David's pictures

pictures from photo sets I take and put up on dcmimages.com

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Lucy O'Doll

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Lucy O'Doll at Wonderland Studios.

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I have been around drifting for a while, as some of my friends have. I remember D1 coming over, I remember drift battles not being any good until the Great 8, I remember when V8’s were the oddball engine and 500whp was SO much…

But I have no nostalgia for these things. Drifting may have it’s issues, but what was on the track this weekend at Irwindale was better than I have seen. Don’t get me wrong, there were issues, it isn’t all wine and roses. But I was excited watching everything go down, and the last battles of the event were pretty great (and after last year’s hoolabaloo it was nice to see a little less controversy). I do like that there was a distinct lack of V8’s on the podium, but a V8 did win the Championship.

So, check out my selected edits from Friday and Saturday at Irwindale, and go check out the monster gallery at WreckedMagazine.

  Final Fight, Formula Drift at Irwindale. I have been around drifting for a while, as some of my friends have. I remember D1 coming over, I remember drift battles not being any good until the Great 8, I remember when V8's were the oddball engine and 500whp was SO much...

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Motorsports Photography

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http://wp.me/s4xsPZ-1230

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Automotive

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In the middle of August every year, there is a week of automotive nirvana that occurs on the Monterey Peninsula. There are automotive auctions and car shows all over the peninsula, from downtown Monterey on the Wharf south to Carmel Valley. You can attend any number of car shows, from the Concorso d’Lemons, The Gathering at the Quail (specializing in historic cars of motorsport), to one of the greatest car shows there is, the Pebble Beach: Concours d’Elegance. You can even just walk around Carmel and watch the amazing parade of cars roll up and down the hills.

Here are a few images from my walk around Carmel on Friday.

But, if you are more like me, you like your history a little more action packed. Bookending the week are events at one of North America’s greatest race tracks, Laguna Seca.

The Automotive Weekend in Monterey and Carmel In the middle of August every year, there is a week of automotive nirvana that occurs on the Monterey Peninsula.

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2956 miles. That is the distance I covered via Scion FRS, in my 7 day long road trip to Evergreen Speedway to shoot the Seattle round of Formula Drift for Wrecked Magazine. I love road trips, I had a new car, so I had to do it.

At 6am I filled up for the first time, and headed out from San Diego North County. I wanted to leave early, but my body didn’t. So I sat in a bit of LA traffic, not nearly as bad as expected, and just kept on going north.

I took the 99 once I got past the Grapevine, following the instructions of my phone’s GPS program. So I got to drive through Fresno and all those wonderful places. Just stopping to get gas an Popeye’s at one point, I kept chugging north until I met back with the 5.

My last stop for gas in California was just short of the border. I can’t honestly remember the name of the town, it was hot and muggy and very green. I guess that is the thing we SoCal folk notice the most when we head north, it is so so green. As I headed through Oregon I saw some people heading the same direction as I was.

The original plan was to stop in Eugene for the night, but after I ate there I felt I could keep moving, so I drove on to Portland. It sucks that so much of the cool stuff I wanted to see was obscured by darkness, but I just didn’t have the time to spare. I did get to have a great local beer in Eugene, and ate at a great spot.

I decided to just skip all the sightseeing and  drove straight to the track, to get there in time for the first media meeting, and start shooting! Only sight was some of my car’s cousins getting hauled to a dealer. Then just on to the drifting and shooting Thursday practice.

Of course I shot throughout the day Friday and Saturday, through the Pro2 and main events. I shot everything a little differently than I had before, more angles, not just seeing how slow of a pan I can get like I normally spend most of my time doing, haha.  When it all was said and done, Darren McNamara had one over Dean “Karnage” Kearney. It was kind of awesome to see the Viper doing that well. I have always liked watching Vipers do just about anything, especially drifting.

The next day I headed back south, and a bit more leisurely pace. I headed to Portland for lunch, then down to Eugene again. But this time I went to the coast, and down the coast from there. This time I had time to stop and take a few photos here and there. And I gladly did, as it was quite beautiful in many spots.

The next day I was able to meet the owner of one of my favorite cars on earth for lunch in San Francisco, and then went down the coast then to dinner near Laguna Seca. This reminded me that I will be driving back up here in a few weeks for the amazing historic weekend held every year in August on the peninsula.

The night was spent in Carmel, and then the next day I drove home. The 1 ALMOST drove me insane because of being covered in slow slow traffic, but I made it home, and I loved pretty much the whole damn trip.

So, check out the rest of the photos. Share this, and come back for my next road trip up to the Rolex Monterey Motorsport Reunion at Laguna Seca!

