Category Archives: Daytona

Busy Birds

Very busy birds! And in a lot of different places!

Seems like the nesting season is going full blast. I’ve been seeing them everywhere I go. Lake Apopka, Winter Park, Holly Hill, and Ormond Beach. Here are a few photos. The first two are from a Lake Apopka trip a few weeks ago :

Four or five nestsLake Apopka Nesting Tree (near the pump house). I could see four or five nests in this tree: Two Anhinga, a Cormorant and a Great Blue Heron. There’s also a Common Gallinule perched (or nesting?) in the lower left.

Great Blue Heron and chick(?)A close up of the Great Blue Heron nest in that tree. Some feathers sticking up from the bottom might be a small chick.

This next photo is from the Winter Park Osprey nest. I’ve checked on it several times this year and although it seems active, I haven’t been able to spot any eggs or chicks yet.

Winter Park OspreysWinter Park Ospreys: As of the afternoon of 4/19. I couldn’t see any sign of eggs or chicks in this nest. I’m going to try to go by again next week.

My friend Robert Wilson offered to show me one of his local spots: Centennial Park in Holly Hill. We went by last Monday and there was a lot of activity there too.

Osprey gathering nesting materialThis Centennial Park Osprey was gathering nesting material.

Nesting treeAnother nesting tree (Centennial Park). This one has five active nests: One Anhinga and four Great Blue Heron. These chicks are getting quite mature, with some already fledging.

Hungry youngsterHere’s a close up of the Anhiga nest in the tree above. Dad is feeding his very hungry youngster.

A stick for the nestThis nest in a close by tree is still under construction. The male just passed his mate a new stick to add.

And finally, Robert and I stopped by another spot up in Ormond Beach where he knew of a nesting Yellow-crowned Night Heron. It was hard to get a good photo, but it was exciting to see. These birds are a rare sight for me and to spot one in the nest was a treat!

Nesting Yellow-crowned Night HeronA Yellow-crowned Night Heron playing peek-a-boo from its nest in Ormond Beach.

You can click on any of these images to see higher resolution versions on Flickr.

It always amazes me what nature shows us if we go out and look. I wonder if you have some near by places like this where you could see some busy birds. We won’t know if you don’t go!

Thank you for reading my blog. Your visits, comments, and likes are always welcome and a big motivator for me. Stay positive, be kind, take care of yourselves and each other. And if you can, wander a bit out in nature – and make some photos while you’re there!

©2022, Ed Rosack. All rights reserved

I'm not a car photographer, but…

With any endeavor, you have to sometimes push yourself and attempt things outside your comfort zone.  And the stated purpose of this blog is to let people know about photo ops in our area.  So, when my friend Vince W. told me he had extra tickets to the 42nd Annual Daytona Turkey Run Hot Rod Show and Swap Meet at the Speedway in Daytona Beach and invited me along, I was more than willing to go see what it was all about.

Intake manifoldIntake manifold

Well, it’s all about cars and car parts.  You can see all kinds of vehicles from fully restored antiques to low riders, dune buggies, and yes – “parts cars”.  And you can buy or trade autos and parts of all descriptions.  So many that I don’t know how they keep track of them all.

As far as photo ops are concerned, there are many of those too.  The place is crowded, with people as well as cars.  Like I said, I’m not usually a car photographer and I found it tough to isolate my subject in the composition.  I’d suggest a wide-angle lens that would let you get in close but still fit the cars in your frame.  Or bring a telephoto or macro lens so you can concentrate on details.

Surfin' CadillacSurfin’ Cadillac

I enjoyed the experience.  If you have any interest in car photography, antique autos, hot rods, or you just need some parts, you should go to the next show.  It’s held on Thanksgiving weekend & the 4th weekend in March each year.  You can click on the link in the first paragraph for more info on their site.

Thanks for stopping by and reading my blog. Now – go make some photos out of your comfort zone!

©2015, Ed Rosack. All rights reserved.

Daytona International Speedway

Intro / Description

The Photography Interest Group was well represented at the Daytona International Speedway last Saturday.  Kevin M., Kevin K., Lutfi E., and I went for the day and covered most of the events from practice to racing and activities in between.

The Speedway in Daytona is the home of the Daytona 500 and opened in 1959.  In addition to NASCAR events, the track also hosts ARCA and other races. It’s a 2.5 mile high-speed tri-oval, and has sports car, motorcycle, and karting courses.

Saturday was part of Speedweeks which culminate next weekend with the Daytona 500.  There were two practice sessions, the Lucas Oil 200 race, the Sprint Unlimited Exhibition race, and other things to see and do.

