I photographed ORSM – the green Holden LJ torana, pictured here – for the cover of the March 2025 issue of Street Machine magazine. The car has been around for a long time, having been formerly piloted down drag strips around the country by the late Sam Fenech.
The family has returned the car to street duties with a full rebuild and it is looking smoother than ever. Grab a copy and read the full story now!
What has 980hp, 22x13in rears and a ton of attitude? Peter Bonassi’s Holden Commodore, that’s what.
This VK was Peter’s dream car from his mid-teens, bit it took almost a decade to make his dream a reality. It’s not every day you find a small-block making this kind of horsepower, either.
My photo shoot was featured in the 2024 Street Machine Yearbook. Enjoy a few photos of the car here.
Who doesn’t love a good skid shot?! I know the team at Street Machine sure do. And from the feedback I’ve seen online, many readers do, too.
I got to shoot Dom Luci’s Holden for the cover of Street Machine’s January 2025 issue. The skid shot was the last thing we did during the photo shoot. It took mere seconds to finish off the sticky rubber at the back and the smoke was instant.
Believe it or not, this was actually the only viable frame I got from the skid. I had set the car up to make best use of the sun, and set up a couple of flashes around the car to fill in some shadow and light up the smoke. The car had other ideas. It immediately kicked off to the side, Dom went out of view – hidden behind the bower – and the flashes were no longer in their optimum positions.Â
After that, the car just disappeared behind a thick cloud of smoke, noever to be seen again. The air was quite still that afternoon and there was no moving it. Despite that, this shot still ticked almost all the boxes and the cover came out great!
Be sure to pick up a copy and read the whole story now!
It was great to see my photo shoot on Chris Schembri’s HT Monaro finally make it into the December 2024 issue of Street Machine. I’d shot it several months prior in a newly finished shed that belonged to a friend of his – both the car and the shed looking a million bucks apiece.
Powered by a supercharged iron-block 408ci Dart LS, this classic Aussie coupe is absolutely no slouch and Chris isn’t afraid to bury the boot in it.I don’t think you can ever get sick of HK/HG/HT Monaros, can you?!
FLASHBACK to 2006. It was the first year that we opened the Car of the Year awards up to a public vote. I was editor of Street Commodores at the time. We had a custom trophy designed and built for the purpose by Danny Hoang from Cyber Motorsports, from memory. It turned out so nicely, but given the state of decay that ran through Express Publications in the 2010s, I hate to think what happened to it.
We courted controversy by having the winner chosen by public vote. The first winner was a twin-turbo V6, which sent some of the diehard V8 guys into a tailspin. I even had one former cover car owner call me one night claiming all sorts of conspiracy theories and making personal attacks.
Frankly, the car was a pioneer and a deserved winner and life continued on.
I continued on at Express until 2010, when I went freelance – contributing to most of the Express motoring titles until the bitter end. It was sad seeing the magazines being allowed to peter out of existence, but I’ll always be grateful for the experience I gained and the people I met.
Mark Caruana found a unicorn when he stumbled across this genuine 11,000-mile survivor that had already been through one ground-up resto. A truly ‘only driven on Sundays’ situation, much of this car’s interior is actually original!
It was a quick build, with the final rush from painted shell to Summernats taking just three short months. Find a copy of the November 2024 issue of Street Machine to read all about it.
Al Vella is no stranger to drag racing or to Street Machine’s Drag Challenge. But his latest Capri build will decimate everything he’s achieved before, thanks to its monster 468ci naturally-apirated small-block build and light weight carbon panels.
Making a stout 1000hp, this little British coupe runs on 15x14in rear wheels and 315 radials. Despite all the horsepower and racing influence, the car has been beautifully finished, with the panel work handled by the talented crew at Image Vehicle Manufacturing.
My shoot was featured in the November 2024 issue of Street Machine.
Simon Kryger’s WB Tonner was a first for Street Machine. The magazine has never run a car quite like it on the front cover before and may never do so again.
Powered by a nitrous-sniffing 632ci big-block and underpinned by a number of drag-oriented chassis and suspension upgrades, this machine looks like it just got done with 40 years of tradie work… and in many ways it has.
Get up close and you’ll see most of the patina on this thing is legit. Original paint, original steel tray. Look closer though and you see the tray floor is now a digital print of a photo of the original tray. The brown vinyl trim actually hides a pair of Kirkey race seats and matching brown painted roll cage. The reverse-cowl scoop is covered in a beautifully executed vinyl wrap featuring matching rust spots and well-matched pale yellow.
The shoot was featured on the cover of the October 2024 issue of Street Machine.
Simon Fawcett and Karen Savage’s 1946 Chevrolet truck is a rare machine – an Australian-built ute that boasts numerous stylistic points unique to the model.
Built by the teams at Image Vehicle Manufacturing and Woods & Woods, the car has been some 12 years in the making and the results are incredible.
It’s also about the fifth or sixth car I’ve photographed from the IVM stable. The photo shoot was featured in the October 2024 issue of Street Machine.
Sorry folks, I’ve been a bit slack with updating the blog lately. Let’s get things re-started with some style here: Chris Palazzo’s killer pair of Mopars as featured in the October 2024 issue of Street Machine!
What is there to say about these two, except that both crawled happily enough through afternoon traffic to our shoot location and backagain without drama 🙂
Looking sleek and menacing all at once in their straight black paint, both machines grabbed bulk attention on Sydney roads.