Hello readers and season’s greetings to each of you! I hope everyone can visit with family and friends and enjoy this wonderful time of year. Here’s a photo of the tree near the main entrance to our building. I think it looks marvelous!
Happy Holidays 2024!
2. Visit to Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge
I also wanted to share some photos from my last trip to MINWR (13 December). Winter is a good time to visit and the activity over there has started to pick up. Here are a few samples of the things I saw, first a landscape:
Early morning view of the causeway and clouds leading into the refuge (from Veterans Memorial Park)
And here’s some of the wildlife I spotted:
Wetland Phoebe
Snowy Egrets on a Mission
Chilly Redish Egret
Young Roseate Spoonbill
Northern Shoveler
Wet Wings (a typical Cormorant pose)
Hooded Mergansers
Lurking Gator
Feral Hog
Thanks to everyone for stopping by my blog. Stay positive, be kind, and take care of yourselves and each other. Enjoy your time with family and friends. Make some memories (with photos!).
In my last post, I mentioned stopping to see Kevin M. in Chattanooga and that he gave me back the very same Nikon D90 that was my primary camera in 2008 and 2009. Thanks again, Kevin!
The camera is in fine shape and after buying some inexpensive after market batteries I was ready to try it out – again. I took it along on a recent outing to Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge. This small pond is near the west entrance to Gator Creek Road and has an easterly view at dawn over the water.
A pretty place for a camera test…
The only Nikon lens I still have is an even older 50mm f/1.8, so I used it for this image. It’s a stitched panorama from 2 rows of 8 frames resulting in a final image size of 9732×7462 pixels (72.6M Pixels in a 4×5 aspect ratio). I used my latest workflow and software and I think it came out pretty nice for 16+ year old tech!
I did notice that the auto focus capabilities are nowhere near as good as current cameras. And the resolution (12 MegaPixels) is pretty low too. But the dynamic range, color, and noise performance held up very well – especially with RAW files run through modern software.
It was a lot of fun to use the D90 again. I was surprised by how comfortable I was with the controls after so long. It was a very good camera when it was released. And it’s still an impressive camera now. Will I take it out and use it sometimes? Yes, for old times sake. But I’m not going to give up my Sony gear!
If you click on this image, you can see a higher resolution version on Flickr along, with EXIF info and a map showing the location.
Thanks for stopping by my blog. Stay positive, be kind, and take care of yourselves and each other. And if you can, make some photos – even with old gear!
We just returned from a trip to Nashville Tennessee, Archbold Ohio and back. We spent 15 days on the road and saw family, friends, and many sights. I thought I’d offer you some photos along with a few words about our journey.
Header image: another view of Chattanooga from Lookout Mountain.
Kevin also gave me a “new old” camera! It’s a Nikon D90 that I originally owned from 2008 – 2010 before I passed it on to him. It was his main camera for a while, but he no longer needs it and asked if I wanted it back. Yes! It’s still working and I plan to try it out (again) on my next photo outing. Thanks Kevin for the tour and the camera!!
Nashville
We stayed with MK in Nashville over the 4th of July. There was a lot of good food and some sightseeing too. She found a close by park with a view of the downtown skyline:
Nashville Skyline – from Love Circle Park, elevation 744 feet.
And after dinner one evening they dropped me off for a few minutes so I could make a few photos downtown:
Downtown Nashville, Broadway, near the river
We’d heard about the Gallery of Iconic Guitars (GIG: https://www.thegigatbelmont.com) and visiting it was one of the highlights of the trip. We got there early and had the place to ourselves!
Gallery of Iconic Guitars. The GIG at Belmont University in Nashville has dozens of historic instruments on display from a total of about 500 in the collection.
1887 Martin D-28. One of the oldest instruments on display at the GIG.
Ohio
Next, we headed up to Archbold Ohio. Although I didn’t make any photos there, one highlight on the drive was a stop at Sweetwater Music in Fort Wayne, Indiana. It’s quite a place and if you have any interest in music, you should visit if you get a chance.
We drove home from Ohio along I-75. It’s a scenic route, but there aren’t many places to pull over for a photo. This one spot a bit north east of Chattanooga was the only safe overlook that we found.
Overlooking Owl Hollow; Stitched panorama from 4 RAW format iPhone frames.
It was a very nice trip, although we spent way too many hours in the car. Family, friends, sightseeing, food, convention, and more. A great time!
