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Selling your kit car
hinges in large measure on displaying good photographs
of your drivin' machine
to your prospective buyers.
If the adage "A picture is worth a thousand words" is true, then it follows suit that
"One good photograph is worth a thousand crappy snapshots." Sean Ireland

Here's a sampling of the typical snapshots
    we receive every day. Check 'em out for yourself...
so you don't make the same mistakes!

Now you’re only 3 steps away from taking really
 knock-’em-dead
photos of your drivin’ machine:

STEP 1
Click each of these hotlinked images and see some
examples of GREAT motorcar/replicar photos

These GREAT motorcar photography examples are borrowed
from our CobraCountry.com website—but the principles
all remain the same for your motorcar:

full-car shots
frontal shots
cockpit shots
engine shots
Not one of the splendid photos in the examples hotlinked above was taken by a professional photographer--each and every one was shot by "a regular motorcar-enthusiast guy" who carefully followed Curt Scott's Motorcar Photography Tips and then sold his Cobra or GT40 on CobraCountry. No magic involved--just good use of today's digital cameras!

STEP 2
Here's a hotlink to Curt's Motorcar Photography Tips--condensed/ prints on 1-page version. It's a mere 6-minute read. Print it out and follow Curt's simple step-by-step expert pointers--so you can capture seductive/irresistible knock-'em-dead photos of your car. Tip: this high-resolution condensed version prints out beautifully on glossy or semi-gloss inkjet paper.

Take your printout with you on your photo-shoot,
as a reminder checklist.

Click here to see a dramatic example of why Curt counsels you to
make certain your flash works with every single shot you take.

STEP 3
PHONE CURT FIRST
after you've read his photography tips and
    checked out the fine motorcar photography gallery above...
but before you photograph your car—at

 (661) 251-0806 
 for his expert personal tips for shooting your own specific kit car 
or replicar (tips specific, for example, to its paint color, the
engine,
how to best photograph an unfinished kit, doors
up or down (on your Lamborghini replica), your
shooting location, et al.).

DIGITAL PHOTOGRAPHY
DEMANDS A SPOTLESSLY CLEAN LENS
Inspect your lens regularly and make sure it's thoroughly clean. Even a small spot or smudge on the front surface of your lens will result in a blurry/foggy area on your digital images, ruining them. You'd be wise to keep a lens-cleaning cloth in a dust-tight little Ziploc bag to periodically clean your lens surface.
We recently had two entirely separate instances--in ONE day--of advertisers emailing us their (otherwise) excellent photographs... all ruined by a small smudge on their lenses. One of them was using a very good Kodak digicam fitted with a superb German-engineered Schneider-Kreuznach glass lens, but his images were none-the-less completely spoiled--part of his car obscured and "ghosted" with a blurry/foggy mess. Inspect your lens regularly and keep it clean.

Finally, email your text and your (hi-resolution)
digital images directly to Curt, at:

Curt@KitCar.com

  

If you use a Canon brand digital camera
and find it challenging to coax your flash to go into forced/outdoor mode, try putting your main setting on "P" (i.e., "Program") mode (instead of "AUTO"), then go to your "lightning-bolt" flash choices and choose the plain "lightning-bolt" mode, and your flash should work every time (this tip sent to us by the owner of a Canon model A540 PowerShot digicam).

Another Canon owner (Canon model A520 PowerShot) reported that with his model, he had to select the icon that shows a silhouette of a person with the sun behind it (indicating a backlit subject), THEN he selected the proper (i.e., plain) lightning-bolt icon, and voilá!, his flash, too, worked perfectly.

The minimal-featured Canon PC1022 PowerShot S200 Digital Elph (apparently Canon couldn't manage to conjure up a shorter model designation... and they can't even spell 'elf' correctly) offers you no setting for forced/outdoor flash. None, nada, nichts, zilch.

We don't have a clue why Canon forces you to jump through these bewildering hoops, but at least most Canon models do offer "forced flash/ outdoor flash".... these thoroughly unnecessary annoyances notwithstanding.

When you get your camera and flash properly working with the flash discharging with each shot (usually in either Aperture-preferred mode or "Program mode," my advice is: leave it set that way permanently, especially if most of your photography is outdoors.

You may notice that occasionally your flash doesn't discharge... simply because you didn't give it enough time to "recycle/recharge" from the batteries. Probably the best way to avoid this problem is to use rechargeable NiMh (nickel-metal hydride) batteries instead of alkaline batteries, since NiMh batteries recycle your flash capacitor much more rapidly than do alkalines... almost instaneously, in fact.

When you email your photos and text to us:
Generally speaking, your ad will go up on prime time the same day it reaches us. But occasionally an email will just vanish into Cyberspace's circular file and not reach its destination. So be sure to phone Curt and make certain he received your files.

Kit Car
advertising rates
standard KIT CAR FOR SALE ad
 
Your ad runs for 2 months on Kit Car

$65 single color photo & text ad--add $15 for Marquis-Sized 2nd image
3 photo array: $95--add $15 for Marquis-Sized second spread
4 photo array: $110--add $15 for Marquis-Sized second spread

ad renewals

it's only $65 to renew/extend your ad 3 additional months... and you pay no add'l charge if your original ad includes multiple photos and/or the optional Marquis-Sized second array.

Kit Car Prestige Showcase
Your vintage replicar gets its own
dedicated "Web Page on the World Stage."
top-notch/high-resolution digital photos mandatory

Here's a KIT CAR/REPLICAR Prestige Showcase; Runs 3 months, $265. The icon at your left is hotlinked to Dan Braveheart's Prestige Showcase page, where he advertised (and SOLD) his magnificent E.R.A. 427 Cobra! With a Prestige Showcase you get your own custom-designed web page, with hotlinked high-resolution "marquis-sized" images.
 

