Interview: Automotive photographer and journalist, Keith Trotter

From his younger years spent learning car control in the forest or laying copious amounts of rubber, to owning a speed shop and shooting the cover for one of Street Machine’s highest-selling issues, photographer and writer Keith Trotter has been connected to some of the most pivotal moments of our glorious car culture.

Fifty years on from his entry into the scene, Keith is still an active and integral member of the Aussie car community and continues to capture and celebrate it. We caught up with Keith at our Street Machine Hall of Fame display at this year’s Meguiar’s MotorEx for a chat about some of his most memorable cars and moments.

A new toy for this 20-year-old soldier: here’s Keith with his XY at the barrack blocks of the 7th Signal Regiment at Cabarlah in Queensland

Keith, you’ve been a part of the street machine scene since its pioneering days; what got you interested in cars in the first place?

For me, it kicked off in the 1970s. I bought an XY GT when I was 20, then later owned a ‘Phase 5’ XB hardtop before buying a 308-powered XU-1. I went to most of the race tracks – Sandown, Calder, Oran Park, Amaroo, Surfers, Bathurst, Lakeside; raced motocross in the army; and I also drag raced. I later started a street machine club and bought a new XC Falcon Cobra, which I still own, and then bought one for my wife. I also owned a speed shop for 10 years and worked for Street Machine and other titles too. Back in 2003, I organised and judged the Cobra’s 25th anniversary celebrations at Bathurst, and then organised the 45th anniversary in 2023, so I’m still at it.

Keith’s 308-powered LJ was purple with white stripes when he bought it, but he later resprayed it Vermilion Fire and decked it out with an L88 Corvette bonnet scoop and Hotwires. It was eventually sold to finance the purchase of his XC Cobra

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What was your first car?

A Ford Mk2 Cortina 440 sedan with a bench front seat and four on the column. I bought it from my dad’s car salesman mate, ‘Slippery Sid’. I was adamant that I didn’t want it, but true to good salesman form, he had an answer for everything: I said that I don’t like brown cars and he told me it was bronze; I told him that I didn’t need a bench seat, and he reminded me that I had lots of friends! The clincher was that he just dropped it off at my work, which made it all too easy. My next car was the same blue XY GT that Chris Christou has owned for years. I was happy with it in standard form but went down the cam, carb and extractors route to keep up with two of my mates.

Here’s Keith with his first car, a MkII Ford Cortina sedan bought from his dad’s used-car salesman mate, ‘Slippery Sid’. “I crashed it on my third day of ownership chasing a mate, so I decided then and there I needed to slow down. That lasted about a week,” Keith laughs

Was there a particular car that really inspired you as a young bloke?

Oh wow, yes, there are too many to mention! The George Barris ‘Invader’ was ridiculously beautiful, and the Barris Batmobile, Munster Koach and Bathtub Buggy were favourites, too. I loved the Lamborghini Miura and the Espada, but when the Falcon coupes came out, I wanted one. I should have kept that Phase 5 XB – it was a one-off car built in the Special Vehicles Department at the Ford Broadmeadows plant – but the Cobra will suffice for now.

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“This Phase 5 XB was hand-built in the Special Vehicles department at Ford and was originally black with orange decals,” Keith says. “I took these photos at a South Yarra caryard around April/May 1975, and it was on the market again later that year, so I bought it. The salesman had scribbled out a repayment schedule, but when I went to pick it up, the figures had changed to become unaffordable, so I backed out”

You were good mates with the late Geoff Paradise, founder of Street Machine. How did that friendship begin?

I won him over by abusing the crap out of him [laughs]! I wrote him a real nasty letter that gave him something to think about. Basically, he published a photo of my car and called me ‘Kevin’ in the caption. That was it; I cracked it at him and got my photos back. I then saw him in Canberra the next year, got chatting and he offered me a job. Geoff told me that the only two readers’ letters he ever remembered were the two that I sent him, so there was mutual respect.

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Here’s Keith at this year’s Meguiar’s MotorEx being reunited with the HT GTS 350 Monaro he shot with five other muscle car legends for Performance Street Car magazine in 1985. “It was always a tidy car, but now it looks spectacular,” he says

So, Kevin – sorry, Keith – you’re both a talented photographer and writer. What piqued your interest in those two fields?

Thank you for the compliment. I believe it’s just an evolutionary path. It’s like throwing your hat in the air – wherever it lands is where you go. I love cars and love the art of photography. I knew my photos were okay, but I wasn’t too sure if people would like my style of writing. Geoff thought it was good enough, so I immersed myself in it.

What was Paro like to work for?

Geoff Paradise was a perfectionist who, after Street Machine, went on to establish Performance Street Car. I had great respect for him and him for me. We got on famously, but socially he was a pain in the arse – argumentative and always right! My biggest disappointment was that he wouldn’t publish my story on Rick Dobbertin and the amazing Pontiac J2000. That aside, in my opinion, Geoff Paradise is up at the top of the list of great car magazine editors, just behind Peter Robinson from Wheels.

