formal adrift

and that crazy world of drifting and tire smoke.

So what was it in your earliest years that influenced the cars and the style that we have around us now?

I'm assuming it's probably the same thing that influenced you to do this.

It's a love for driving and a love for cars. Am I right?

But did that come from any singularity? Was that a parent? Was that a brother? Was that an experience?

I feel like it's something that if you grew up in Southern California,

so much car culture was born here and so much of it is ingrained in this area.

You have to have a car to move, to just have for transportation.

Why not have something that's pretty cool?

Why not have something that you can be proud of?

And naturally growing up here, it was just the cool thing to do with me and my friends.

Back then, when we were just getting into cars, we would have $500 cars.

And the only way to make them better or improve on them is if we worked on them ourselves

and we still push them to the limit and drove them and enjoyed them.

But it all really just came from a love for cars and as time went on,

I quickly realized that for me to be surrounded by this community

and be in the car industry, I had to do something.

I had to have some sort of special skill and lucky for me, it was photography

and it worked out versus me wrenching on cars.

I love wrenching so much and I love driving, but it's not my specialty.

It's not my skill.

While I enjoy it, it's just not going to earn me a living, right?

So that's why at one point in time, I told myself I would quit all high performance driving.

I would quit tinkering on cars.

I sold whatever I had and I sold all the things that were related to cars and car culture.

I even tried to sell my one really prized possession at the time,

which was my 1972-40Z that's parked out in front in my garage.

And nobody would buy it at the time and I was selling it for very cheap.

I just told myself, look, I'm going to get rid of all this stuff.

I'm going to use all the money for camera equipment.

I'm going to use it to travel the world to improve my photography.

And luckily that worked out and now we're on the other side of this.

I am doing everything I can to drive and race and drift

and get behind the wheel as much as possible.

I want to use that moment there, that moment of singularity to like home in on

because to me, I grew up with car culture.

I grew up in my local town with a group of friends that all naturally had the same interests.

We all naturally went to car meets.

We went to events.

We went to anything that was on together.

And I think any group of friends that love cars,

there's always the person that's going to be the best mechanic,

the best tinkering, the best at working with them.

You've always got the photographer of the group.

Then you've always got the semi photographer at the group

that really just does it for a hobby as a way to keep the ADHD active

if it shows, like going around clicking.

And the group is made up of all of these people.

For you to pick up a camera and start shooting, did you ever see an image

or was there something that captured you that sticks in your mind

to actually take that step and become that person?

I think it wasn't so much about me looking into pictures

and saying that I'm proud of these pictures.

That came later on.

I think what's really special about photography

is when you show someone else their picture.

When you show someone else their car that they poured their heart and soul into

and you took a picture of it and you printed it out

or it's on your laptop or when you're showing them this,

the way you see it, it triggers something.

It's so interesting.

It's like, I don't know, something in human nature maybe.

Something that you recognize that is yours

but somebody else made something from it.

I don't know what it is.

I think it's something that I've thought about a lot.

But one of the moments or one of the things that I talk about all the time

is the fact that I'm at the best races

and the best events in the world.

We were just in Monterey for car week.

This year I was at Goodwood Festival Speed,

which is one of my favorite events.

I photograph, I speak every single year,

Formula Drift, so many incredible events.

Your car was actually in the quail,

which is insane.

Crazy.

You've also just released or pre-releasing this,

which we're going to get onto.

Yes, so what I'm getting to is I'm there.

I'm live.

I'm seeing the cars.

I'm taking pictures of the cars live, in person.

But so is everyone else.

Everyone else is there enjoying these cars live.

They can touch it.

They can feel it.

They can smell it.

They can hear it run.

But the funny thing is time and time again,

and this happens almost every single day I'm shooting,

somebody comes up to me and they say,

I can't wait to see your pictures.

But I always think to myself,

just stop right there.

The car is right in front of you.

Just look at it.

Just don't wait for my pictures.

Enjoy it.

But again, that's human nature.

You know, maybe they want to see it through my lens

and what I saw.

With that said, I mean, I appreciate that.

But I think it's hilarious.

Does that?

We're going to have something so good in front of you,

and it's right there in reality,

but we want to see the non-reality.

Yeah.

But even though it kind of is reality,

maybe it's because humans always strive

to see the best version of something,

and there is something about some pictures

that are taken that when you see them,

you can be looking at the exact same thing,

but in a photo it just looks ten times better,

albeit the editing, the lighting, the way it's done.

And I think that we also as humans

always tend to appreciate,

especially people that are in an entrepreneurial,

maybe have got their own business position.

We always love to hire or look for people

that are better than us at doing any given task

and tend to appreciate that.

Yeah.

And obviously, I appreciate it the same way,

but in a different way.

So for example, just this last week,

I had a chance to drive my R34 at Laguna Seca,

you know, going down the corkscrew.

So cool.

A track that was on every game growing up as well.

Yes.

I love driving that track so much,

and I was pretty familiar with the track.

So I felt comfortable to push that car,

even though it was my first time on that track with that car.

Died in.

So then I thought to myself,

I really hope somebody gets a picture

of this going down the corkscrew.

And it did happen, but that's another example, right?

I have the car.

This is my car.

I get to drive it anytime.

But what I treasure is a picture of it

going down the corkscrew with me driving it.

And I think that's something that I'm able to tap into

for everything, you know, with car culture.

People are just so excited.

There's this passion for this thing

that is not alive.

It's just plastic and metal and,

you know, this machine that we've given a soul.

Sierra, let's get moving.

Yeah!

The Carl's Jr. lawyers said we couldn't name our new burger

the biggest burger for the smallest price burger.

So we didn't.

And that's called a loophole.

The new Cali XL burger.

A beefed-up Charlboro double burger with double cheese,

only $5.99.

That's more meat, not more expensive.

Get it now for a limited time only at Carl's Jr.

Available for a limited time at participating restaurants.

Not valid for use within a combo

or in combination with any other offer at discount.

What I want to get into, though,

is to have moments like that in your story

and what you do is capture stories.

But to have moments like that in your story

when you can enjoy a car like that,

which was your dream, which was the thing

that the little teachers ripped off of that poster,

you had to turn your passion into something

that actually paid and paid well.

And I think it's a fair comment to say that

humans as a whole probably wouldn't look at photography

as the most lucrative career in the world.

