Appalachia in Summer – Old Glade Antique Tractor Show

Jul26

We recently had the very special treat of attending the Old Glade Antique Tractor Show, perched on a picturesque hillside in Abingdon, VA. At first glance, the similarities between an antique tractor show in the Virginia hills and our usual coverage of an event like the Amelia Island Concours d’Elegance seem few and far between. Sure, the items on display are old and the vehicles on display have 4 wheels, a motor and some curious designs – but beyond that how could these two events be more dissimilar?

In fact, these sorts of events have more in common that you would think. While most of the collectors probably don’t have bank accounts to rival the GDP of a Central American country, these folks are every inch as passionate about their vintage tractors as are the owners of a prestigious piece of racing history. They know the provenance of their machines, the nuances that make their tractor unique, and they have a high opinion of what their equipment is worth. It’s often said you can tell you’re at a concours by the garish and stylistically confusing coloring of participants pants, and so too you find a distinct wardrobe at an antique tractor show – consisting mainly of crisp blue bib-overalls and straw hats.

So, what is different you ask – there is an order of magnitude separation in the value of these vehicles for starters. A pristinely restored 1950s Ford Jubilee Tractor, for example, will set you back about $5,000 – but even a bargain-basement concours-level entry will set you back 30 times that amount. In other words, if you were so inclined to sell just one of your concours cars, you could fill up an entire barn with top-notch antique tractors – in-so-doing have one of the best private tractor collections in the country – and still have enough loose change to buy yourself a few dozen acres to play farmer with. Tempting, isn’t it… Or, if you’re like me and don’t have $200,000 burning a hole in your pocket – getting into the world of tractor collecting could prove both profitable and enjoyable. For a boy with rural roots and a love of the country, I thoroughly enjoyed the day spent with these genuine and kind antique tractor enthusiasts.

Check out all the fun in the galley below! As always, please feel free to download any photos you like – and if you enjoy our photos, please share this blog with your friends and help us spread the word!

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Copyright 2014 Deremer Studios – Jacksonville, FL
Check us out at: Pro.DeremerStudios.com (Commercial Photography) or DeremerStudios.com (Wedding & Portrait Photography) | 904-744-1103 | nate@deremerstudios.com

2014 Coke Zero 400: The Rain in Daytona Falls Mainly on the Track…

Jul7

It’s been a rough year for racing at Daytona – from the horrific crash that nearly killed two drivers at the Rolex 24, to the severe weather that overtook the track and it’s 200,000 fans at the Daytona 500, to this weekend’s never ending deluge that threatened to completely cancel the Coke Zero 400. Thankfully, the race was able to get underway a day late, but even still, those pesky showers managed to end the race early. But, despite the bad weather, the 2014 NASCAR racing at Daytona has been full of action – three and four wide racing – and as such, some rather spectacular pile-ups. Yesterday was no exception – with two big wrecks, the second of which involved over 75% of the field.

When the dust had settled and the rain moved in, the winner of this year’s running of the Coke Zero 400 was Aric Almirola, racing the #43 emblazoned Ford of Richard Petty Motorsports. What makes this victory all the sweeter you ask? 30 years ago, on this very same weekend and on the very same track, Richard Petty won his 200th NASCAR race.

As always, please feel free to download as many images as you like – and if you enjoy our photos, please share this blog with your friends and help us get the word out!

Automotive Lifestyle Shoot with the BMW Resort Driving Tour

Jun6

Again this year we had the pleasure of photographing an automotive lifestyle shoot for the BMW Resort Driving Tour. This year we took out a 2014 BMW 550i and 640i Convertible. On our photographic adventure, we stopped at some of our favorite spots for photos, went exploring, found a peacock, went into downtown Fernandina, and spilled ice cream on ourselves… okay, so technically, I spilled the ice cream. Then there was that whole bit about accidentally taking the keys home with me – but we won’t talk about that. Want your own chance behind the wheel? The BMW Resort Driving Tour travels to a variety of luxury resorts each year – offering registered guests the chance to take out a new BMW for several hours of fun on the roads.

As always, please feel free to download – and if you enjoy our photos, please share this blog with your friends and help us get the word out!

2014 Amelia Island Concours d’Elegance – Shooting for McLaren

Mar14

It has proven a very busy week between a few shoots, a few meetings, and a ton of work on post-Concours distribution and promotion. But more on that once things settle down. For the second year in a row, McLaren had a presence at the 2014 Amelia Island Concours d’Elegance – and for the second year in a row, we’ve had the pleasure of providing photography coverage for them! A lot of people would say that the main event of the Concours is the awards ceremony, but I bet the majority of the people in the picture above would beg to differ – several hundred people gathered to see the unveiling of this beautiful P1.

