NOT JUST PIECES OF METAL: THE WORLD OF MOTORSPORT THROUGH THE LENS OF SHOTSBYKILI

Photos by Kilian Gatti — Shotsbykili

Not a distracted glance, but a real act of observation. That’s how Kilian Gatti, known as Shotsbykili, relates to every car he comes across on the street: he stops, observes, tries to understand what lies behind that line, that bodywork, that detail that escapes everyone else. For him a car is never just, to quote Jeremy Clarkson, a ton and a half of wires, glass, metal and rubber: it is the highest expression of human creativity, the meeting point between engineering, vision and passion. And photography is his way of telling that story, of freezing what most people merely look at without truly seeing.

From Nettuno to Munich: the birth of a passion

Almost twenty-four years old, Italian-French, Gatti got into photography about eleven years ago, when it was still just a pretext for staying close to cars. The turning point came with the move to Munich, where he lived for seven years: seeing certain cars live on the street every day changed everything. It was there that he came into contact with a group of older photographers, with whom he began carspotting — going around the city in search of rare or unusual cars to capture in their everyday setting, on the street or in parking lots.

His first shots were taken with a compact Canon borrowed from his father. Watching that group in Munich, Gatti developed a clear goal: to buy the same camera they had, a Canon 6D, at the time one of the best on the market. At eighteen he started working, and after a lot of effort he achieved that dream. He hasn’t stopped since.

Engineer and photographer: equipment and training

Today Gatti works with a Canon R6 and three lenses that he alternates depending on the occasion: a 50mm f/1.8, a 24-105mm f/4L and a 70-200mm f/2.8L. He is also just one step away from a master’s degree in Mechanical Engineering, automotive track: training that, he himself admits, makes him biased when he claims that extraordinary engineering lies behind every car. But it is precisely this interweaving of technique and image that guides every shot he takes.

A true self-taught photographer, he has never taken a photography course: his apprenticeship came entirely from observing the more experienced photographers he met in Munich and from studying the great names of international automotive photography.

How a shot is born: from location to editing in Lightroom

For Shotsbykili, photographing a car doesn’t mean shooting it from the front, the side and the back. It means immersing it in a situation, making it come alive in a context: whether it’s a private shoot or an event, the principle never changes. He doesn’t just photograph the car: he tells a scene.

When a client contacts him for a photo book of their own car, the first step is understanding which model it is; the second is finding the perfect location. Originally from Nettuno, in the province of Rome, Gatti spent five years as a university student living away from home in the Capital, and knows its corners well: that’s often where he looks for the right spaces to bring out the best in the car. Once the date and place are confirmed, the moment of the shoot arrives, during which he plays a lot with natural light to find the truest tones. Only afterward, at home, does the editing phase in Lightroom begin: retouching meant to enhance, never to transform, and it stays light precisely because the result is already sought out during the shoot itself.

Rome, at dusk

Even winter has its own light

Experimenting with night lights
Even when he’s not working, Gatti keeps attending events on his own, with a single goal: experimenting with new angles to reuse in the future. What he always looks for is the shot that others haven’t seen: at events he likes to break away from the group of photographers to find another perspective, a different framing. Because behind the tire change, the driver change, the mechanics at work, there is a story just as important as that of the car itself, and it’s precisely those details he wants to tell.

A moment before the start, in the eyes of the driver

On track with Porsche Club Roma and Porsche Club Interseries
Among Gatti’s most meaningful experiences are the track days organized by Porsche Club Roma and Porsche Club Interseries, dedicated to Porsche customers. It’s there, on the circuit, that the photographer finds the fullest sense of his own work: the happiness of the owner bringing their car onto the track, the mechanics’ work in the pits, the informal atmosphere made of chatting, laughter and shared passion that accompanies this kind of event.

Pits, Porsche Club Interseries

On track

Ferrari 812 Competizione Ferrari Tribute

Cars as a refuge
For Gatti, cars remain, above all, a way to disconnect from everything. Even when he’s at an event purely out of passion and not for work, in that moment only the car and the camera exist: his safe place, his peace.

Engineering and photography remain two different worlds that, in his work, keep intertwining. The search continues: new places, new lights, framings never tried before. The result isn’t always what he hoped for, but it’s precisely in that margin of experimentation that a point of view different from everyone else’s is found.

How to follow Shotsbykili’s work

Anyone who wants to discover the world of cars through Kilian Gatti’s eye — made of details, natural light and stories to tell — can follow his work on Instagram: @shotsbykili.