You know, when you picture brain surgeons

or lawyers or business owners,

I don't really think that comes into it.

So to take that to this level,

I really want to get into the understand the how

because I had so many friends that the reason I

saw you for the first time, come across to you

for the first time, and never forget it,

was in my local pub.

And my friend had won the same car

on a giveaway competition in the UK.

And another friend brought up his phone and said,

I took some photos of that car,

but this guy took some better and brought up your photos.

And that was all the way in the UK.

Now those lads I was sat with,

you are living their dream.

That is their dream to do what you do.

So what do you think is the moment?

Because for me, when you talk about that moment

where you were prepared to sell everything

and ditch it for the lens, for the equipment

and for the travel and the experiences,

to me that seems like possibly one of the most

impactful moments in your story.

Yeah, it was.

I've made a lot of sacrifices to get to this point.

But I feel like not everyone needs to, right?

Your friends who enjoy photography

and also enjoy cars, they can do it their way.

That's the beauty of it. It's a scale.

It's not all in like me or none at all.

It's a sliding scale.

They could do it on their off time.

They could do it at events.

They could do it as a hobby.

Or maybe they take a couple paid gigs.

That's the beauty of it.

Not everyone needs to go as crazy as I have

into car photography.

But I welcome people who want to

because there's a place for everybody.

I mean, you probably saw it very evident

at Car Week this year.

There's more car spotters than there's ever been, period.

It was insane.

Off the chart and the place literally,

we describe it, because it was our first year

going there, me and my partner Edie,

we described it as a literal video game.

The place turns into a video game.

You can't comprehend what is going on

and it desensitizes you for cars

because it becomes so ridiculous.

There's like 6F50s that go past you one way

and then a Yesco that goes past the other way

and it's just like, what the hell?

What gets me is the enthusiasm, right?

What gets me are the people can't buy

on the side of the road, on the sidewalk,

sometimes with chairs set up.

And then you have the car spotters

that are literally running with knife hands

as fast as they can go just to get in front of the vehicle

just to get that shot.

Who the heck knows where any of this material goes, by the way?

I don't think there's that many content creators

pumping out this much stuff.

It's almost like a lot of these people

just do it for themselves

and that's what makes me happy.

You know, they're enjoying cars this way.

We actually parked the van when we had an off-morning

on one of the bends going out towards Big Sur.

We opened the doors just like this

and just sat and watched all the cars

coming down the road.

And that, to be honest, just as a car fan

get rid of the podcast or anything

monetized over the top of loving the automotive one.

That is just the purest form of enjoying cars

that you can be, not even behind the wheel.

Yeah, and this also is a great example you mentioned

earning a living as a photographer.

Honestly, if somebody were to look for money

or they're looking to earn a lot

doing photography or video or being in this car industry

it may not be the right gig for this person

because that's not what it's about.

Money may come eventually

especially if you're really good at what you do

if you're extraordinary, if you're very talented

and you have something to add to the community

but it shouldn't be the driving factor.

It shouldn't.

Your love for cars, your love for making connections

your love for traveling and making friends

and uncovering stories

that is what should drive you first, in my opinion.

Do you remember a first experience

stronger than a first paid gig?

Stronger than a first paid gig?

What comes to mind first?

Your first paid gig or like something that happened?

Honestly, around that time

I feel like I don't even remember really my first paid gig.

How did it start?

Can you shoot my car?

Yeah, something like that

or can we pay you to use these pictures?

It wasn't significant.

That part wasn't significant.

Did you plan to turn it into a business

earlier on than that moment?

At one point I was taking Baby Steps

and I was thinking that it potentially could be possible.

The reason why I knew it was possible

is because it already existed.

I knew people that did it for a living

and I looked at them from behind the fence

or from far away and I thought to myself

I need to be doing what they're doing.

I can do what they're doing.

I feel like I had it in me.

So then I just pushed really hard

in every single way possible to get to that point.

To all my loyal listeners listening on Spotify,

Apple and other streaming platforms

I urge you to do me a quick favour

that you might not know that you could do.

You can actually follow if you're listening on Spotify

the Road to Success podcast

and also rate it with how you feel these conversations have been

how they may have helped you

or if you're just enjoying the one that you're listening to today.

It really will help us if we're able to grow our streaming platforms

beyond hundreds of thousands of monthly listeners.

Thank you so much for listening to this episode of the podcast

and I really hope to bring you some more inspirational guests soon.

Do you think without the launch of social media

back in 2011 I think Instagram launched

and we're able to display photos far and wide

I know we have Facebook, etc.

But did that also

I say put you on a global stage

just make you so much more exposed to the world

and different opportunities.

Yeah, I definitely think social media helped.

I was a pretty late adopter to it

part of it is because I'm not an Apple user

I use Android and as you probably know

Android

they were a very late adopter to Instagram

In fact, I remember the day I signed up for Instagram

I was at the Spa 24 hour race

in 2012

and it was just like that day

that they launched it and the moment they launched it

I signed up for it because I was jealous for a while

for that whole year that it was available on iOS

I was seeing my friends, you know, posting and sharing

like, oh, this is so cool.

I was thinking to myself, oh man.

And you weren't tempted just to go and get the flipping under quid

from the shop down the road.

No, part of it is because I'm a diehard PC guy

I've always been

you know, I come from a gaming background

I loved playing games

I love playing Gran Turismo and racing games

and Need for Speed, all of that stuff

so I feel like I'm kind of stubborn in that way

but it's also helped a lot later on in my career

because we are so lucky

it's so crazy that I've done a lot of work with Intel

I've done some work with Google

I've done a lot of work with MSI

they make incredible computers and that's what we use

and a lot of people ask me

and some people even make fun of me

they're like, hey, we need to start a GoFundMe for Larry

because he obviously can't afford an iPhone

but my response is like, hey, is Apple calling you

reaching out to you to work with you

or what's going on here

because I'm actually actively trying to work with these companies

and help them improve their products

yeah, sorry, I went on a tangent there

No, you're alright

in the early days being that introverted character

that you described

I can clearly see though

you are uber competitive

especially comes out in racing

and I think that anyone that becomes successful

has that competitive streak in them

but I never hear ever in the photography world

photographers saying, my pictures are better than his pictures

I do it better

is there a degree

that you do hold yourself to be like

you remember you upload a YouTube video

and it sometimes shows you like

will your thumbnail stand out compared to these 100 thumbnails

do you think about that and the shots that you're doing

not necessarily for a thumbnail

like for a shot in general and say

I'm capturing this moment on this corner of this track

and there's all these other guys stood here

but I'm making sure that the snap that I take is going to be unbelievable

does that go through your mind?