You can click on these photos to see higher resolution versions on Flickr.
Thanks for stopping by the blog. Stay positive, be kind, and take care of yourselves and each other. And if you can, make some photos on your road trip!
Memorial Day is observed in the US on the last Monday of May. It’s set aside to remember, honor, thank, and mourn men and women who have lost their lives serving our country.
Decorating soldiers’ graves with flowers is an ancient custom. We’ve done this in the US since at least the Civil War and in 1971 it became an official federal holiday.
There are parades in many places across the country, and we also observe Memorial Day by visiting cemeteries and memorials. Some wear a red poppy in remembrance of the fallen, a tradition called out by the by Canadian physician Lieutenant-Colonel John McCrae in the World War I poem “In Flanders Fields“. Our local veterans group does a very solemn and moving missing man table as well as a Memorial Day Ceremony.
The US Flag at half mast at Veterans Memorial Park in Titusville Florida.
Please join us tomorrow and take a few moments to remember service members who have perished in the line of duty and those they left behind. Heroes all.
I was surprised recently to get an email from Bill Hemmer, the publisher of Portfolio Magazine. He said “I was looking at your website and saw that you had quite a bit of new work. Really great. I wanted to see if you might want us to do another feature on your work in an upcoming Portfolio Issue?”
I said yes and he selected 14 photos for the October 2023 issue. I made all of them in and around Central Florida. Bill chose this one for the cover:
Long exposure sunrise – looking east from Space View Park in Titusville, Florida
Bill published a group of my Florida photos once before in the June / July 2015 issue. That one doesn’t seem to still be on line, but you can see my photos in their gallery here: https://www.portfoliomagazinenaples.com/ed-rosack.html
It’s a lovely magazine and their photo selection and article layout work is very good. I’m honored to be included – thank you so much Bill!
We were able to spend some time with MK at her place last month. She’s a most excellent host and Nashville has a lot to see and do!
On our drive up, we stopped and had lunch with Kevin M. It was fun to catch up with him and hear about his recent expedition to Costa Rica. He saw 100+ life birds there! https://www.flickr.com/photos/44542650@N08/albums/72177720310091373. Unfortunately, we forgot to get a photo at lunch – but I did get some photos in Nashville.
All three of us have watched and enjoyed the Nashville series and it was fun when MK pointed out places around town that we’d seen on TV. The Blue Bird Cafe is featured prominently and she managed to get us tickets. The music was just as awesome in real life!
Blue Bird Cafe, Sept. 2nd 2023: In the round with Rob Harris, Jamie Rowe, Kim Parent, and Adam Wheeler
Nashville has some really great guitar stores. Both MK and Lynn were very understanding and let me indulge my guitar obsession. I’d been to Gruhn Guitars before, but the Gibson Garage was new for me. I’d never seen a guitar conveyor belt:
MK suggested a bit of exercise one morning so we walked around Radnor Lake Park.
There were quite a few ducks and Canada Geese on the water. These swam in formation for me:
Canada Convoy
MK’s cat Narwhal is a certified therapy cat with Love on a Leash. He has a busy schedule and while we were there he volunteered at a Nashville area nursing home. He really seems to enjoy his work:
I’ve wanted to walk the John Seigenthaler Pedestrian Bridge across the Cumberland River, but hadn’t made it before this trip. MK and Lynn dropped me off in East Nashville and I walked across and met them on the other side. They report that there are plenty of rooftop bars to wait at. I found some photos while they were waiting:
Nashville’s John Seigenthaler Pedestrian Bridge
The Gateway Bridge (also known as the ‘Korean War Veterans Memorial Bridge’) is just south of the pedestrian bridge. I’m not sure if it’s alway lit up like this – it was pretty on that night:
Blue Hour on the Cumberland River
The view of the downtown waterfront is amazing:
Evening along the river
I think the buildings along the river look good in B&W. I like the Gateway Bridge reflection in the windows on the lower right:
Nashville Reflections
And finally, here’s what lower Broadway looks like as the country music starts to crank up in the Honky Tonks for the night:
Blue Hour on Broadway
Eating was also a highlight on the visit – both at some very nice restaurants and the meals that MK made at her place!
The only not so good part of our trip was testing positive with Covid when we got home. It was the first time either of us have had it but fortunately our vaccines were up to date and we got prescriptions for Paxlovid, so the symptoms weren’t too awful. They lasted for two solid weeks, but we’re better now thankfully.
