Automotive history is littered with projects and concepts that push the envelope and concept of what a car should be , but few have even come close to even match the out the box thinking of the Briggs Automotive Company .

Their concept was simple to build a machine to allow for the purest form of driver engagement. Their clean sheet thinking and design process has produced something truly radical , a car that compromises on nothing but the ability to allow the driver to engage with the road in a way that no other car can even come close to matching.

Since its launch I think the personality of the mono is getting a little bit lost, it fast becoming known as a track car with number plates and a tax disc however I think if you spend some time with it and forget the conventions of what a car should be (as they did when building this project). You start to realise that yes it does use race technology and yes it does loosely take its styling cues from single seater racing , however its not a race car. For me you realise that its form and function are more geared much like the gearbox for the highway.

With the pictures we wanted to get the Mono away from the track out into the open road and usher viewers to get out and just drive the car, in the way its intended to be driven. I wanted to place this ultra sleek ultra modern car out into the truly rural setting and then prove that the car is as much at home here as it is on a race track.

By far one of the most iconic tracks on the F1 calendar, spa a true drivers circuit, fast flowing and fully committed  . However to shoot its a tricky circuit with images spread out across its sprawling expanse, often becoming an exercise in planning and time management to ensure that your able to utilise the sessions to their best rather than the over indulgences in creativity that some of the more condensed tracks allow for.

As a photographer its one of the few circuits in the world where you wake up wishing for rain, the 2013 grand prix saw rain, but not in the levels that have helped secure the spa circuit a place in history. When the rain falls, as only it can at spa the track really starts to show its teeth and with it produces some truly unqiue opportunities to capture  motorsports finest drivers absolutely on the limit dancing though Belgium’s very own slice of green hell . So here is to  next time and hoping the sky really starts to fall, and not just with green peace protestors !

These days its rare that as an editorial automotive photographer you actually get to do any proper miles on a shoot. Most happen on one or two local stretches of road, how ever once in a while the opportunity arrises for a real road trip and when its in a couple of seriously quick german machines then you know its going to be a lot of fun!

Starting in Germany the plan was to clear some big miles on the autobahns to really stretch our legs before hitting the alps via Liechtenstein and then on down in to france to rendezvous with the rest of the team for three days of track based shenanigans

A tight tight two days of driving left little time for sight seeing and even less time for photography.  When your shooting a  road trip for a feature its all too easy to want to stop every two or three miles and shoot however if your not careful this can soon turn an ‘easy’ 8 hour drive in to a 12 – 14 hour marathon. You really need to pick your spots and make sure that when you do stop you work every angle and look for as many pictures as you can.

I always love a feature where we get to travel and shoot the cars in a multitude of environments and this has been on of the most enjoyable that I’ve done for a while.

The Nissan S15 is about as fast and the furious as you can get , very much the go to car for boy racers and drifters alike. 10 years on and as second hand prices have fallen, so have the chances of finding an example with out the breakfast bar sized rear wing, garish paint and oversized exhaust . However every now and then you stumble across a car that hasn’t been subjected to the same treatment as the rest. A car where the driver hasn’t taken the same lemming-esk approach and has actually produced something a little bit refreshing.

The use of matt black is nothing new with its roots chased back to the early days of hot rodding, it has however gained a resurgence in popularity in recent years with many luxury manufactures sporting it as an (over priced) optional extra. When used correctly (and no fiat putting it on a 500 is not using it correctly) one thing matt black can do very well is give a car attitude, the same kind attitude that the school yard bully had where you knew what ever you said chances were he was going to hurt you.

With the BHP to back up the attitude this is one S15 thats a refreshing change  from the normal Fast and Furious brigade .