Keith shot American Rick Dobbertin’s iconic pro street Pontiac J2000 at the first Summernats in 1988. Unfortunately, Performance Street Car then-editor Geoff Paradise would only feature overseas cars if they were modified here in Australia: “Geoff dropped his guard and let me shoot Rick’s car, and I wrote the story of my life, but sadly, it was never published,” says Keith

What was your first assignment for Street Machine?

Chris Christou’s beautiful blue XY GT. Chris and I had been great mates for years, so I had confidence that I would get everything right. That August-September ’84 issue of Street Machine with my photo of Chris smoking the tyres on the cover made it the highest-selling car magazine in Australia for the time.

That’s a pretty incredible first gig! Could you have ever imagined that Chris’s XY, which you owned before him, would still be capturing imaginations today?

That XY is coming on 55 years old, and it’s a very special car. When it was built in 1971, a 55-year-old car was made in 1916, which is worth reflecting on. It’s a credit to Chris that the XY is better now than ever, and he has made it an icon of our street machining legacy. The fact that I once owned the car is irrelevant; sure, it was once mine, but that is a very small part of its history. But I feel privileged to have been a custodian of it, if only for a brief but tyre-shredding two years.

“Before it became famous as Chris Christou’s HO775, this was the XY GT clearly doing what it was born to do,” says Keith, who owned the car before Chris. “Here’s a pair of Dunlop Aquajets going up in smoke; I reckon I went through five sets of rear tyres in just under two years!”

Here’s a bit of history you probably didn’t know about Chris’s XY: two of its previous owners were coppers, and it was also owned by my mate, legendary VFL footballer Brendon Schurmann. I went to see Brendon play in his first game with Hawthorn in March 1975, and he kicked five goals from the centre circle! He was fearless, as tough as that XY, and always up for a bit of biffo.

Fifty years to the day from Keith buying the blue XY GT that would later become the legendary HO775 in the hands of Chris Christou, all three were reunited at our Street Machine Hall of Fame display at MotorEx 2025, along with Keith’s iconic photo of Chris smoking the tyres for the cover of our August-September ’84 issue

What were some of your favourite cars you covered while you worked for the magazines?

I’d say Graham ‘Doc’ Docherty’s XY ute with the under-bonnet 6/71 was a highlight (SM, Jul-Aug ’87), and we still keep in regular contact. John Cannon’s red pro street LX hatch (SM, Jul-Aug ’88) was another, along with Rick Dobbertin’s iconic Pontiac J2000. Alan Cooper’s BLOBAK Holden ute, Nick Gizas’s mighty powerful SL/R 5000 and Mark Bellam’s 1968 Datsun 1000 ute were other favourites.

One of Keith’s favourite Performance Street Car shoots was for Graham ‘Doc’ Docherty’s blue and gold XY ute, which featured Fairlane front panels and a trick fuel filler behind the tail-light. It was also the test mule for Doc’s engine mount kits that allowed you to squeeze a Clevo with a 6/71 and twin carbs under a shaker! We ran our own feature on Doc’s XY in the July-August ’87 issue of SM

One of the unveiled cars at MotorEx this year was Shaun Whale’s 350-powered HT GTS Monaro, which you shot for Performance Street Car back in 1985 when it was a giveaway car for the mag. What was it like seeing it again?

It gave me flashbacks! I remember the car well; it was 1985 when Geoff Paradise was in talks with Elwyn Uren to purchase it, but only after the magazine had their day at the races with it. That feature pitted six muscle cars against each other and was a pretty famous cover for Performance Street Car (Oct-Nov 1985). It looks better today than it ever did, and the Exclusive Customs team have done a stellar job.

Keith bought his Falcon Cobra brand new in October 1978 and has gradually upped its power through the years, culminating in its current grunty 351 Clevo combo. It’s had a few minor cosmetic changes over that time, but the pic of it sporting tinted headlight covers while parked next to Laurie Gatt’s XA (SM, Feb-Mar ’84) at the 1982 Street Machine Nationals is on point

Is there anything you miss about those foundation years of Aussie street machining?

Life was so much simpler then. You could get a start with a good paintjob (or even a cut and polish), a set of wheels and a detail. I started Valley Street Machiners in 1983, and our 20-odd members had nothing really special – just Holdens and Fords with tidy engine bays. We had less disposable income back in those days, and it showed. Plus, people actually drove their street machines daily, so they were a regular sight on our roads.

This is Keith’s beautiful shot of Marty Brennan’s MADNES Holden ute following its revamp for the 1988 Street Machine Nationals, after it had won the burnout comp at the ’86 event. “From the front, it still looked like its previous all-white guise, but from any other angle – well, see for yourself!” Keith laughs. “Back in the 80s, we shot on slide film and used coloured filters to help disguise a grey sky”

What’s in the garage nowadays?

I have a matching pair – my BF Falcon MkII GT and XC Falcon Cobra are both build #389. The GT is my daily ride, while the Cobra has spent most of its life tucked away in the garage. It has 27,000 kays on the clock, but I don’t want to leave this world having never enjoyed what it has to offer, so I have gradually increased the power from a stock 302 to a Phase II/III-spec 351, then added 2V heads and a bigger cam, to now having a stroker Cleveland with some serious grunt. I might have to change the number plates from KOBRA to DIVORS, though [laughs].

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Interview: Automotive photographer and journalist, Keith Trotter