Seeing isn't believing

[qwertydude]

I just washed my car. Literally just a wash. My car is due for a polish, it's been three months since the last polish and one month since I last waxed it with Collinite.

Most people would look at the pictures and think it's already looking outstanding. But in reality it's just so so. It's got a decent shine and some light swirling now. But people get caught up looking at the work of the detailing pros and wonder why there car doesn't look as good as those guys. Well one of the major reasons is simply photography.

Knowing how to use a camera and how lighting and angles play on polished surfaces sorta gets ingrained in detailers. Especially people who did this as a business. There's no better advertising than word of mouth, but the second best is photos of your work. An iPhone simply won't cut it.

Here's some pictures of my so so car, it's my daily beater. This car has only been polished with a cheapy 6" random orbital, wool bonnet and M105 years ago, it's kept up with a seasonal polish with D151 and then when that protection wears off quickly I wax it with Collinite 915 and repeat the Collinite waxings monthly since where I work my car gets at least a half dozen very acidic bird bombs a day and spends all day in the sun. The birds feast on sour purple mystery berries and the bombs are thus bright purple too.

First the swirls, you can see light swirling, in real life it looks slightly worse. So nothing to write home about.

You can see it's very reflective. Or is it? The photo was taken near sunset, with a Pentax DSLR at stopped down at f11 which greatly sharpens the reflections when you take close up shots. Tricks of the trade really which enhance the photos.

The hood which is actually quite beat up and a little more swirly than the rear panel but I couldn't take a picture of the swirls since it was sunset and the rear panel was facing the sun which would show off the swirls more.

But like I said this car is only decently polished and taken care of nothing special. So if you think just because you snap a pic and it doesn't look like the pros job it may just be your bad pic and not your polish. Sometimes it's easy to forget, unless you've seen the car in real life you don't know that your's isn't looking pretty much just as good.

 

[qwertydude]

Oh and recently I've just discovered an old school product that really works wonders, I posted a little on it before but felt it really deserves another mention. Johnson Paste Wax.

It's an old school paste wax but I don't use it for the paint. I use it for the black plastic trim. It works amazing and blackens the plastic as well as any other liquid but the amazing part is it's completely waterproof. I've washed it 4 times now and the plastic parts I've waxed still bead up like the day I waxed it.

I assumed it would whiten plastic but I guess the wax formula is different, it doesn't whiten and even on the tin it says good for plastic and leather. I've used it on my motorcycle leather jacket too since it helps put a shoe shine-like gloss to it and waterproofs the leather too. Good stuff and cheap too. Just leave your jacket outdoors for a couple days after treating it because it will smell like gasoline until all the fumes dry up.

 

[HammerDown]

"Johnson Paste Wax"...I wonder what it would do to rubber as in tires or, vinyl seats or a plastic dash?

 

[qwertydude]

It says it's good for plastic. But you should probably avoid putting it on your dashboard it will make it shiny and a shiny dashboard is a glare hazard.

I suppose since it's safe for leather and doesn't whiten plastic it should be safe to use on vinyl, rubber might work since I know it'll put a shine on the rubber edges of the soles of my dress shoes but the problem is tires just aren't conducive to waxing all the little ridges and creases would collect the wax and this is a high build up wax so you'd end up with it flaking off if you can't get an even and very thin coat on.

Maybe if you were to spread the wax and then before it sets you use a horsehair brush to buff it off like a shoe. I'd try it myself but I don't want to ruin my horsehair shoe shine brush.

 

[SatinSilver]

What year Focus is that? At least there's no rust on it.

 

[Vikas]

qwerty, you are *the* man!! I really appreciate all the solid information that you have posted on detailing. You also have a knack of explaining everything just right.

 

[surfstar]

and here's a 13 year old car with no prep, one use of NuFinish. Likely could be the second time its been waxed since new.

cell phone camera also. It is very easy to make things look good when you have the ability to limit what and how you're presenting it.

 

[qwertydude]

Originally Posted By: satinsilver
What year Focus is that? At least there's no rust on it.


2003 the paint is ok. But the headlights of course turn yellow and need periodical polishing.

 

[Vikas]

Can I get pictures of RIDS using iPhone4? I have tried but not succeeding. It does not like to focus too close.