All posts by Ed Rosack

Dinosaur Invasion at Leu Gardens!

March 14, 2021Leu Gardens, OrlandoDinosaur, garden, landscapeEd Rosack

Dear Grandson,

I know how interested you are in dinosaurs and when I found out that they were invading Orlando, I was disappointed that you couldn’t go see them with us. So I thought I should at least make some photos you can look at.

I went on a week day so it wasn’t very crowded, but it was a little bit scary being all by myself sometimes with a few of the dinos. This next photo is my favorite from the exhibit. It’s a close up of an Allosaurus mom and I think she’s looking right at me!

Allosaurus close-up

As you probably know, an Allosaurus looks a lot like a T-Rex, but they aren’t closely related. The next picture shows the mom with her babies. I wonder where the Allosaurus grandad is?

Allosaurus family (Jurassic– 155 to 150 million years ago)

The Appatosaurus was a massive dinosaur – about 75 feet long and 30 feet tall. It was a herbivore and could eat hundreds of pounds of plants each day. It’s too big for an exhibit like this one, so they show two of its fossilized bones.

Apatosaurus Bones (Jurassic– 155 to 150 million years ago)

Because they’re small, Bambiraptors are named after the Disney character. Have you ever seen the Bambi movie? These may be small but they don’t look much like a baby deer to me! They walked on two legs, might have been able to climb trees and were possibly covered in feathers.

Bamiraptors (Cretacious– 75 million years ago)

Citipati fossils were discovered in the Gobi Desert in Mongolia, and the fossil find included an entire nest and four adults.

Citipati Nest (Cretacious– 84 to 72 million years ago)

Allosaurs aren’t related to T-Rex, but Daspletosaurs are. Its name means “Frightful Lizard”. They stood about 12 feet tall and had very long razor sharp teeth. This one looks like it’s running after me through the bamboo forest!

Daspletosaur (Cretacious– 77 to 74 million years ago)

Heterodontosaurus was a smaller dinosaur – it only weighed about 13 lbs. It had five fingers and opposable thumbs for picking up things.

Heterodontosaurus (Triasic / Jurassic– 200 to 195 million years ago)

Hypsibema is the official state dinosaur of Missouri. Florida doesn’t have an official dino. I don’t think your state has one either, but it needs one!

Hypsibema & Nest (Cretacious– 75 million years ago)

Experts think that the Parasaurolophus used its head crest to make loud bellows.

ROAR!!!

Parasaurolophus (Cretacious– 75 million years ago)

Placerias looks fierce but it was a herbivore. It could use those tusks for defense but also to slice through thick branches and roots.

Placerias (Triassic– 220 to 215 million years ago)

Modern day Crocodiles are related to the Postosuchus. I guess it does look a little bit like the crocodiles and alligators we have today in Florida.

Postosuchus (Triassic– 237 to 201 million years ago)

Quetzalcoatlus was one of the biggest flying animals of all time with an estimated wingspan of 36 – 39 feet! They could probably move fast on the ground too.

Quetzalcoatlus (Cretacious– 70 to 65 million years ago)

Sordes was another flying reptile that could walk on the ground and climb trees. Its wingspan was only about 2 feet – much smaller than Quetzalcoatlus.

Sordes Pair (Jurassic– 155 million years ago)

And here’s our last Dino -the Velociraptor. It’s name means “Speedy Thief” or “Swift Robber”. These carnivores are pretty scary in the movies, aren’t they?!

Velociraptor (Cretacious – 85 to 75 million years ago)

Grandson, I’d never heard of some of these. Did you know about all of them? I hope you enjoyed looking through this. I had fun making the photos and imagining how much you would have liked going with us to see the dinos. Next time you’re here in Florida on vacation, we’ll find some exciting things to do together. We know about a museum we can visit over in Daytona that has a Giant Glyptodont!

Love you!

Grandmom and Granddad

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Here’s a bit more info for those of you that might want to take your kids or grandkids to see this.

Cypress and dark water along the shore from the Lake Rowena Overlook at Leu Gardens

Harry P. Leu Gardens (see this previous blog post and this album on Flickr for more photos) is a botanical showcase for plants that grow well in our Central Florida climate. There’s also a restored 19th century home that’s listed on the National Register of Historic Places and you can tour a portion of the downstairs. It makes for a great photo walk, and the lush vegetation also makes a great backdrop for a Dino Invasion!