No, I feel like I'm pretty well aware

of where I stand in the photography world

I feel like I know where my skill level is

and what is possible with

if I'm in the right place at the right time

with the right camera

and I happen to get the right settings

I understand where I am in the hierarchy of photographers

and skill and knowledge and vision and all that

I think my true talent

is putting in more effort

to be in front of the good subject

so oftentimes I'm with photographers that are very inspiring

a lot of people ask me

hey who inspires you

which famous photographer inspires you

I always say that it's the people in the trenches with me

at the events

shooting these cars

at Car Week

at Pike Speak

at Formula Drift

at Goodwood Festival Speed

the people that I'm with

you know

trackside

suffering together

almost like

locked arms

just enough space for all of us

they've sought the passes

they've been through the process

they've grown ages to give them the opportunity to be there

those are the people that inspire me

because

I'll tell you right now

so many times

very often

I'm right next to somebody

and we publish our pictures

and after the fact

I look at their pictures

and I think to myself

oh my god

how did I not see this

they just figured out some different angle

or put a different spin on it

or

did something different

even though it was the same place

same time

same car

they were a better technical photographer

and that happens all the time

non-stop

but

the advantage that I try to extract

all the time

is to

have the access to

a certain collection

or a certain build

or a certain scene

or set something up

or whatever

go earlier

stay later

wait for the cars to roll out

I just put myself in a situation

where

I potentially could get a shot

that this other photographer is not even at

what is it

that created

that piece of your brain

that thinks like that

versus the guy next to you in the trench

I think

it's the motivation

it's the drive

to

be able to

create something

that's different

that's special

that's

maybe extraordinary

that

maybe is inspirational

I don't know what it is

jaw dropping

I love the phrase with photography

jaw dropping

because

there's like a small amount of photographers

that I'd love to have all of you

I've asked him several times

he's actually said no

but he's still so inspiring to me

as Alex Penfold

and I love some of the shoots that he

especially some of the desert shots

and it always was when it came up in my feed

picture picture picture

jaw dropping

he's a very good example of somebody

that I

look up to

these are the people that inspire me

because

these folks

are the ones that are pushing the limit

of what's possible with car photography

and I'm not saying I'm not doing it too

I am

I'm trying my absolute best

you know

I built a camera car

just to be able to

photograph

and film at speed

when these drift cars are

pushing their hardest

right

I always thought to myself like

well

they're there

what if I'm there too

it sounds so simple

and it sounds so dumb

but it's something that

I've just been working on

year after year and year after year

to perfect

it's just so much of that

you know

but to get on the tarmac

with that car

in front of the other car

is down to people

connections

opportunity

and reputation

that's the hard part

reputation is my favourite word

and it's become my favourite word

of all these podcasts

because I used to do this thing for a while

I would give a guest

three words that might mean something to them

and I'd ask them to pick the one

that meant the most

and every single time

five episodes on the chart

the person picked reputation

so I stopped doing it

because I knew

that it becomes one of the most

important parts

of absolutely everybody's story

but reputation is only built

over time

and it's built by people

starting conversations

and that can also be difficult

when you're a little bit introverted

and a little bit off the side

so how did you build

that early reputation

because there were so many people

that you'd have watched in movies

and that you'd ducked to

they've ended up being part of your story

that you then

ended up capturing their moments

so like

where was like a major point

in your earliest years as a photographer

where you really took a big step forward

in building your reputation

that's a really

good question

I think

if you see my storytelling

and if you

watch

our content

on YouTube

and if you see my written articles

something that was really ingrained

in me

early on

was

to be very positive

about the things that we're covering

there's

terrible builds out there

right

we try not

we try to avoid those

it's not

something that needs to be highlighted

what needs to be highlighted

are the

really

top-level builds

inspirational builds

and they don't have to be expensive

they could be the $500 car

but if there's a good story

and if they put heart and soul into it

then it's something that's worth telling

it's too easy to be negative in this industry

right

especially

if you're highlighting car culture

that's honestly

probably the easiest way to get views

is to be negative

to

be controversial

to

spark some fighting

you know

that's a great way to get a lot of views

a lot of interaction

a lot of comments

not

but

I feel like I've gone this far

by being positive

by being the opposite

yes

I try

I try my best

and you know

there are cars

that I photograph

that

may not hit the mark

and

I still try to focus on the positives

so if you believe that

and you're Mr. Nice Guy

and as someone comes up to you

and they can have the worst build in the world

but they're a lovely person

and I've struggled with this

as a podcast host as well

because we often

if we're showing our pictures

or videos or books to the world

we don't get to interact with our audience a lot

like

you're inside

you're shot behind your house

very

like encourage you're surrounded by the people you see every day

and then the people that you shoot with

you don't necessarily see

the hundreds of thousands of people all the time

that then support you

but you still have the same

level of

you owe them the same

because they're there supporting

watching

and my point is

what I struggle with

I get a lot of people that get

what's the word I'm looking for

what's the word

insulted

that's it

yeah

so I find that I have people that can

potentially

are not the right fit for the podcast

for me and for my audience

and I owe my audience the best possible examples of guests

and what my audience would love to watch

and they can't understand

why they wouldn't make the podcast

you find it hard that there's people

that would love to see you post

and write about

and do all these things with their cars

but you don't think that they're necessarily

the right fit for what you've built

yeah

I'll

give everybody a chance

and

sometimes people surprise me

but

I know what I like

and I generally try my best

to highlight what I like

but I'm also looking for

new and interesting things right

there's so much of our car culture

that

we have to look at

closer

especially if somebody

is in love with this thing

that they love so much they put their heart and soul into it

I should take a second look at it

and I should highlight it

but if you want to talk about reputation

I'm really relying on my reputation

for something that I'm going to do

next week

okay so

I'm going to try

my absolute best

to pursue the story that

I've been trying to pursue for a long time

on Monday

what's today today is

Thursday Thursday on Monday

I'm flying to Brunei

so

that face is showing it right now

you kind of see where I'm going

I'm putting my

reputation

forward

to basically show

the royal family

that I'm not there to

push any agenda or anything

I'm there

for cars

so

I'm not going to

go through life regretting

not trying

so I'm going to try

so by the time this comes out

you guys will see

if I succeeded

how the hell does that

opportunity

drop into your inbox

it's been

something that I've been

it's been something that I've been

taking baby steps

over the past couple years

to eventually

hopefully

come to fruition

I don't know

we'll see

the point is that

I'm going to put it out there

and then I'm going to show that I'm there

and I'm going to

put my best foot forward

and I'm going to be positive

but

there's no way until

there's no way for me to know

I'm going into the unknown

and that's often the case

when it comes to me

traveling and pushing for these cars

culture stories because a lot of times

and still happens today

I go to these places

the far reaches of the earth

wherever because cars are everywhere

people always ask me

why are you even here

why is this interesting to you

this is just a dingy old shop

and I just work on these old trucks

or I work on this thing

or I built this over time

and this is my car

why are you here

and I look at them

and I think to myself

you have no idea how cool you are

and how much of a trendsetter you are

and how much I want to tell your story

and how much I want to photograph you

and your hands and the cuts

that you have on your arms

and this blood, sweat and tears

that you put into this thing

so with that said

I'm just going to try

and by the time you guys see this

who knows

you'll see

many of you might not know this

but away from the recordings that I do in my van studios

I've actually got a digital marketing agency

now we specialize in a lot of automotive clients

but we cover everything really

everything is made up of PPC specialists

SEO specialists

and the most talented designers I've ever seen

which have done work like the Starnagloss website

the TWR website and many more

we've actually just built icon box

for the autoalex crew as well

meaning that people that watch their channel

can buy their favorite merch

seamlessly and in style

so if you're interested in starting a project

and you'd love to speak to us

just tap the link below

and let's hop on a call

magic is in the work that others aren't yet doing

and I think that right there

almost sums up that quote to a T

because it's looking for the places

looking for the shops, looking for the detail

that others aren't necessarily doing

if I come

to this hardback copy

of your book which must be

when I hear stories like

the opportunity of doing what you're going to be doing on Monday

it must actually be hard

to know in these 400 or so pages

when to stop

and say enough's enough

it's time to publish

because your story is ongoing

it's nowhere near over

so is that quite a tough thing to do as well

to be like well this cool thing's going to happen

and this cool thing's going to happen

yeah so

this book is something that I've been dreaming about

it's been something that I've been

thinking about

for a long time

I thought to myself that

hey maybe I had the 10 year mark

I'll do a book

or maybe add a 15 year mark

and then there was one point in time

when I was getting very serious

about making a book

when Ken Block was just doing his

Gymkhana 10

pretty much like the final Gymkhana

I thought to myself ok

once Gymkhana 10 is done

that means that

it's such a

big moment

and it's like a stamp

like a time stamp

in car culture history

like the great Ken Block

is ending this series

and might as well

end my book

with this series

and

for whatever reason I just couldn't get it together

and I'm glad I couldn't

because

I don't think

it was the right time

now I think is the right time

because I'm a big

I'm really big on round numbers

and while

20, 21 years

not so round

but

I just figured

if I don't do it now

when am I gonna do it?