[$220 to extend your Kit Car Prestige Showcase Page for 3 additional months]

British roadster replica Prestige Showcase
MG-TC, MG-TD, Jaguar (SS-100, XK120, XK150 and D-type),
and Austin-Healey (100 and 3000) replicas

Here's a BRITISH ROADSTER REPLICA Prestige Showcase; Runs 3 months, $265. The icon at your left is hotlinked to Tom Hughes' Prestige Showcase page, where he advertised (and SOLD) his LeMans Blue CAV GT40! With a Prestige Showcase you get your own custom-designed web page, with hotlinked high-resolution "marquis-sized" images.

Porsche replica Prestige Showcase
356 Speedster, 359 Roadster, Super 90 Coupe,
RSK Spyder and 550 Spyder replicas

Here's a Porsche REPLICA Prestige Showcase; Runs 3 months, $265. The icon at your left is hotlinked to Tom Hughes' Prestige Showcase page, where he advertised (and SOLD) his LeMans Blue CAV GT40! With a Prestige Showcase you get your own custom-designed web page, with hotlinked high-resolution "marquis-sized" images.

Lamborghini replica Prestige Showcase
Countach, Diablo and Murcielago replicas

Here's a LAMBORGHINI REPLICA Prestige Showcase; Runs 3 months, $265. The icon at your left is hotlinked to Tom Hughes' Prestige Showcase page, where he advertised (and SOLD) his LeMans Blue CAV GT40! With a Prestige Showcase you get your own custom-designed web page, with hotlinked high-resolution "marquis-sized" images.

Ferrari replica Prestige Showcase
Modena 250GT Spyder California', 246 Dino,
365GTB 'Daytona Spyder', 308GTF and 328 GTB replicas

Here's a FERRARI REPLICA Prestige Showcase; Runs 3 months, $265. The icon at your left is hotlinked to Tom Hughes' Prestige Showcase page, where he advertised (and SOLD) his LeMans Blue CAV GT40! With a Prestige Showcase you get your own custom-designed web page, with hotlinked high-resolution "marquis-sized" images.

Maserati replica Prestige Showcase

Here's a MASERATI REPLICA Prestige Showcase; Runs 3 months, $265. The icon at your left is hotlinked to Tom Hughes' Prestige Showcase page, where he advertised (and SOLD) his LeMans Blue CAV GT40! With a Prestige Showcase you get your own custom-designed web page, with hotlinked high-resolution "marquis-sized" images.

-Kit Car classified ads-

  • $65 all-text (no photo) classified ad, runs 2 months (appropriate for unbuilt kits, engines, other components)
-Kit Car wanted ads-
  • $50 classified "Kit Car Wanted" ad, runs 3 months ($50 to renew for another 3 months): broadcast to all the Cobra owners what specific replicar you're searching for, what drivetrain components you desire, and/or what maximum price you're willing to pay.

Getting your ad to us:
Marketing your kit car begins--first and foremost--
with good (preferably excellent) photographs

So here--by the numbers--are the steps you take.

1. Print out and (carefully) read Curt Scott's Motorcar Photography Tips; then

2. phone Curt (661-251-0806) and describe your car to him, so he can give you some extra expert tips for photographing your specific car. This advance phone call to Curt will probably pay you big dividends in presenting your replicar to the world;

3. Photograph your car, carefully following Curt's tips. And don't stray away from his tips: if you follow them to the letter, you'll have captured a batch of superb photographs of your car;

4. Compose your text; for a "regular" classified/photo ad, keep it all in one paragraph; for a Prestige Showcase page, putting your lists of features and components into columns is just fine. You can use just about any ad you see on any of Kit Car's "For Sale" pages as a guide to arranging your own descriptive text. Just be sure to keep all the logical items together--for example, everything under the hood belongs together, everything on the chassis & suspension belongs together, everything in the cockpit, and so on.

In a "regular" text/photo ad, try to keep your word count under 250... you'll be charged 20¢/word over 250 words. But you could write "The Great American Novel" in fewer than 250 words. There are no limitations on the number of words you can use in a Prestige Showcase ad;

5. Email your photos and text directly to Curt@KitCar.com

Curt gently recommends that you email him 10 or 12 photos for him to select from; for example 4 or 5 "full car" shots, and 2 or 3 each of: engine, cockpit, and head-on frontal shots. And be sure to phone Curt shortly after you've sent your files, just to make sure they made it to him safely.

CAUTION!! Some digital cameras now come with special software to send your images over the Internet, especially Kodak. Apparently this software is often confusing to use (Wonders never cease!), and offers you a choice of resolutions, including "email resolution." This typically results in your sending an ULTRA-LOW-RESOLUTION copy of each of your photos. DON'T USE THAT SETTING--these low-rez/low-quality images are worthless for using in your ad.

IMPORTANT!!Whether you send us your photos using your regular email program, or using your Camera's uploading software, make sure you send us your photos at their full-size/ high resolution, and precisely as they came out of your camera with no cropping, no editing, no resolution downsizing.

 

Crown Publishing Company, Inc.
P.O. Box 1337
Santa Clarita, California 91386
Attention: Kit Car Advertising

for ad insertions to be paid by credit card, dial:
661-251-2223 voice line, or
661-251-8584 (24-hr. fax line)

email: Curt@KitCar.com

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