These dinosaurs were created by Guy Darrough’s Lost World Studios. They make them life size and as realistic as possible. They looked very authentic to me! If you want to see this exhibit, make your plans quickly. The last day is April 18th.

Thanks to everyone for stopping by and reading my blog. And as always, take care of yourselves and each other. And when you can – visit with your grandkids and make some photos!

A Good Morning

March 7, 2021MiscellaniousIndian River, landscape, sunrise, TitusvilleEd Rosack

I hope you don’t mind a short post today. I’ve just recovered from a sore throat and laryngitis that I somehow caught in spite of all our pandemic precautions. It wasn’t serious and I’m feeling fine now, but I didn’t get a chance to go on any photo excursions last week.

Anyway, I made this image about a month ago in a favorite spot along the Indian River in Titusville.

It was a good morning

It’s on the western shore, just south of Veterans Memorial Park. The light was changing that morning and I managed to make several photos that I like. For this one, I exposed one frame for the foreground and bracketed three more for the sky. I adjusted them in Lightroom and merged all four manually in Photoshop.

Thanks for stopping by and reading my blog. Take care of yourselves and each other. And when you can – make some photos!

Walking Lake Davis

February 28, 2021Downtown OrlandoEgyptian Goose, Lake Davis, landscape, mallard, ring-necked duck, sunset, White Pelican, Wood DuckEd Rosack

I’d heard some reports of American White Pelicans visiting Lake Davis in downtown Orlando. When MK confirmed they were there, we agreed to meet last Tuesday morning for a walk and a look-see.

They’re winter visitors in Florida and I often spot them at Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge over on the coast. I didn’t realize their stops at our in-shore lakes are as common as they seem to be now. In addition to Lake Davis, Wally Jones writes in his blog about a pod of them in downtown Lakeland on Lake Morton.

White Pelicans are interesting. According to this article, they can have wingspans up to nine and a half feet, making them some of the largest birds in North America. And they often feed together in small groups, herding fish in front of them. Here’s a video MK made of this behavior:

White Pelicans on Lake Davis.

The Pelicans were somewhere else during our walk, but MK has seen them since – so if you don’t catch them the first time, it might be worth another visit. Since I missed them that day, I’ll have to cheat a bit and use a photo of one that I made over in Merritt Island last December:

American White Pelican in flight (MINWR)

We did see many other birds that morning including some Mallards:

Drowsy Ducks

Many Wood Ducks:

Dandy Drake

A few Ring-necked Ducks:

Ring-necked Duck

And even a family of these strange looking (to me at least) Egyptian Geese.

The Egyptian Goose is native to the Middle East but humans have helped them spread around the world. They’ve been in Florida since the 1960s and as recently as 2009, Florida Fish and Wildlife didn’t think they bred outside of Pinellas and Hillsborough counties. See this article for more info : http://wildsouthflorida.com/egyptian.goose.html.

Lake Davis is a lovely surprise hiding in downtown Orlando and a wonderful place for a walk! This search will bring up other posts on the blog about the area: https://edrosack.com/?s=lake+davis.

Lake Davis Morning

Thanks for stopping by and reading my blog. Take care of yourselves and each other. And if you (peli)can – make some photos!

T-Mount Try Out

February 21, 2021Astrophotographymoon, prime focusEd Rosack

The T-Mount system was devised by Tamron in the 1950s to allow their lenses to be used on many different cameras. It’s also the system used to attach a camera to the prime focus of a telescope. I’d never tried it, so I ordered a T-Ring and Sony adapter and gave it a go.

All of these images were made with a Sony A6600 APSC camera mounted on a NexStar 6SE telescope at prime focus using the T-Mount adapter. I captured multiple frames for each and processed them with astro photo capabilities added recently to Affinity Photo.

In prime focus astrophotography, you’re using the telescope as a lens, mounted directly to your camera. There’s no eyepiece involved, although you can insert additional optics into the light path. I used three different configurations.

1. Prime focus, with a Celestron f/6.3 Reducer Corrector. Equivalent focal length = 1.5 x 1500 x 0.63 = 1418mm

In the first image I used a Reducer / Corrector. This both widens the field of view / lowers the focal length, and flattens the field to enhance sharpness at the edges. This worked OK, but did have some obvious vignetting that was hard to deal with in post processing.

2.Prime focus. Equivalent focal length = 1.5 x 1500 = 2259mm.