Thanks for visiting my blog. Stay positive (and Covid negative!), be kind, take care of yourselves and each other. And if you can, see some of Nashville!
I’ve been busy with other things and it’s been terribly hot here (and everywhere). So I haven’t been photographing much lately. I know summer isn’t the best time for wildlife but I really needed to scratch my photography itch. So I headed out one morning about a week ago toward Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge.
I usually try to make a sunrise photo before I start looking for wildlife. This time I wasn’t sure where to set up for a landscape, so I decided to go early and stop at several places. Sunrise was at 6:41am and I got to the my first spot a little before six. This is a two frame vertical panorama cropped to 4×5, at 24mm, f/8, 25 sec @ ISO 800. The scene was a bit dark!
Early morning by the river, Titusville – Marina Park, 5:54:48am.
The sky was so dramatic, I made a second photo from the same spot a few minutes later. On this one I zoomed in to show some of the detail in the distance. Single frame, 66mm, f/8, 29 sec @ ISO 250.
Early morning by marker 6, Titusville – Marina Park, 5:58:22am.
At that point, I decided to move to Scobie Park – just south of Veterans Memorial Park. The folks that live in that condo have a great view every morning! Single frame, 49mm, f/11, 20 sec @ ISO 100.
Rooms with a view, Titusville – Scobie Park, 6:07:41am
I moved again to Veterans Memorial Park and made this next photo from the gazebo to highlight the virga beyond the bridge. It’s a two frame exposure bracket, 69mm, f/11, 5 sec and 2.5 sec @ISO 100.
Might be raining beyond the bridge, Titusville – Veterans Memorial Park, 6:20:27am
I thought the show was about done, so I put things back in the car and started over to MINWR. On the way the sky kept changing. I hurried to a small pond on the left near the entrance to Gator Creek Road. Luckily I still had my 24 – 105 landscape lens on my camera. I quickly jumped out of the car, set up my tripod and made this image. It’s a stitched panorama blend of 7 exposure bracketed frames, 24mm, f/8, 1/125 – 1.6 sec @ISO 100.
Cloud shadows at sunrise, MINWR – Gator Creek Road, 6:39:50am
And the header image is actually a 6th photo: a black and white conversion of another image made from the gazebo at Veterans Memorial Park.
After all that, I switched lenses and drove through the refuge looking for wildlife and macro subjects. I didn’t get too many of those, but maybe there’s enough for a future blog post.
I went out that morning with no expectations. My only goal was to exercise my photo muscles. I came home with these 5 images (and more!) that I really like. That’s one reason I enjoy the photography hobby so much – it surprises me almost every time. Sunrise isn’t just a moment. This one took about an hour to unfold. If you want some great sunrise (or sunset) photos, show up early and stay late. And it helps to be familiar with an area so you can get a variety of viewpoints / perspectives in your photos.
Thanks for stopping by and reading my blog. Stay positive, be kind, take care of yourselves and each other. And if you can, spend 45 minutes photographing sunrise!
I haven’t posted in a while, so it’s about time. And I have been making some photos lately. Here are a few that I like – all made since my last post.
Another quiet morning on the St. Johns river.
(February 17; Boat ramp on HW 50 at the St. Johns River; three frame panorama; merged in Photoshop.)
Warm light on a wading Willet.
(February 17, Gator Creek Road in Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge, single frame, cropped.)
A wary Raccoon.
(February 23; Orlando Wetlands Park, single frame, cropped.)
Forest flowers.
(February 24, Central Winds Park in Winter Springs; Focus Bracket in Camera, merged in Photoshop.)
Through the trees.
(March 4; Orlando Wetlands Park; single frame; cropped.)
Nesting Woodstork.
(March 4, Orlando Wetlands Park, single frame, Adobe enhanced resolution, cropped.)
Ruffled Feathers.
(Eastern Meadowlark; March 7; Joe Overstreet Road; single Frame; cropped.)
A river runs through it.
(March 10; Leroy Wright recreational area along SR 520 at the St. Johns river , Cocoa Fl; Sony Pixel Shift Multi Shoot (16 frames), merged in Sony Imaging Edge; Converted to B&W in Lightroom.)
I made all of these (and more!) while trying out and setting up my new camera.
