Gearing Up For Scotland

One more day until we leave for Scotland!

Mary Ann and I are travelling with Ron and Ricki, good friends whom we have met through the Richmond Hill Camera Club.  Ron is a dentist by trade, but a serious hard-core photographer after business hours.

As a tune up for the big trip, Ron and I have been planning to get out to test our equipment and make sure everything was ready to go.

Ron was planning on shooting some promotional photos for a patient of his, who happened to drive stock cars.  Sounded like a fun day, so we made our way up to Sunset Speedway last Sunday.

Kendra Adams is a very talented driver, and has been driving stock car for a little over one year.  We met with Kendra and her family before the qualifying heat and spent a few minutes with her in the pits.

Considering she was preparing herself for a 10 lap qualifying heat, she was remarkably calm.  Kendra was happy she would run in the first qualifying heat of the afternoon.

Getting ready to start the first heat. Kendra drives the #2 Honda.

Kendra on the offensive.

Kendra on the defensive.

Kendra finished 5th in the qualifying heat, which meant she would race later in the feature race.  Here are a few more shots later in the pits.

Unfortunately we could not stay for the feature race, so I'm not sure how the rest of the day unfolded. One thing is for sure, Kendra can hold her own. Oh, I forgot to mention... Kendra is only 14 years old!

We wish her all the best in her career driving, as well as anything else she puts her mind to.

I'm happy to say that the camera gear passed the test too, so the camera bag is packed and we are ready for Scotland.  Hopefully I'll have a chance to get a few blog entries out during the trip, so stay tuned.

If you are reading this blog for the first time, don't forget to review the archives at the right side for earlier entries. And feel free to add a comment, as well as share this blog with your friends. If you have not already done so, please enter your email address in the "Follow my Blog by Email" box on the right hand side. It will be much easier for me to stay in touch with you. If you don't see a signup box on the right side, then click on the blog heading and that should take you to a webpage with better graphics. You should then see the signup box on the right side.  If you have trouble signing up, send me an email at mark.girard@rogers.com.

Thanks for reading...

Mark

Timing is Everything

Photographers will tell you that the "Golden Hour" is the best time for landscape photography.  The Golden Hour is just after sunrise and just before sunset.  When the sun is low in the sky and the light is a warm golden tone.

The opposite is also true.  The worst time of day for landscape photography is at "high noon", when the sun is directly overhead and casts harsh shadows.

A couple of weekends ago, I had the opportunity to search out an old farmhouse near Chatham that I had wanted to photograph for several years.  I knew it was on Highway 3 near a little town called Palmyra.

When the chance came up to take off for a weekend, I jumped at it.  Mary Ann was at the spa with a friend, and I was on my own. On the way to Windsor on Saturday I photographed drag races in St. Thomas, and wrote about it in the last blog entry.

Saturday night I spent the night at my mom's in Windsor.  I was on the road Sunday morning an hour before dawn to make sure I found the farmhouse during the "Golden Hour".

Sure enough, I found the farmhouse with plenty of time to spare.  Here is a photograph from the road, taken before sunrise.

On closer inspection, this was a farmhouse where the brick was striped off and reused.  Here is a closer shot of the front of the house.  Notice the brick chimneys, and some brickwork left near the peaks of the roof.

This must have been quite a farmhouse in its time, notice the wood carving around the window trim.

The next photograph was taken during the "Golden Hour", after the sun had risen above the horizon.  Notice how warm and soft the sunlight is.

There is one more point about timing that I would like to raise.  As I recall, none of the other photographs of this farmhouse that I have seen had that much greenery in front of the house.  Come to think of it, the other photographs that I have seen were taken in winter, or early spring, before the sumac had a chance to leaf out.  So not only is the time of day important, but as I learned that day, the time of year is also important.

Just down the road from the farmhouse was an interesting little cemetery, so I couldn't resist a few from there.

Everyone loves a good sunrise, don't they?  Well, not photography judges, but that's another blog entry.  Here is one for those who like sunrises anyway.