Image 2 is the same setup, but straight from the telescope to the camera. There was no vignetting and I think the image quality is very high. The featured image at the top of this post is a crop from this photo. (Note: This one is posted on Flickr and is worth a click to see in greater detail. Click it twice when you get there to enlarge it.)

*3. Prime focus with a Meade 2x Barlow lens. Equivalent focal length = 1.5 x 1500 x 2 = 4500mm*

And finally, image 3 uses a Barlow lens, which is like a 2x extender. The image quality in this one is not as good. That could be due to degradation from the Barlow, a slight mis-focus, or vibrations / motion (or all three!).

Conclusions:

Check and double check all settings and adjustments.
These are longer focal lengths than anything I’ve ever tried before. Technique is super important and it’s hard to know if you’ve messed up until you get things on the computer later.
The straight prime focus method works very well. The image quality is the best I’ve gotten through the telescope, It’s better than the afocal approach (camera lens through an eyepiece) I used for this post.
The reducer / corrector works OK, but I’ll probably shy away from it unless I need a wider field of view. And if that’s the case I think I’d try using piggy-back photography first.
The 2x Barlow approach is challenging. The magnification makes any focus or motion issues much worse. This should probably be reserved for planets, and used as a second option to straight prime focus or piggy-back with a long telephoto lens.
There is a lot to learn about astro photography!

Thanks for stopping by and reading my blog. Take care of yourselves and each other. And if you can – make some (astro) photos!

Happy Valentine’s Day

February 14, 2021Miscellaniousbrick, fence, Fern, ValentineEd Rosack

Years ago, Lynn brought a few ferns back from her mother’s home over in Bartow, Florida and transplanted them into our back garden. Since then, they’ve thrived, and a few usually even grow on our brick fence. We noticed last weekend that they’d arranged themselves into a very nice message appropriate for today’s holiday.

Ferns in a Valentine’s Day arrangement on our backyard fence.

I’m a bit unsure if they didn’t get the “E” done in time, or if maybe they were going for the colloquial “LUV”. Anyway, this isn’t photoshopped and unless there’s a stealth gardener we didn’t notice sneaking into our back yard, these ferns grew this way naturally. The odds of something like this happening spontaneously have to be vanishingly small. Maybe it’s more likely nature is trying to send us a message?

Peace and ‘Lov’ to all of you gentle readers. Thanks for stopping by my blog. Take care of yourselves and each other. And today, cherish your valentine!

MINWR – 2/5/21

February 7, 2021Merritt Island NWRAmerican Robin, Black Skimmer, Dunlin, Gull, landscape, sunriseEd Rosack

Well. Kevin M. wanted to meet and photograph the SpaceX launch scheduled for 5:15 am last Friday morning. Talk about zero dark thirty!

Anyway, I was all packed and prepared Thursday night when the launch was postponed. Since I was ready to go, I decided to head over to Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge anyway on Friday morning (just not so early!). I’m glad I did. I got to see a lot more things flying than just a space ship. By the way, if you like to look at photos of SpaceX launches, their Flickr stream is awesome.

With our recent cool, clear weather, I expected few clouds and a so-so sunrise. But this scene with the sun rising below the clouds and centered behind the Vehicle Assemble Building at Kennedy Space Center was pretty.

VAB Sunrise

Gator Creek Road at MINWR has been closed for a while so I was glad to see it finally open again. They’ve been busy maintaining the dirt road surface and trimming vegetation along the sides. You can see a little better now – and you don’t have to dodge potholes! There was a lot of bird action.

A large squabble of gulls (Mostly Laughing and Ring-billed)

Birding is interesting in many ways. For instance, you can always call a group of birds a “flock”. But I think the group names for different bird species are fun. If you’ve ever listened to a big “squabble” like this, you’ll probably agree it’s an appropriate name for gulls. You can also call a gull group a “flotilla”, “gallery”, “screech”, or “scavenging”.

I’m not sure what attracted these huge gatherings to Gator Creek. but they sure seemed to like it there.

A tightly stacked scoop of Skimmers

“Scoop” is a wonderful name for a group of Skimmers too. The classic photo for Skimmers is of a single one feeding just above a calm surface with its lower mandible in the water (like this one). I didn’t see any of that behavior on Friday, but I really liked this alternate flight shot. It’s hard to understand how they fly that close without hitting each other. Groups of Skimmers are also known as a “conspiracy” or “embezzlement”.