In late October of last year, Sony announced the latest version of their high resolution model line: the A7R V. There’s a lot of info available on the web about it. I read a great deal of that over 3+ months before finally deciding to upgrade my faithful A7R III (which was announced way back in October of 2017). I packed up quite a bit of my existing camera gear and traded it in for the new one. If you’re interested, you can read a lot of the same info I researched on-line, so I’m not going to repeat any of that here. I’ll just summarize some things and give you my first impressions to go along with the images above.
6 years is a long time in the camera design universe. These are changes that I really like:
The native sensor resolution is slightly higher – nice for landscapes and very helpful for wildlife photos. The pixel shift multi shot capability now seems to work very well (it didn’t on the A7R III and I never used it). For static subjects where you want huge resolution files, I think it’s a better implementation than even the Olympus EM 1 MII version that I used a lot when I had that camera.
Focus capabilities are immensely improved. The human eye auto focus on the A7R III convinced me to buy that years ago. The A7R V AI auto focus is much better and will be wonderful for many subjects, not just people.
Image Stabilization on the A7R III was not a standout feature. On the A7R V it is.
The A7R V has a huge image buffer. You can shoot continuously at the highest frame rate for up to 1000 frames (using CF Express cards). Even using SD UHS-II cards (slower than CF Express) it will still shoot over 100 frames before the buffer fills.
Many RAW Image formats are now supported. You can choose compressed / uncompressed as well as medium or low resolution RAW files if you don’t need the full resolution.
Video is much improved (although I should study this and use it more often!).
The Electronic Viewfinder and the back LCD are both improved with higher resolution and frame rates. The LCD also tilts and swivels – very useful.
Other things have changed, but they’re minor (for me). In summary I like everything Sony did with this camera and I hope to use it for a long time to come. If you have any questions, I’d be happy to try and answer them in the comments.
By the way, nesting activity at Orlando Wetlands is still in full swing. It’s a good opportunity to observe several species creating new life.
Click on any of these photos to see higher resolution versions on Flickr.
Hurricane Ian was a slow moving, high wind storm when it came ashore last Wednesday. The news and photos from the Fort Meyers area are horrific. By the time it passed through Winter Springs Wednesday and Thursday it had weakened, but we still had ~40 MPH sustained winds and gusts much stronger than that.
There are tree limbs and some whole trees down in our neighborhood, and we have what looks like minor damage to one place on our roof. We lost power, water, and internet on Thursday but power and internet came back after a little over 24 hours. Water pressure is back too, but we’re under a boil water notice due to water main breaks.
Winter Springs recorded more than 15 inched of rain and there’s widespread flooding in the Orlando area. Fortunately, our home is up on a slight ridge, so the flooding is not too close. We do have a couple of the major roads through our neighborhood blocked due to flood damage. The city has said some areas will need to be rebuilt so it may take a while to reopen them.
Flooding along Winter Springs Blvd.
Lynn and I have ben very lucky. I hope all of you are doing well. And if you’ve been impacted by this storm I hope your recovery efforts are well underway. Stay positive, be kind, and take care of yourselves and each other.
Header image: Flooding along Mitchell Hammock Road in Oviedo, Florida has completely covered this sod field. Photo by Lynn Rosack, used with permission.
I’ve been thinking about this blog and what it should be like going forward. I haven’t reached any conclusions about revising the purpose or content, but I am going to revise the schedule.
What’s around the bend?
Over 15+ years, I’ve written 758 posts: an average of over fifty a year. In recent years, I’ve been publishing every Sunday and I’m finding that pace harder to sustain. Coming up with something worthwhile each week is a challenge, especially since I’ve been photographing less than I used to. I guess I’m suffering a bit from writer’s / photographer’s block.
So I’m going to shift to an irregular schedule and publish when inspired. Instead of searching for something every week that I hope will interest all of you and me too, I’m going to update the blog when I have something to share. My goal will be once per month, but I’m not going to force it.
I’m very grateful for all of you that subscribe and for everyone’s visits, views, comments, and likes – thanks! Remember to stay positive, be kind, take care of yourselves and each other. And if / when you can, make some photos!
Happy Holidays 2024!
Wetland Phoebe
Snowy Egrets on a Mission
Chilly Redish Egret
Young Roseate Spoonbill
Northern Shoveler
Wet Wings (a typical Cormorant pose)
Hooded Mergansers
Lurking Gator
Feral Hog