There's meaning in time

can you

pinpoint for me a time in this book

a place in this book

you just mentioned a name that

anyone that's ever been near a steering wheel

and actually cared about it would know

which is Ken Block

he burst onto my TV screen

through top gear sliding

a black car around the streets of London

at the time a Hoonigan mobile

do you have

a point for you in this book

that summarizes where that started

or something really

really impactful

it's tough right

here

smell without a doubt

yeah the smell of fresh print

but smell of fresh print of paper

okay so

that was genuine reaction

genuine reaction

this is my most famous photo

and we're putting this on screen now

for those of you listening

on Spotify you can watch this in video form as well

if you're listening to this through audio

and if you're listening to this through app

I genuinely ask that you go and listen

to this now

like view this now in the pictures that are on screen

because this is jaw dropping

this is my most famous photo

and it was

during the filming of Climb Kana

at Pike's Peak

with Ken hanging two wheels off

at

probably the most famous corner

this is also known as Evo corner

which is where that

Evo 9

went off

and started rolling down the hill

and it was like a big moment in Pike's Peak history

this is

certainly a death defying moment

right if he went off

it doesn't end it just keeps going

and

yeah I was just very

fortunate to be able to

show one and a half that's in the van

as well and everybody through that lens

with your car in the background

because it's

capturing these moments

in so much talent

it leads to the ability of

having moments with things

like your cars behind us

it's interesting because when I think about

photography

when I think about car photography

especially working with somebody like Ken

he's really

helped me

put my images on the map

there's no

other way

for me to get my images

in front of so many eyes

one of

the tasks that I was always

really pushing

hard for

every time I was on set with Ken

or any time I'm on set

with the Hoonigan guys

or shooting Jim Khanna

Travis Pastrana

any time I have

this really important

task of being the photographer

my number one goal is to get that thumbnail shot

you know how important it is

to get that thumbnail shot

that's what's going to make somebody click

on 100 million

200 million

view video

and if you're scrolling the wheel

the moment that you pick the camera up

and you start scrolling your wheel

I'm guessing hundreds of shots of that moment

that must have been taken

this one was special in that

I did a huge panoramic pan of it

and I've told the story before

but

the actual photo is only this big

and what

the rest of it is

is a panoramic

so I just

as I was watching

listening to the radio and predicting

when Ken was going to come around the corner

I kept tiling this panoramic

of 20 or so images

I think it's a little more than 20

but I just I kept tiling

I kept tiling

but I chose not to photoshop

the camera in any way

I showed it the way it was

so you could see B cam is here

my buddy Brandon Cotto

he was holding the camera

for the second angle

the first angle was somebody that was just standing

right in front of me

and the director Brian Scotto was standing behind me

and

when Ken came around this corner

what a lot of people don't see

or a lot of people don't realize

is that he's drifting this way

this corner he flicks it the other way

and I kid you not

he

grazed our shins

maybe two to three feet away from our shins

to make this corner

that's something that you don't see

and I thought to myself

oh my goodness I cannot believe that happened

but when he stopped

I ran over

as fast as I could

you know like a car spotter at Monterey car week

and on the back

of my camera I had this shot

I was going to ask when did you get the chance

to show him that shot and I was imagining

after the paddock maybe a drinks

or something like that I showed him immediately

and that moment where

I showed him and I was so excited

made it onto the Amazon

show which is the Jim Conner

files and it's actually in the

intro because I'm so

excited I'm like

you know I can't believe I got this shot of you

doing this death define thing

yes tea like yeah

exactly

yeah it's

it's crazy

and I think about this all the time

I think when you look into

a crowd of people or when you're

like you mentioned if anybody has

held a steering wheel

as a car enthusiast

they know who he is and they've seen his videos

that means they've seen my photos

so

it's countless

there's no way to know there's no way to know

because of him and because

of all the incredible people that I've worked

with builders

drivers

everybody even mechanics

just people that I've been surrounded

with because of those people

my photos

I don't know

it's impossible to know it's impossible

to know how many people have seen my stuff

we talk about

those words that I mentioned that I asked

people when they come on and that

reputation usually is the one

that people would pick but when you

capture a moment like that and you're talking

about such an inspiring

individual

the word talent comes up again you've used

it so many times in this podcast

like

is it that that also inspires you

to take pictures just being able to witness

the raw

unedited talent of someone

that's able to do that

yeah

I really have to hand it to

I have to hand it to these drivers

even more so

now because now I'm

on the other side

of

really clawing my way up the ladder

trying to make a living

trying to make a name for myself

I'm so lucky that I get to race

and I'm so lucky that I get

to get behind the wheel

which in turn

means that I

get just the little inkling

of how difficult

it was for them

it was so easy

a lot of times in my career

for me to brush it off and say

what the hell why can't

you just hit your mark

we get our pictures we get the best

video ever and then we call it a

day

it's so easy for people to do that

right now when they're watching f1

how could you not see that

you let the guy pass

it was so easy to see or whatever

how could you make that mistake

how could you spin out

oh my goodness

I could not

believe the skill that people like

Ken, people like Travis

people like everybody that

I photograph

Tanner Faust

whomever

Reese Millen, Ken Gushi

all these people that I photograph

Sung Kang

all these people that I

shop from the outside

they have their talent

that's what they do

that is what they do

and that's what they're good at

and it's my job to capture it

and I have so much more respect

for these drivers

so much more

if you want to see more content like this

please subscribe

to success

we've spoken about a moment in the book

that perfectly summarises Ken

and also your relationship

with photography with Ken

and that you're able to share moments like that

can you show me

something in the book that is

by chance because as you said

you've sometimes got to be in the right

place at the right time

to capture the right shot and that's sometimes

standing places outside of ours

staying a little bit later

