Jumping in a puddle, running in the mud, playing catch, riding your bicycle down a hill at a speed too fast to avert disaster. Some things boys do (and girls too) when they’re young shouldn’t have to go away when we grow up. Riding motorcycles definitely belong in this category.

I’m motorcycle guy. I’m not sure when it happened but somewhere along the way I choose to continue riding, long after the economic situation that pointed me to that original Honda 350 had changed for the better.

I like to spend my time on twisty roads and ride motorcycles that scratch that itch. As an artist, I’m also interested in any medium that allows an expression of creativity. In addition to being fun to ride, a motorcycle is a great canvas to “paint” a vision upon. Both the motorcyclist and artist in me drew me to custom and restored motorcycles from Japan and Europe at the Californian Motorcycle show held on the infield at Santa Anita Park.

Each of these motorcycles is no longer manufactured. Some were restored, like the beautiful example of the Honda 305 Dream. Others are stock or mostly stock, like the Honda CBX and CB 500. All of them are rare. Like using an old film camera, these bikes can deliver the goods. And like the old film cameras it is the operator more than the machine that makes the magic happen.

Below are a few bikes that caught my eye. I hope you enjoy their artistry as much as I do.

It was an overcast day at Santa Anita. I was trying out the new Kodak Gold 200 in medium format on my Mamiya 645. After shooting this roll and developing the film, I’m confident that I can use Kodak Gold, a low-priced consumer film, as a substitute for Kodak Ektar, a highly saturated Kodak professional negative color film. Sometimes I might even use it on purpose.