Pit Road and the grandstands
Pit Road and the grandstands from the Fanzone

Kevin K’s son, Evan scored a package deal for us that included general admission, infield parking, and Sprint Fanzone entry for a very low price.  Sometimes being part of a prestigious organization like the Photography Interest Group can really pay off.  😉

Info for Photographers

Photo hints:

This was the first time I’ve actually photographed an automobile race and it took a while to settle on a shutter speed.  Luckily, Kevin M. was along – he’s a big race fan and advised us on settings.  He suggested using 1/1250th sec. and at this shutter speed the car body was relatively sharp while the wheels were a bit blurry – which is what I wanted to help imply motion.

These cars run over 190 mph and if you can get to the stands in the infield, they pass by very close.  So it’s a great situation to practice your panning technique.  I got the best results when I picked up the car in the viewfinder well before I pressed the shutter, concentrated on smoothly following as it approached, and continued to follow through after the shot.  I also had better luck when I used a focus point on the side the car was coming from and selected  continuous focus.  Previous experience with bird photography and keeping the focus point on target will pay off here too.

You may want to try turning off your camera / lens image stabilization to see if it works better without it at high-speed.  With fast shutters, you probably don’t need it, and depending on your equipment it might actually degrade the image.

I normally shoot in aperture priority but for this, the most critical part of the exposure triangle is the shutter speed – so I switched to shutter priority.  I set 1/1250th, and then controlled ISO manually to move the aperture to 1/f8.  It was cloudy most of the day, so my ISO ranged between 400 to 1000.

I also found myself using some positive exposure compensation at times to bring out detail inside the cars.

It’s fun to try to catch each driver at practice, but photographing single cars can quickly get monotonous.  We were fortunate to have access to several locations which helped us vary positions / light direction, and avoid back lighting most of the day.  Be on the lookout for unusual / different compositions.  There was a checkered flag in the foreground near turn two and it was fun to try to catch cars as they passed underneath.

Juan Pablo Montoya - car #42
Juan Pablo Montoya – car #42; Passing underneath a Daytona International Speedway checkered flag during practice

You should also watch for interesting people.  Be quick, since they don’t seem to stick around very long.

Richard Petty during the Dollar General Car (Matt Kenseth, #20) inspection
Richard Petty during the Dollar General Car (Matt Kenseth, #20) inspection

Tripod/Monopod:

Allowed, but not recommended.  With all the panning you’ll be doing, a tripod would get in the way.  And when crowds get dense, you’ll have trouble finding space to set yours up.

Lenses:

This depends on where you are at the track.  We were using various camera systems with a number of zoom lenses (70-200, 70-300, 150-500, 200-600 mm – full frame equivalent).  From the infield grandstands, the 600mm was a bit too long.  From the main grandstands, something that long might be useful.

It’d be helpful to have a shorter zoom available too for non-racing situations in the garage and Fanzone areas.  And a wide-angle or even a fisheye lens are useful for car close-ups.

Best time to visit:

Consult the speedway website for race schedules.  I found that last Saturday was a wonderful day there.  We got to see all the big name stars, but the crowds were very reasonable.  The traffic and number of people at the track can get crazy for big events like the Daytona 500.  Of course, if you’re a race fan, you probably don’t mind putting up with crowds to see that one.

Here are a couple more photos from the races:

Julian Jousse in car #94
Julian Jousse in car #94 has trouble in the Lucas Oil 200 race

The Big One
The Big One (photo by tkmckinn) –  A crash after dark in the season opening Sprint Unlimited exhibition race later on  Saturday night

Other:

Check the weather before you go.  It can be a bit warm or even a bit cold in Daytona in February.  Dress appropriately, and bring sun block.

Food and drinks are a little expensive.  Consider  bringing in some of your own in a small cooler.  Check the Speedway website for their rules on what you can bring in.

The Speedway has a phone app that might come in handy.  It’ll show you the day’s schedule, maps, and other info.  It also has a mode that allows you to find friends  (although it didn’t work all that well for us – everyone needs to have it open and on the GPS map screen).

Entry to the Fanzone is worth doing.  There are a lot of photo ops there that you won’t be able to get close to from the grandstands.  The infield parking was also nice, since it allowed us to move around for better vantage points.  Separate fees for admission, parking, Fanzone, etc. add up though.  Do a little research, and you might be able to find a special deal like we did.

Summary

Even though I’m not a huge race fan, I had a good time.  I wish I hadn’t waited this long to visit the speedway.

My Gallery /  Flickr photo set:  http://www.flickr.com/photos/edrosack/sets/72157632780891033/
 more photos Kevin M’s / Flickr photo set
 more photos Kevin K’s /  Flickr photo set
 more photos Lutfi E’s /  Flickr photo set
Website:  http://www.daytonainternationalspeedway.com
Address / Phone: 1801 W International Speedway Blvd  Daytona Beach, FL 32114
(386) 254-2700
Central Florida Photo Ops Rating:  A Central Florida Photo Ops “should do”

You can click the photos above to see larger versions on Flickr.  And you can see many more photos from yesterday at the links in the table above.

Thanks for stopping by and reading my blog. Now – race out and make some photos!

©2013, Ed Rosack. All rights reserved.