sometimes people set themselves up for the perfect shot

and it eventually comes

but is there something in this book that also represents

luck

and that ability of being in the right place

at the right time

there is a lot of that

well I imagine with

300,000's a half a million photos a year

it probably is

while I'm looking through this book and I'm

choosing

because it's hard to do that on the spot

sometimes you need to get a picture to actually think

of that was that time

I

I'll explain a little bit about

this book and what it took

to get to this point right so

my estimate

is that I've taken

about 5 million photos

in my lifetime

and

it may be

it's actually a very conservative estimate

because I'm assuming that it's more

especially because I have two

cameras

Canon

1DX

Mark 2

I have two of them

that have over a million actuations on them

each

like on the counter

so

the 5 million estimate

is honestly

probably very conservative

and those cameras were also part of your journey

when you were really ramping forward

your photography and what you were doing as well

because I heard you say you actually got a video

because we talk about so many still

moments

but also your journey, your story has become

about visual moments

about capturing video, about your YouTube channel

about the stories

I just can't, I'm sorry

I completely got off chat by looking at some of these

images because I don't think

what's beautiful about a conversation

sitting down on podcasts and turning our phones off

which none of us do a lot

you sometimes look at something

and you get so much more depth

in your brain to analyse it and to think

about something you don't normally think about

if I could just take the audience just for a second

on a random page

every single one of these pictures

represents

a story

if I said that's a picture

there's a story for you and how many

pictures are in this book

so we tried

our best to keep it to

2500

but it ended up being closer

to 2700

more than 2700

I think it's 2800

I was very

very particular

very careful about choosing

which images I want to

make it into the book

each and every single one

meant something to me

and each and every single one

was the best of a series

so

I'm so glad you mentioned that because

when you flip through these pages

and point at something

that could have been

a week, that could have been a day

that could have been a whole project

but it just got

distilled down to one

image

I think this is a car that I recognise

that's Magnus

and Magnus has sat on that very seat

off at me and I'm lucky enough to been to his garage

and seen the talent

that he also has

for how to make his cars look like that

he wrote

the afterword

for this book

so that's Magnus right there

and that photo

purely sums up Magnus because

I think the word

outlaw when it comes to Porsches

is his Magnuses

we can say he owns that, he's got trademark of it

if everyone wants to use that word

it's a pound and I was lucky enough to have a 911

and it had Fuchs wheels

but they were done in black, it was a 930 turbo

G50, I loved that car

but

it's amazing how an individual can be linked

to a point of a photo

that we see so much and many of

but

I adore him, I love him so much

he's such a great

ambassador

for the culture

and I've just been so

lucky to be able to connect with him

and I told

the story of how I connected with him

in this book

so

405 pages

and honestly

a lot of writing, I'm a terrible

writer, I'm just gonna say it right now

but I tried my absolute best

to do as much writing

as possible, to do as much storytelling as possible

and a lot of stories that I haven't told yet

and it was all

in airport lounges

on the flights

in cars

in transit

waiting for

some event to start or whatever

that's all the free time I had

for this year of me making this book

I sat down

in front of my laptop and I just started banging out words

and

Ryan

from Carrar Media who

who published this book

for me

he

inspired me with

starters

because he interviewed me and I told him

that's Carrar, let's go

from the release of the GTR

and who would have known

15 years later

I would sunset the GTR

for Nissan

and I would do the last pictures of the GTR

there's so many

crazy stories when I

turn the pages and I look at these

honestly I get emotional

because I think about

how much sacrifice and how much time I put into all this stuff

but

I tried my best to write as much as I can

and those who care to

read and to learn about

my story they'll

read it and

the cool thing about this book is it's backwards

chronological

and I did it on purpose so

somebody's flipping through the book

when they open the early pages

they see my best work

they see stuff from 2024

like December of

2024

is like kind of like the star

of the book and then it goes

all the way

to 2004

so it's backwards chronological

yeah you have like Sebastian Loeb here

you have

I don't know just so many

I can't make sure I can read all these pages

out of the audience

or maybe you should do the page number

but

anyways the point is that

I want it to be something where

you see my

work

I guess the D evolution of my work

go from something that

I think

is my best work which is my latest work

because I've

now over 20 years made

my connections

I've developed my skill the technology

is the best it's ever been

the Canon cameras are absolutely incredible

the glass is so good now

and then you keep flipping

and flipping and then you see okay

so now the style

is different right maybe

at one point I talk

about this in the chapters

it wasn't so much about

the beauty and the composition

the colors and the technical

challenge

it was more about

this is this personality

and I had access to this person

and I want to tell the story about

this car

being stuck here or

it crashed here or flipped here

it was more and then it goes

it evolves to like storytelling

it evolves to

here's

what the story is not

a technically good photo

but it's something

that's extraordinary that's happening

you know and on that

a moment for you

of capturing a photo that is

extraordinary might also be

a moment of absolute

sadness for someone else or one of the

worst moments in their life

and that's a really hard thing to balance

do you have a photo that springs to mind

in the book could summarize that

there is one

I'm so glad you mentioned

something like that and I'm like

there's got to take a picture of the page

because I owe it to everybody

I get every one of these pictures on the screen

and I may have to swap the batteries over

in the camera just a minute

first Instagram post

look at that 128 likes

but it's funny some

of the likes look July 27th

2012

24 hours a spa

it was during media check

I was getting my tab art

and

I saw this 12C

parked in the parking lot

and this is the photo that I got

with my Canon camera

and then this is the one that I got

on my phone because I don't know if you remember

back then you couldn't

use other pictures you had to

use the picture that you shot with Instagram

and then you post it

and I thought I myself I would have known that then

but obviously forgot that now yes

