History Now In Color!

Cool. There is some charm to old photos that just don't come through with today's equipment. I am sure the film and cameras had a lot to do with that, but maybe even the fact that people just had a different perspective on things as well and saw things just a bit differently than we do now.

And nice to finally see an actual period Studebaker truck Custom and a pretty nice one to boot. They are some what popular now, but pretty hard to find an old custom.

 

For me the early to mid-sixties is the golden era for hot rods. These pictures are great!

 

It's cool that most of the photos have people in them (We will assume some of them are the owners) not just models, not that there is anything wrong with that but it adds some interest.
That 37 Ford is cool and that mean blue supercharged Ford would probably give grown men nightmares!

 

Ryan, I think some cool pics of your Wife's Wagon done in the same manner as the originals would be rad. That color that is used on the wagon would look great on saturated film as shown in your JJ images.

 

I do like the atmosphere of those old rod photos, remind me a bit of Andy Southard's books which are never far away when I need alittle inspiration.

I'll have the 29 roadster pickup too if you don't mind>

 

Any tips on how to do this digitally? I don't really have any photo editing skills myself.

 

Border helps as mentioned.
Also... play with polarizing filters, desaturation filters and bump the reds and greens a bit.

Here's a couple of quick photoshopped digis...

hc

 

Thanks Ryan, those pics are awesome. Does anybody have info or more pics of the Stude P/U.

How are you guys saving photos from the blog entry? I would like to save the pics and the Shoebox entry from a few weeks ago.

 

This one is not quite it but close. I stole the pic from a different thread.

 

I like 'em. As with glamor photos of pinups of the era, these photos seem to be sandblasted with light. Everything looks smooth and clean, and happy! No photo expert, I; just my .02 impression FWIW YMMV PITW.

 

Every day's sunny and you meet the nicest people in a Hot Rod!

 

The first thing I thought of when I saw these pics was that several of them also went on to be featured on the old Hot Rod Magazine bubblegum collector cards from years ago. I've got a stack of them somewhere but I never managed to collect the whole set. Have to dig them out and make a list of the ones I need and my duplicates and maybe do a little trading with somebody here.

It's pretty amazing the way the brain processes certain combinations of certain colors and makes us associate them with a certain period of time in our lives. I wonder if our current digital photos will evoke the same kind of feelings 30 or 40 years from now?

This isn't quite the same thing as the Kodachrome "look" but a couple months ago I posted this info about a free download for PolaDroid software.

http://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=325152

It's a quick and fun way to recreate that random, funky look of a Polaroid SX70 print and there were a few other samples posted here.



To get your copy check out http://www.poladroid.net/

 

Soon there will be no use for designers as everything will have an application or filter to do the dirty work that the rest of us take pride in.

 

Thanks Ryan I'm savin all of em!

 

I remember that 28/29 in pic #4 roadster like it was yesterday, and the way it shows in this picture is exactly the way it showed in Hot Rod Mag. I loved it then and built a model of it, trying to get the color just like the picture, got close, with the paint at the time. I remember the Stude pickup also, awesome!

 

Yeah, I know. It's another skill suck. But it kind of makes up for it some with it's uncontrollable, grungy, unpredictable output. Plus it makes whirring and grinding Polaroid noises and you have to wait a couple minutes before you can see the results. So at least it probably pisses off some of the instant gratification crowd!

 

Shit! ever been to Viva Las Vegas and seen how people go nuts over vintage threads?? Love the way those chicks looked back then. Why was everyone so skinny?
Also, all that chrome is rediculous!! Thanks for sharing.
JT

 

Noticed a few SBC powered rods. But look at all the Olds, Cad and Poncho powered units along with a W block and an FE. Hot rod building declined a lot in the 60's due to the Big 3 enticing the paycheck with factory muscle - it was way too easy to buy the performance thrill than it was to build it yourself. I've been part of both: began with a 324 powered T roadster, then a 61 Vette and finally a 68 Hemi Charger to round out the 60's era. All three were great vehicles. Today, I am back with a 324 Olds powered T - because it impacted the greater number of the five senses.
Side note: my personal observation at specialty car events is that stock "1000 point" restoration muscle cars garner less attention than the homebuilt real hot rods.
Thanks Ryan for stimulating this part of my "getting older" grey matter.

 

I can still remember reading about this one in high school study hall.
That was about 45 years ago. I loved this car so much I cut it out and hung it
on my bedroom wall. I still have it in a box in my art studio.
The picture AND the car held up well!

 

Thanks for posting. I really like the look of the mid 60's hot rods/customs. The pics are giving me ideas on paint for my Acadian...

 

I've always been a fan of this soft but bright look. I wish I knew how to imitate it.

 

koda chrome -- and they took it away from us

 

Thanks for the astounding "pictorial"!!!

 

Great photographs; I love how the builders/owners often posed with the cars back then; the girls-next-door/models too... not only were they "skinny" but they seemed to have hardly any tattoos neither...

 

I think you've made a couple of very accurate and interesting observation here. I've always felt that a similar situation existed in the broadcast and color TV business during roughly the same time period. Having grown up with B&W TV, I used to consider early color sets to be unwatchable. If I had my choice I'd have rather watched them in B&W than to see people with orange skin and blinding blue skies. The original technology obviously had a lot of room for improvement.

And then sometime in the mid 70s, I was staying at a friend of a friend's apartment in Indianapolis while attending the US Nationals over Labor Day weekend. One evening we were all sitting around watching the Jerry Lewis Telethon and after about 20 minutes I sat up and blurted out, "Hey, we're watching a color TV!" Of course everyone else assumed that I was an alien, or maybe a Luddite, but it was the first color TV I'd ever seen that had fairly accurate watchable colors. And I still remember that it was a Philco TV, a brand that hasn't been made for a lot of years.

Now, if I could just convince everybody to set their wide screen TVs to the proper aspect ratio and learn to accept the occasional black bars around the picture...

 

I said it elsewhere but I wish real life was shown in Technicolor.

I love the saturated colors as well as some elements that are washed out.

Have you ever watched "Brady Bunch" and then "All in the Family" back to back?! The video taped Archie Bunker leaves me cold.

Yeah, sick.

 

I purchased a used Aires 35V, 35mm camera many years ago. It was made in the 50's as a sort of Leica/Canon rangefinder knock off. The color coatings on lenses back then weren't what they are today. The color that is produced on print film is very much like the look of pictures posted here. I always get a kick out of shooting with it.
Old looking pictures from an old camera. You can still purchase one from an Ebay auction for under a $100.

 

Cool. I like the soft dated color in these pics too! I had these on my walls "back in the day." Do you have the one of Gene Chan's purple "T" roadster with brass plated wheels, Shannon cones, and hemi engine? He was from the town where I grew up.