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So I'm cruising around today and I come across a 2008 Ford F250 Super Duty Powerstroke just sitting in a public parking lot with no one in it. Has the zebra stripe sticker camouflage all over it. Not really too exciting, there have been about a million spy photos of the Super Duties in the last 6-8 months. I shoot a little anyway since I didn't have anything better to do at that moment. You never know, maybe the photos will sell.
Im parked right next to it and I shoot the interior a little and shoot a detail shot of the side vents. Then a guy comes up behind the pickup, so I immediately pull away and go down the street to set up so I can shoot him driving it away. So he drives away and Im shooting and he sees me of course. He stops the pickup right next to me, gives me that normal "you turd" look that spy photographers often get, then puts the pickup in reverse and goes 20-30 yards backwards to the spot where he was parked. Parks, gets out, and starts walking towards me looking less than pleased. We usually try to avoid confrontation with the engineers at all costs because it really never does anyone any good. That usually goes like: "You can't photograph this vehicle" "Yes we can, you're in public" "Grrrr"
Anyhow I leave before he's halfway to me and just pull around the corner out of his view. The engineer leaves so I start following from a distance. Through stop lights and cars turning off the road, I end up on his tail again in 2 or 3 mins. Im sure he knows Im behind him but I also know where he's going and it's only another 1/2 mile down the road. So I figured I'd follow him to there, get what I could, and be done with it.
It quickly becomes obvious that he isn't going to this certain spot because he doesn't want me to see where he goes. I pull off on a side street and he continues down the road past the spot. He turns around and starts back towards the spot, so I go back to the intersection to shoot him going by. This was going to be my last shot before I went on to look for something else.
But.....then things went ape shit.
This guy barrels towards me while Im sitting at the intersection and it looks like he's just going to flat out ram me. Instead he uses the Super Duty to block the *entire* intersection and parks about 1 foot off my front bumper (apparently he thought being an engineer from Ford gave him the powers of a police officer) Anyhow, I guess he thought that would stop me from going anywhere. However I have this neat little thing on my transmission called.........reverse. So I drop it into "R" and floor it. I get turned around and take off in the other direction. In about 15 seconds I can see him flying down the street after me in my mirrors. Know how black smoke pours out of diesels when you put the hammer down? Yea. Lots of black smoke.
So we're on a main road now and hit a few red lights. Dude comes up on the back of my car really fast and stops the pickup maybe 1 or 2 inches from the back of my car. When I say 1 or 2 inches, I mean that literally. I was waiting to feel the bump. He does this 2 or 3 times. He never actually made contact with my car, which is too bad because then Ford would've paid off my car loan as part of the settlement.
Now we hit the highway and then the engineer REALLY starts driving nuts. Swerving, diving across lanes and tailgating the crap out of me...again I was waiting for the bump from behind. I think he cut at least one other motorist off too. Did I mention it was downpouring rain at this point. So I get on the phone to Brenda telling her that she wouldn't believe the lunatic that is behind me right now. We can't figure out what the big deal is, there have been a million spy photos of the Super Duties and the program is no big secret at all. From this guy's reaction you would think I just shot photos of the Ford Fairlane production model with no camouflage or the next gen Mustang. Brenda says maybe I should just pull over (while rolling video on the guy of course) but having seen how nuts this guy is so far, I pass on that idea. About 5 mins have passed at this point since he blocked the intersection.
I decide to see just how determined this guy is...heh, and to screw with him a little....so for the next 20-30 mins I basically drive in circles. In and out of parking lots multiple times. Around the block multiple times...the same block even! The guy stays with me the whole time! I even go past a police station at one point and roll down my window to point at it as we go by. At that point I almost DID want to stop just to ask him "wow man, how insane are you?"
Anyhow, after 20-30 mins of his mental episode, I'd had enough and had better things to do. Heh so in another few mins I shook him. Made sure he caught a long red light and then enthusiastically waved to him as I drove off with him sitting there
I still have no idea what this guy's deal was. I mean, sure, the spy photography business generally pisses off engineers. We get dirty looks all the time and the occasional middle finger. Those things don't really bother me, it's just part of the territory. Sometimes the engineers even smile and wave or give the peace sign. The point being, while most engineers probably don't like being photographed, most of them take it pretty well and just chalk it up as being part of their job. It is *really* rare for the engineers to go completely wacko like this guy today. Especially with such a low value "target" like a 2008 Super Duty.
As a hilarious contrast to today's events, earlier in the week, I was shooting the Buick Enclave. Just as I was finishing up with the Enclave, another engineer came up behind me in an Acadia to block my view of the Enclave. I was done at that point anyway, so I pulled away and the Acadia followed. We were in a big parking lot so I decided to go up and down the lanes of parked cars just to see if he'd follow me. Hah so me and this guy in the Acadia sort of started playing a car version hide and go seek or tag in the parking lot. I looked back and could see the engineer laughing as we did this.
So, that was my day today. One crazy engineer trying to make me a hood ornament on his Super Duty behemoth. Now, normally we will blur out the plate numbers and any other ID numbers on the vehicle to lessen the chance of anyone catching heat. We are interested in the cars, not the people driving them.
Well, not today. There is no excuse for the way this guy conducted himself. Here he is.
I think someone in Dearborn may be getting a call tomorrow....
This post has been edited by CD/BP: 23 July 2006 - 07:36 PM
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