and it was square only

what about this photo

if this was one of the early days

what do you look at and love about

and what you look at and hate about it now

I wouldn't have taken this photo from this angle

because the wheels turn to the right

and it annoys me that there's a gap here

so if I were to take this again

I would have gone this way a little bit

and then it would have been cool because like the wheel

is out a little bit

and it gets rid of this gap

a couple other things

I feel like it's maybe a little

underexposed

I also shot it wide open

which makes it a little soft on the

edges but that was

the camera technology back then

I had the best but it was

still lacking compared to what it is now

just like a lot of little things

that I look at and like

I can't believe I did that

AI is having such an influence

in our world now because we're looking at a moment

now a snapshot quite literally

at a time where that wasn't a thing

AI is in

Photoshop

that background that you took

all those images to make a panorama of

you can now ask Photoshop to expand

AI is in the writing

that it's done is in the grammar

that it's done is in the ideas

that it's done it's becoming a weed

it's becoming something

so like electricity that's part

of everything that we do

is there any

AI influence in this book whatsoever

it's honestly my first line

in this book that I wrote

is no AI here

it's the real deal

that's not to say I don't use

AI in my photography

I use it to fix

my mistakes

and I also use it to correct

technology

now

I can finally go back

and fix

photos that were previously unfixable

and you do that

when I say fix

I'm talking about noise

I'm talking about ISO noise

so artifacts

from ISO I'm not changing

the car I'm not changing the color

I'm not adding things

what I am doing is

fixing

the fact that technology

wasn't able to handle this

back then if that makes sense

even though you talk about the

technology was so much passion as well

because of how far it's come during your journey

yeah I mean like you look at

better pictures something like this where I'm shooting

break rotors

in order to

achieve this sort of shot

it has to be dark

and in order to

in order to

in order to achieve

a shot like this I have to bump up the ISO

so much

but then in turn

back then

when you had to bump up the ISO

that also means it had so much noise

so what I'm doing now

I'm finding that I want to go back

and fix the photos that I was never

able to publish

or fix the photos that I always

thought were good and I could

publish it small but I couldn't blow it up

because there was a lot

of problems with it it was just not

perfect yeah see the original

question was

if we could pinpoint

some pictures that show

maybe something that is an amazing

photo for you but someone's

worst moment especially

maybe in that time and even

that page that I've held on now

shows one of those moments I fold

over and this page here

of Kemblok going through

this wall

this is a fake wall

they built this for

Gemkhana 4 this is the

set of Universal Studios

but

let me see if I can find it

but the

whole point is

I don't know what the point was

what were we talking about

could be someone's worst

there is a man on fire

hang on

I love your reaction

to this you know one thing

that you haven't done is you haven't

scrolled

or you haven't flipped the pages

yourself and

it makes me so happy to see

people

look at this book because

we haven't had physical copies

of this for very long maybe

two weeks because the publisher

hand bound this

for us so we can

show it to

people and

you know get in front

of the camera like when you show

other people their pictures and they're excited to have them

yeah exactly this was the same moment

for you so when

we had a chance to see these for the first

time I just

there was so many different

reactions right

if I showed the drivers

they would point themselves down

they're like I remember this I remember that it was crazy

you know and I show

people that put on the events

or I show personalities

it's all a different

reaction and it's so interesting

because what this has become

is a yearbook

like a yearbook

you know when you're in

high school you get a yearbook

and it's all your friends or whatever

this has become a yearbook for car culture

in our generation for the past

20 years

the people that

I encounter

these are the trendsetters these are

the wave makers these are

the people that are

doing something significant

for me to want

to tell their story

here's the picture that I was talking about

it's so small but it means

so much

why

this is the moment

my friend Justin Pollack

is there with his hands

on his face

just so upset because

he knows he messed up

and he

lost the championship

the formula drift championship he lost it

because

of his one small mistake

one entire year's worth of work

just

I wouldn't say thrown away but he just slipped through his fingers

literally slipped through his fingers

because he's the one behind the wheel

he's the one

in the cockpit

controlling this car

and he

after I published this photo way back when

in 2011

he told me I look at that picture

all the time and I think

I don't want to get to this point again

you know I this is what motivates me

to be better

to be a better driver

so that could be one of the most valuable pictures

that's ever been taken for him

I don't know it's crazy because

this is not a technically good picture at all

it's dark you can barely tell

what's happening but

when I originally published it

online and it was like

such a significant

moment it was a storytelling

moment

it made a lot of sense to

a lot of people if that makes sense it's like

this is literally the moment you lost

the championship

people go

their entire lives

now

now that drifting has become like a pretty

well established motorsport

it's what they dream

for it's what they aspire

to do you know it's

it's what they

put their heart and soul into

like what I've put my heart and soul into

these individuals these

gladiators really

put everything on the line

to become formula drift champions

or drift masters

or whatever series

you know so

this is something in their worst moment

really this justin pollock

I feel so at the time I was like

I have to take this picture

but I feel terrible for it

but I'm going to tell the story

and I'm going to document this moment

because that's what I'm here for

why do growing businesses love working in Slack

let's ask Christia Ari Bikes

running things in Slack saves me so much time

AI summaries save

97 minutes per week

what say you rocks from Gosney

Slack helps us build community it helps us build connection

your partners vendors and

customers all in one place

take us on home Ashley from Caraway

if we didn't have Slack tomorrow

I would explode well let's not let that

happen visit slack.com

podcast to get 50% of Slack

business plus

tax act understands you

haven't memorized the tax code

that's why tax act has live experts

to help tax act can even

do it for you if you prefer

it's the easiest way to know you're doing it right

well other than going back to college

