Why I Hate Photographing the Most Beautiful Bike Show of the Year

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I recently attended the MADE bike show. It’s in Portland, so it’s a short commute for me, and plays host to some of the most beautiful handcrafted bikes of the year. Walking into a former shipbuilding dry dock lit with twinkly lights, you’re surrounded by handmade bikes and the craftspeople who build them. It should be easy to take great images, but everyone is trying to do the exact same thing.

Some people get possessive

Outside of Zidell Yards, the location of the event is big, but lots of space doesn’t necessarily mean lots of usable space for taking photos. There’s a tension to that where industry folks can get very possessive about specific spots. That looks like a cool spot over there, but so-and-so always sets up there. Do I care?

I tend to get there earlier than others, but I’ve had people actually set up in front of my tripod before and I’d rather not deal with it. It’s a random stretch of pavement in front of a wall. I have other things to concentrate on, and the best location is more fluid anyway. For me it’s about isolating the bike rather than the specifics of background textures.

Of course, this is not my first year here. I’d already dealt with all of this in past years and this year I had a plan. I knew before I even arrived that I was going to avoid the main building. I wanted to avoid both the morning light that causes strong verticals and other people walking around fighting for a shot against the wall. Instead I intentionally went to the unloved, full sun spot that is as far from the building as you can get.

Building a signature look

I generally try to have the sun behind the camera, hitting the bike straight on. Sometimes we are blessed with typical Portland overcast skies, but even then, the sun direction matters. I also want the saddle and handlebars to stand out against a light background, and I always shoot from a low angle. That means I can’t use the pavement as the backdrop.

Doing my own thing

The whole challenge at MADE is to create images that look distinct. It is unusual to always shoot from such a low angle, and it’s also rare to embrace the sun rather than hide from it. I say let the metal shine and just make sure the shadows fall in the right spot. Coincidentally, that also lets me pick locations no one else wants, saving me from having to jostle for space.

Then there’s framing. Most people in the industry use a long 200mm or even 300mm lens. That choice isolates the bike with ease and looks impressive. It stands out from everyday photos, but because most everyone in cycling media relies on it, that look tends to be similar across outlets.

I come from a background in studio product photography; I love the medium format look and I know it well. To replicate that wider field of view while maintaining a shallow depth of field, I stitch multiple photos together. That extra context creates a beautiful contrast between the soft, out-of-focus background and the sharp subject.

It’s a little harder to do things this way, but I know exactly how to make it work. The real challenge is sticking to my guns. I had someone help me out this year, and there are always people I know talking or giving advice. Everyone thinks they know how it should be done, and they question my process because it doesn’t look like it’s going to work. It can also be difficult to manage as the sun moves.

It’s physically hard on me as I do the work, too. At one point, I was worried the camera would overheat from the direct sun and I was dripping with sweat. I’ve practiced this technique over and over for years, but I have to be willing to stick to what I know works and trust—without being able to see the final results on site—that it will come together. It’s genuinely scary when there is no second chance and no one checking the work as it happens like there is on a commercial shoot. I have had things go wrong.

Ultimately, I stuck to what I’d practiced this year and it worked. I breathed a sigh of relief that evening and came away from this year’s show happy to have embraced some weird spots while other people at MADE were fighting for background textures.

Next year I’m told that we won’t be at the same location. Instead of the challenges that come with a dark and cluttered interior and a full sun, crowded exterior, the show will be at the convention center. I won’t have had three years of practice there, so do I show up between now and then and practice? Do I take the bikes outside or do I embrace that the images will look like a convention center floor? There are a ton of questions that I don’t yet know the answers to, but I’m excited to figure out.

The gear

I know bikes and cameras definitely intersect. I use a Nikon Z6III and the Nikkor Z 105 macro lens, but options from Canon or Sony work just as well. Would anyone be interested in an in-depth bike photography tutorial article sometime? Let me know!

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