On Black Point Wildlife Drive the water was very low in spots but there was still a lot to see. Here’s one more group flight shot:

A fling of Dunlins

I’m a little embarrassed to admit that Dunlin are sort of a life bird for me. What I mean is I’m pretty sure I’ve seen them before, but I find Sandpipers challenging to ID and I’d never consciously done so with Dunlin. I also saw / ID’d some Western Sandpipers on Friday for the first time. Flocks of Dunlin are also called a “flight” or “trip”.

And here’s one last bird photo. This group was a lot smaller than the others. They were spread out and flying around so fast the only time I could grab a collective image was when they settled for just a moment.

A small worm of American Robbins

It looks as though there’s only the one name for a group of Robins. I suppose you could always be boring and call them a “flock”.

If these names interest you, here’s a good summary article on the subject: https://www.thespruce.com/flock-names-of-groups-of-birds-386827 (page no longer on line).

So that was a great visit to my favorite wildlife refuge! In addition to the birds above, I also saw a Bottle Nose Dolphin, Alligators, a Bald Eagle, Roseate Spoonbills, Forster’s Terns, a Eurasian Collared Dove, Brown Pelicans, Turkey Vultures, Ospreys, Ibis, American Avocets, Great Blue and Tricolor Herons, Redish Egrets, Great and Snowy Egrets, and some others that I’m forgetting or (once again) didn’t ID.

Thanks for stopping by and reading my blog. Take care of yourselves and each other. And if you can – make some photos!

GO BUCS!!!

Wildlife Panoramas

January 31, 2021Merritt Island NWR, Techniquepanorama, Spoonbill, stitch, White PelicanEd Rosack

Sometimes you want to get closer / zoom in with your lens to show as much detail as possible but if you do, you can’t fit everything in your frame. When I’m in that situation I try to expand the frame by making a stitched panorama. It’s a common approach for landscape images – but it can also work for wildlife and I don’t see that mentioned very often elsewhere. Here’s a recent example I assembled from two photos:

And here’s one more made from three photos:

A Partial Pod of Pelicans. (Click to see larger on Flickr. Click again to zoom in)

I’ve written about this before, so I won’t repeat myself. If you’re interested in my approach, see these two posts:

A Panorama Workflow Example: https://edrosack.com/2013/08/04/a-panorama-workflow-example/
Reprocessing a Mt. Evans Elk Herd panorama: https://edrosack.com/2019/07/13/reprocessing-a-mt-evans-elk-herd-panorama/

And there’s much more info on the web waiting for your DuckDuckGo or Google search.

There is an added complication to watch out for when stitching wildlife panoramas: the animals may move between frames. For that reason, I shoot as quickly as possible. I try stitching the frames together automatically and look for any anomalies along seams. If I find some, then I assemble the panorama manually in photoshop and mask out the issues.

I enjoy making these and have many more collected in this folder on Flickr: https://www.flickr.com/photos/edrosack/albums/72157637736002816. Take a look to see some possibilities.

Thanks for stopping by and reading my blog. Take care of yourselves and each other. And if you can – stitch some panoramas!

The Telescope

January 24, 2021Astrophotographymoon, Orion Nebula, telescopeEd Rosack

Comet Neowise and the Great Conjuction in 2020 made me think about the telescope I’ve had in the closet for many years. I’m happy with the images I made of those two events, but I regret not trying to use the scope to photograph them.

I’d only ever used it for observing. Photographing through a telescope requires a much higher level of knowledge and technical skill. In addition to knowing how to set up and align the scope and camera, you have to understand and balance many more factors: camera (ISO, aperture, exposure time, focus, …), astro (atmosphere, alignment / tracking, field rotation, …) and post processing. So I thought I’d try a couple of shots to see what it could do.

I used the moon to get everything set up and tested. Next I wanted to try to photograph a Deep sky object. They’re plentiful, but harder to find or even see. I picked the Orion Nebula as my second target – it’s probably the easiest DSO. Even here in my back yard, Orion’s belt stands out.

Orion Nebula. Same setup as above, using six frames instead of thirteen.

I know these aren’t Hubble level images or even very good amateur astronomer images. But I’m pleased with how they turned out. I want to continue exploring photography with the telescope and see how well it can work in my urban (and light polluted) environment. If I make some progress, I’ll share the images with you.

Thanks for stopping by and reading my blog. Take care of yourselves and each other. And if you can – make some (astro) photos!