and obtaining a bachelor's degree in accounting

with a minor in finance then interning

somewhere and becoming fluent in all tax

forms but that might be

hard to accomplish before tax day

so maybe just stick with

tax act tax act

let's get them over with

this represents

exactly what you just said

is a moment that

Justin is so horrific at the time

but ends up being something

so valuable to them

if someone had a camera maybe they did

but the moment

for you that was closest

to that head in your hands moment

throughout your journey a moment that you think

is so horrific

at the time and it's tough to come back

from where would what would that have been for you

I feel like I've had

a lot of those moments

I've getting to this journey

I've had

I've made a lot of mistakes I have

and

that's part of it

that's part of learning

I mean I can talk about

I think one of them

is in here if you want to see

I've had a lot of crazy moments

but there's this one that I even talk about

here in this book

I scrolled to it right away

so this page is fun

because

this story

is talking about the time I spent

a night in Chinese jail

so

this

photo

in particular is the last photo

that I got before

this entire mob

chased after me and smashed my camera

yeah

but I talk about the story in here

what

so

at the time I was going to

China

I was going to all over the world

I was traveling all over the world to

photograph drifting, photographing car culture

so this driver who is scratching

his head

was upset

that the judging didn't go his way

right as you know

in drifting it's subjective sport

right

but in the judge's eyes

he didn't win

so he got fourth place

if you notice there's no fourth place

stand

he just happens to

butted his way into this picture

and he was just upset

he was just so upset

that he lost

that him and his whole crew

just started a riot

and pushed this backdrop over

and started

flipping things over

caused havoc

with the officials

and then so

guess what I did

I just started photographing it

I just did what I always do

I took pictures

and then you could kind of tell

what's going on here

guy has his hands on my camera

or my lens

this guy is getting upset

security this whatever

he sees me that camera

cause he sees me getting evidence

of them doing this

thing

and

he says give me my camera

and then I say come get it

and I signal him to come get it

and then him and all of his

entire crew

came to get it

which by the way there's video of this

but that's part of the story

and I started running as fast as I could

away from them

and then it just turns into this huge

dog pile of people

just

grabbing from my camera

punching me, me punching them

I honestly

can honestly say I got some good hits

then okay

honestly I didn't take any hits to the face

I did take some hits

but

I gave some close to it

and I'm not kidding you

say this in the story

but I'm not kidding you I purposely

went for

some individuals crotches

I'm not kidding

I'm not kidding like it's the world

versus me you know

and eventually I was pulled away by the cops

and spent some of my night

in a Chinese jail

exactly so

as this was going on I was there with

Americans right

the American drift team

they were in the stands watching

because if you were eliminated

or if you were part of a team whatever

you're just in the stands watching

like

two of the Americans got second and third right

I think that's probably one of the reasons why he was so upset

because he was beat by

you know one of the American drifters

that came to his home turf

so as this was happening

all the Americans started jumping down

from the stands

like

a big distance

like I'm talking about

like three meters three four meters

jumping down like they're

doing like a human rope

like lowering themselves down

to basically join the fight join the

riot and they all picked up

wrenches from

they had tools

and it was just like this crazy

scene it was insane

and I was the center of it

with this driver

so the police pulled me away

and they put me and the

driver in jail for the night

and the organizers of the event

came and build us out

and all of that story

is captured in these moments do you think

that one of the keys to your success

because we're talking about so many individual

stories because the photos

are triggering those inspiring thoughts

like how did that happen how did that happen

but do you think that one of your keys

to this success of your

story is the fact that you

click the shoot button when maybe

others wouldn't

let me tell you I had this

moment during this

melee

during this fight when

if you could imagine

holding on to something with your life

imagine holding on to

at the time I had a 1D

mark 2N

Canon

with a 17 to 40 lens on it

I still have that lens

today imagine holding

on to this camera for your dear life

and

a mob of people are pulling it out of your hands

and there's literally nothing you can do

to hold on to it and the camera is gone

that moment was

I wasn't really thinking

like oh they took my camera

I was thinking I lost these pictures forever

and then

because the Americans

were coming down from the stands like

God bless them I love them

so much with their

wrenches in hand and

metal pipes or whatever they had

they joined the fight too

and they were able to get the camera back

it was smashed already

you know they like

smashed out on the ground

they were able to get the camera back

yesterday

and then they

there was this moment where they

I didn't talk about this in the story but

there was this moment where they

handed the camera back to me

because like it was

to a point where they were helping enough

where it was like a good fight

they handed it back to me

and I literally handed it back to the person

and I went back to fighting

yeah

not quite that introverted self

well I just had to do

a photography

at the time

I'm not a fighter I'm a lover

this was probably

the biggest fight I've ever been in

and

I'm just glad I had something to show for it

in the end this driver

had to buy me a new camera I think

at the time it was so expensive too it was like

$6,000

back in 2007

but to get on to

the monetary side of things

if I was to flick through this

book and as you said you've done it

the opposite way round you had a phrase for that

what was it called

backwards

chronological

so we started with the McLaren

photo which was

well

so these

the first pages

let's see

Ken

yeah Ken flicking me off there's a lot of that

like the first pages

here

see

like my first ever

like for example like these

with a point and shoot camera

from behind the fence

and even this

this is my first time ever seeing a Nissan

Skyline

and these photos are so bad

and they're just so

like shaky

out of focus

amazing when it's super out of focus

like you said isn't up to scratch

in terms of the paint or the build

or whatever because it makes such a difference

when you see that but it's only when it's been explained

that you know to look but I look

at this and I think to myself

I was so in awe

of what I was seeing

something that I

only saw in video games