For the photographers in the readership, all of the farmhouse and cemetery images were taken as a 5 shot bracket and processed with Nik HDR Effx.  The sunrise was a single shot.

In a little over a week from now, Mary Ann and I are headed to Scotland with friends Ron and Ricki. Ron is a fine photographer, so I'm sure there will be a blog entry or two while we are away.  Stay tuned.

If you are reading this blog for the first time, don't forget to review the archives at the right side for earlier entries. And feel free to add a comment, as well as share this blog with your friends. If you have not already done so, please enter your email address in the "Follow my Blog by Email" box on the right hand side. It will be much easier for me to stay in touch with you. If you don't see a signup box on the right side, then click on the blog heading and that should take you to a webpage with better graphics. You should then see the signup box on the right side.  If you have trouble signing up, send me an email at mark.girard@rogers.com.

Thanks for reading...

Mark

One for the Gearheads

Mary Ann was off to the spa last weekend for a little R&R, with her friend Brenda.  I was feeling the itch to grab the camera gear and shoot something.  There is an abandoned farmhouse near Chatham that I've been meaning to shoot for a couple of years now, so I thought it was the perfect time.  More on this in a future blog entry. And I could drop by to see my mom in Windsor.  If I could only find something else to shoot on Saturday....

Google is a wonderful tool to find stuff.  Turned out that Saturday was a day for drag races in St. Thomas.  Who knew St. Thomas had a drag strip?  And what were the chances that Saturday was the CK Nationals (CK Stands for Chatham-Kent).  There were four classes of cars, all the way from street legal cars to heavily customized racing machines.  The even had a couple of funny cars.

I've always wanted to shoot drag races.  As a kid, I used to go to the Windsor Dragway, and I've been hooked on drag races ever since.  I also learned through Google, that Windsor Dragway closed in 1971.  That was a long time ago... do the math.

I arrived around 11:00 and they were in the middle of time trials.  Each class took turns taking a couple of runs, then the elimination heats started.  The track was the usual quarter mile, with lots of areas to walk around.  The crowds were minimal, so I could pretty well shoot from anywhere I wanted. There was a walkway above the back of the track which afforded a great view all the way down the track. Here is a shot from the walkway.

Another great place to watch is from the grandstands.

But the most fun was definitely at track level, the closer the better. This is a shot of the burn out area where the tires are warmed up so they stick to the track during the run.

And everyone loves to feel the acceleration when the Christmas Tree turns green.

 For those of you who have read earlier blog entries, you know I like conveying the sense of motion in my images. It is a little more difficult when the cars are speeding by you in excess of 100 miles per hour! Here are a couple that I was happy with.

The highlight of the day, without question, was the funny cars.  Three were running, two alcohol burning, and one nitro burning.  You could feel the excitement in the air, everyone paid attention when these guys took their turns.  These two are doing their "burn outs" to warm up the tires.  Notice two things: 1) very little smoke from the tires - I'm not sure why, I might have to ask some of my gearhead buddies, and 2) EVERYONE is covering their ears.

My only regret was forgetting to bring ear protection.  I have never heard, or felt, anything like it.  My ears rang for days.

Here is Solid Rock with a green light.  Notice the wheelie wheels are practically touching the ground at the back of the car.  They don't want the front tires off the ground allowing any air under the car to slow it down or damage the fibreglass body.

 At the end of the run, they use parachutes to slow down the cars.

I thought it was a great way to spend a Saturday afternoon.  I'll keep an eye out for the date of the 2015 CK Nationals...

If you are reading this blog for the first time, don't forget to review the archives at the right side for earlier entries. And feel free to share this blog with your friends. If you have not already done so, please enter your email address in the "Follow my Blog by Email" box on the right hand side. It will be much easier for me to stay in touch with you. If you don't see a signup box on the right side, then click on the blog heading and that should take you to a webpage with better graphics. You should then see the signup box on the right side.  If you have trouble signing up, send me an email at mark.girard@rogers.com.

Thanks for reading...

Mark