My ALMOST 3000 mile road trip to Formula Drift Seattle 2956 miles. That is the distance I covered via Scion FRS, in my 7 day long road trip to Evergreen Speedway to shoot the Seattle round of Formula Drift for Wrecked Magazine.

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Cars and Coffee - Irvine

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aka – Just another Saturday.

  Haha, I WISH all my Saturdays were so great. I started with a plan. Well, I had a plan that kept changing as I found more and more things to do during Saturday. As the day began, the plan was:

Go to Cars and Coffee in Irvine

Get a quick breakfast

Head to the LA Roadster Show

Meet friend at Donuts and Coffee event at East Fork Supply Co and drool all over an 8×10 polaroid.

Bother said friend (photographer Adam Bendig) while he welds on his motorcycle

Go watch speedway racing at Costa Mesa Speedway

Cars and Coffee Irvine went off as planned. The Toyota FT1 show car was there, as well as the normal mind bending number of other restored beauties and modified monsters. It is a crowded event, but worth the effort every time. Basically the best thing about it is people go there to talk to other car people about cars and look at cars. I always have at least 2 interesting conversations with new people while I am there.

By the time I left Cars and Coffee I decided that I needed to strike the LA Roadster Show off the docket, which allowed me to have breakfast wherever I wanted.  Anepalco’s Cafe is one of the best places for breakfast I have ever found. You won’t get french toast and waffles, but amazing Mexican dishes OR crepes! Parking is always an issue here, and I went, drive around 4 times finding nothing. And with the monster looking line out front, I drive off dejected. I drove to some highly Yelp rated pancake shop, but the line there was even scarier, and it just didn’t sound good. I REALLY wanted Anepalco’s so I drove back. It worked out for the best as there was parking and no wait when I got back! Fantastic! HUEVOS DIVORCIADOS – Green & Red Sauces, Tortillas, Ham, Bacon, Eggs, Red Onion, Avocado, Cotija Cheese, Sour Cream, Cilantro

After that I went over to East Fork Supply Co. to wee what was up. There were Cronuts, there was iced coffee, hand made leather goods, and a big honking camera. I talked nerdy camera stuff, looked at stuff I wanted to buy.

I then ran around and saw some friends I don’t get to see often over at WOnderland Studios, which was great. After they were sick of me I went and bothered Adam while he was trying to work on his project bike. I got some photos of him welding so I think he forgave me.

Then we drove to the Speedway in Costa Mesa to watch some racing! I had never been so I didn’t expect much, but it was awesome! There were so many people there! There were sidecars, kids classes, and pros. The SMELL, loved the way those bikes smelled! Haha. After all the racing there was a Motorcycle Demolition Derby! This entailed taping 3 balloons to themselves, and having a PVC “bat” to pop the other people’s balloons! It was kind of insane. I didn’t have my camera for this, because I can’t be a photographer ALL the time! But I got this shot from my phone!

So, below is the WHOLE gallery from the day, check it out, and enjoy. Then next weekend, GO SEE SOME SHIT!

Cars and Coffee, Donuts and Coffee, Welding, and Speedway Racing aka - Just another Saturday. Haha, I WISH all my Saturdays were so great. I started with a plan.

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HRE Open House

This weekend was very very Saturday heavy. Sunday was a day of doing nothing, Saturday was full. It started out with meeting up with the SoCal SD FT86 at Carlsbad Cars. There we gathered and went o...

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This is a photo of Arielle Lipsen (a good friend of mine) who was thrown to the ground and hit with the butt of a DEA agent’s rifle. She is now wrongfully being charged with assaulting a federal agent during a DEA raid of her sister’s smoke shop in Texas. Her sister gave the following statement to a local news site:

“She was having a conversation with a female agent, and trying to give the agents the lock code,” Ilana Lipsen claimed. “She was trying to tell them there was no key, but a code. There were too many officers and about half of them were doing nothing, then this one agent charged at her, threw her, kicked her legs out from under her, and when she was falling, her leg brushed up against his leg. That’s when he said ‘you’re trying to beat a federal agent’ and shoved the butt of his rifle into her neck.” (via BigBendNow)

Arielle reached out to me last night asking if I could help get eyes on her story because not only is she being wrongly accused, but her bond restrictions are insane. She said: "Part of the bond restrictions is that my sister retract all her statements from the press and say that I was never assaulted and that she lied."

There are a lot more details here, here and here.

She asked me if I could get people’s eyes on this story. This is a thing to scream about. There’s no reason for a federal agent to put his hands on an unarmed, unthreatening citizen. Not only was she assaulted (LOOK AT THAT PHOTO) but now they might actually send her to jail.

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Wow. Can they put restrictions like that on her bond?? They won’t let her out unless they tell the press they lied? I can’t eve wrap my brain around that.