Haute wheels

A pursuit for creating something larger than life is what drew celebrity fashion photographer Vikram Bawa to the world of automobile photography. And besides focusing his lens on a subject, nothing excites him more than his other passion of criss-crossing the country.

So, on this occasion, he has got together with Skoda once again to shoot a calendar that will be unveiled at the upcoming Lakme Fashion Week.

Defining the flavour of the season, Bawa says it’s time to shake off the ordinary and mundane and embrace what is complicated. That means recreating artificial rain and lightening with a backdrop of a rugged terrain. About the huge task, Bawa says, “I have a team of 100 people working to help me execute this mammoth project.”

For someone who spends most of his time in studios capturing lissome ladies in drop-dead, gorgeous dresses, Bawa feels that shooting cars bring their own sets of challenges given the fact that it is not entirely possible to doll them up. But the photographer has his own formulae, “Most often than not, people who shoot cars make them look like product pictures. I see them from a fashion point of view. They are classy and sexy. They are the devils trying to ride into our lives.”

The backdrop of the calendar will have a futuristic feel to it with a violent stormy night. Bawa describes, “I have sexy women around the car and the whole idea is about how some superwomen are trying to take control of the car.” The calendar has been shot with the setting of a broken down mill that is part of the Mukesh Mill Compound.