That Darn Dodging Duck

January 17, 2021Merritt Island NWRAlligator, american kestrel, Bio Lab Road, Black Point Wildlife Drive, Cinnamon Teal, landscapeEd Rosack

You may remember my post from late last year (https://edrosack.com/2020/12/13/three-spoonbills/) where I mentioned a Cinnamon Teal that’s been wintering on Black Point Wildlife Drive in Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge. I didn’t find the bird on that trip and it avoided me on three more tries, although reports kept coming that others had seen it. Finally on my fifth try last Tuesday I actually saw it with my own eyes!

This is my first sighting and photo of one so it’s another addition to my (relatively short) birding life list.

Another update for today: It’s been a long while since I’ve visited Bio Lab Road. Damage from Hurricane Dorian closed it for a while, but that’s all been repaired now and the road is in very good shape. Howard T. told me they’d driven it a few weeks ago so I decided to check it out too.

There are some nice views across the Indian River through breaks in the vegetation. I think this one looking out across that sand bar is very “Florida”.

Bio Lab road is a good place to see large gators. I’m not sure if this is the same one Howard saw, but it’s huge. I was glad it was across the canal!

And here’s one last image from the day, also on Bio Lab Road. I don’t often see these little falcons and this one stayed still for a moment so I could make a photo:

It was cloudy last Tuesday. Some might think the light was bad and I agree it was dim. But diffuse, even light can be a plus. Direct sunlight can be harsh and create deep shadows and blown highlights. I had to raise my ISO to get decent shutter speeds for some of these shots, but the camera sensor handled it well. So if you’re out photographing on a cloudy day, use your ISO setting!

Thanks, Howard for reminding me to re-visit Bio Lab Road! And thanks to that darn dodging duck for providing such a large dose of motivation to get out, enjoy nature, and keep looking!

Thanks to all of you too for stopping by and reading my blog. Take care of yourselves and each other. And if you can – make some photos!

Lake Jesup’s South Shore

January 3, 2021Lake Jesupblack and white, cloud, landscape, spanish moss, treeEd Rosack

I doubt many landscape photographers have the south shore of Lake Jesup in Seminole County on their must do list. But local parks are a great resource and we should take advantage of them. At the very least, you can practice your landscape photo skills and maybe spot some wildlife too. I went for a very short drive last week and made three stops. Here are some photos from the trip.

This first one is in Central Winds park in Winter Springs, down past the playground and basketball court where there’s a short nature trail leading to the the lake and this view. I used a 16mm focal length (with a variable ND filter to lengthen the exposure and smooth the water) and made two frames (using this technique) to capture both the tree / sky in the distance (ISO 100, f/11, 1/4 second ) and the foreground (ISO 100, f/11, 1 second). Then I blended them by hand in Photoshop using layers.

Stop two is a little west, on the pier that you’ll get to when you turn in at the dog park and drive past it down to the lake. Two frames again with the same general approach as the first image. Sky at ISO 100, f/11, 1/6 second; Foreground at ISO 100, f/11, 1/2 second.

And stop three is east of the other two at Overlook Park in Oviedo. Also using the same general approach (although no ND filter for this one). Sky at ISO 100, f/11, 1/200 second; Foreground at ISO 100, f/11, 1/80 second.

Finally, this Oak tree caught my eye and I made one last photo on the walk back to my car:

I used my phone – 13mm equivalent focal length, ISO 25, f/2.4 at 1/240 sec.

Here’s a map image showing all three locations (yellow markers) to give you a better idea of where they are:

Note: If you clicked on any of the photos, you’ve noticed I’m trying a new way to embed Flickr photos. Starting with this post, a click on a photo will still take you to that image on Flickr, but now it will open in “Lightbox” mode and fill your browser widow. You can still click once (or twice) to enlarge it, and you can hit the escape key to return to the non-lightbox view. Then use your browser’s back button to return to the blog.

By the way, the tree in the center of the first photo has been on the blog twice before, here https://edrosack.com/2010/11/21/local-park-landscapes/ and here https://edrosack.com/2010/05/16/under-the-weather/. I think I like this latest version the best.

And you can review all my posts about Lake Jesup at this link: https://edrosack.com/category/photo-ops-in-florida/lake-jesup/.

Happy New Year! We’re all looking forward to better times in 2021! Lynn and I are waiting to get vaccinated so we can visit family and friends again and life can return toward normal. I hope that doesn’t take too long.

Thanks for stopping by and reading my blog. Take care of yourselves and each other. And if you can – visit your local park and make some photos!

Central Florida Photo Ops

What and where they are and how to photograph them.