and also in magazines

and VHS

was in front of me for the first time

and I freaked out

and now I'm

very very lucky to have one

but that and not just one

one that literally was sat

at the quail

because it's perfect I've been underneath

that car it is I I literally

have a lot of pinch me I must be

Jamie moments and that was

one of them so the story of

that one I

bought it

in Japan and I enjoyed it

as my car in Japan unrestored

for

two years I drove around

all around Japan with my family

and I put about

10,000 kilometers on it

and it was just my daily driver

once it came

to age once it turned 25

years old it was legal to import to the

US I was thinking

okay that's going to come around the corner

I

need to pull the trigger

on a restoration if

if I want it to be

restored right it needs to be

done in Japan so I took it

to graduate Shida who does

the ones for built by

legends they build the mines demo cars

I told myself I need

to do this and I needed to do it

properly and I need to document it

and that's what I did

and we're talking about

a car that was left outside for 25

years it was well taken care of

still the interior was very clean

but it wasn't base

side blue it was fade side blue

and it was very faded

and it was mechanically

sound but it was pretty ugly

especially when I parked it next

to something that was a lot more

well taken care of maybe

it was if I parked next to a car

that was garage you can tell

right away it

was like a light blue

so then I thought to myself

I got to get it restored

get it done right

and we uncovered quite a bit of rust

and I showed all of that stuff

on camera but

now it's all new shock towers

all new

pretty much everything the only thing

that we left alone was

the subframe and that's something that we'll restore

here in the U.S.

but the engine is basically

turned back to zero miles

and it's just stock

stock horsepower

330 horsepower

dyno verified

and it's just something that I enjoy

and I drove it from Los Angeles

to Monterey

and displayed at the quail

dirty brakes and everything

you know completely filthy

after driving maybe

800 miles

and now at the tail end of this

I've put 1200 miles on it

in a week span

so

now I'm actively unrestoring it

but if you could

tell the person who had

their line

removed from their school

photo with a quote on it by the teacher

that you got that car

if you could tell that kid that

what would have his reaction have been about

one of disbelief it's just not a car

it's not just a car

it's something that

is a symbol

and it's significant

and it's

like a milestone

in my life

I think that's what it is

it's something that was so

far it could not be

as far it could

it might as well be

saying

like you could go to the moon or you can go to Mars

whatever maybe one day that'll happen

in somebody's lifetime

but it might as well have been

that for me

because we're talking about a car that was

never meant for US shores

and

so many other factors right

everything

I just never thought

I was just thinking to myself

I just never thought I would get to that point

I never ever

how does one learn to charge

the correct amount of money

to capture

a very special moment

to allow themselves to put themselves

in the position of owning

these cars and living the passion

that you capture through your lens

so that's a great question and that's something

that people ask me almost every day

especially

photographers they're like I don't know

how much to charge

it really comes down

to what your time is worth

supply and demand

it just that's really it

265 days in a year

300,000 photos you can take

so for me

it's about

time but it's also about the story now

right so

I'm lucky in that I get to

choose the stories that I

want to tell

and honestly

so much of what I do now is still for the passion

and I come out of pocket to make sure it exists

I

I keep mentioning Goodwood but

that's a really good example of one where

I

wanted to photograph

this year I wanted to

see what it was like

see the atmosphere

see how it's evolved

because the last time I was there was in 2017

it was a special year

so I thought to myself okay

I gotta go this year I'm gonna pay my own way

and see what happens

and tell stories and get

the best imagery

I physically can get

and just show the world

what this place is like

and what it's like to be there

and so

with events like that

I put in the time I put in the effort

I put in the money to make sure it exists

who knows if I'll come out

positive in the end who knows

I might come out negative I don't really care

the point is that

I was able to do it

and at the end of the day

I was so proud

of the pictures I was able to make

what percentage of photos

in this book

are from paid work

now I think it's

that's a really good question

if I had to take a really educated

guess

I would say probably

80%

wow

it was actually higher than I was anticipating

well

and that's a really slippery slope

when it comes to paid work right

because

what does that actually mean

is it something where

expenses were getting paid

or if I was paid to go somewhere

but I spent an extra day

or my afternoon

to shoot something

that's when it gets crazy right

so because I have such limited time

I always make the most of my time

always

when I was in the UK

I was so happy to be able to visit

ProDrive

always loved what they do

so do I

incredible craftsmen

and they're right on for anyone from the UK

that's driving and listens to this podcast on the road

they're right on the side of the M40

I want to say

it's not the M40

I forget the name of the motorway

you literally drive down it and it's on the less

and you go past ProDrive in that building

everyone that knows exactly where that is

peers over to see what is outside

it's next to an aerospace company

it's one of those things where I've driven by it

a couple times now

and every time I thought to myself

I know what's in there

I need to go in there

and this year I was able to make it

happen and

I just have to

make the most of my time

I just had that afternoon

blocked off for that

and no matter where I am

in the world

for example, going to Brunei

I have to stop by in Singapore

that's the only way to get there

which means I'll be

on the ground for this amount of time

maybe I'll visit a shop in Singapore

maybe I'll

end up with some crazy super car

story where

guy dug out the basement of his place

and you never know

and that's the beauty of car culture

it's endless

I can shoot for the rest of my days

every weekend

I can try

but there's endless amount of stories to tell

and there's also the beauty of it

and you agree with me

there's an endless amount of people to listen

and watch and enjoy

we can't

can't make content fast enough

we just can't

there's not enough time

that's the theme of this podcast

it's time

if you were to take your top 10 photos

from the book that you're the most proud of

if you had to

and there'd be 10 different ones every time

but do you think they would be

World No.1 Car Photographer: Larry Chen On Ken Block, Gymkhana BTS & Going To Prison

Nissan R34

About this episode

Original notes