But that wasn’t all. With McLaren’s 50th anniversary underway, the manufacturer had its own class, filled with unique and stunning racers from the first four decades of McLaren. As with previous years, we used our ND filter to capture some unique full-sun time exposures such as the one above. Also new to the field in Amelia was this stunning example of McLaren Special Operations – the MP4-12C below has over 20 unique elements that make your car stand out from a ‘regular’ McLaren (as if they needed any help)… All in all, it was again a wonderful pleasure to shoot for the McLaren.

As always, please feel free to download – and if you enjoy our photos, please share this blog with your friends and help us get the word out!

2014 Amelia Island Concours d’Elegance – Sunday is the Day!

Mar10

The 2014 Amelia Island Concours d’Elegance is here! Well, at least it was 16 hours ago… After another dose of sleep deprivation, I fear this post may be completely incoherent, but we all know you are mostly here for the photos and free HD desktop wallpaper anyway, right? Now that we’ve got that settled – take a look above to see the scene that greeted us this morning – it’s one of BMW’s awesome art cars enclosed in an LED lightbox and set at that wonderful time just before sunrise where the colors are so vibrant.

As we began to work today, the stunning lines of this 1939 Horch 930 S Streamliner (above) arrested my attention as it pulled into its spot. Turns out, it was awarded best of show – and after spending about 10 minutes photographing the car, I certainly can understand why. Below is another awesome example of the diverse collection the Concours staff bring together each year. I am remissed to say that I never took a look at the placard on this one, so if anyone know’s what this turn-of-the-century truck is, feel free to share with all of us!

As always, please feel free to download – and if you enjoy our photos, please share this blog with your friends and help us get the word out!

2014 Amelia Island Concours d’Elegance – Saturday Anticipation

Mar8

The 2014 Amelia Island Concours d’Elegance has outdone itself. Sleep deprivation will keep my thoughts brief, and probably more or less incoherent to boot. The second annual Cars and Coffee was a marked expansion over the inaugural event last year, with nearly twice as many cars and what looked like about three times the guests. There were some great cars out there – some rare, some more familiar, but all interesting to look at. On the way up, I had the pleasure of driving just behind one of these cars and couldn’t resist taking a few slow speed shots (above).

Today also saw a very exciting and quite entertaining RM auction, as well as the first public showing of the Lamborghini Huracan in North America (below). All in all, a tiring, but amazing day at the event!

As always, please feel free to download – and if you enjoy our photos, please share this blog with your friends and help us get the word out!

2014 Amelia Island Concours d’Elegance – Friday in Full Swing

Mar7

The 2014 Amelia Island Concours d’Elegance is now in full swing. Friday marks the first full day of Concours activities, including the Porsche Driving Experience (above) which includes a Porsche autocross, a high-speed run with racers including Hurley Haywood, and tours of some beautiful private car collections. Want a small taste of the event? Check out our photos from the event in the gallery below. After the tour, we returned to The Ritz-Carlton and spent some time shooting for our friends at McLaren, as well as photographing many of the other great manufacturer displays. As we were leaving, we also stumbled upon the beautiful 1914 Mercedes-Benz 115HP (below) as the folks at Mercedes were wrapping up a shoot of the car. They graciously let us take a few photos as well.

As always, please feel free to download – and if you enjoy our photos, please share this blog with your friends and help us get the word out!

2014 Amelia Island Concours d’Elegance – Thursday RM Preview

Mar6

The 2014 Amelia Island Concours d’Elegance is underway! Thursday is when things begin to pick up steam at the Ritz-Carlton with RM’s Auction Preview open to the public, as well as open doors to the retail shop and antique signage store. Jaguar also began their test drive schedule early this year – featuring a rather loud Union Jack liveried F-type convertible, among other cars. Also spotted today was the quite splendid BMW i8 in a really rather stunning electric blue (below).

As always, please feel free to download – and if you enjoy our photos, please share this blog with your friends and help us get the word out!

It’s Beginning to Look a Lot Like Concours!

Mar5

If you’ve followed our blog for a while, you probably know my favorite shoot of the year is coming up this weekend – the 2014 Amelia Island Concours d’Elegance. This week, I’ve been up at the Ritz-Carlton with AAA, photographing a wonderful event they put on at the resort, so I had the privilege of seeing the area transformed into a car lover’s dream and all the great cars rolling into the resort. Check out some of these amazing cars in the gallery below!

As always, please feel free to download – and if you enjoy our photos, please share this blog with your friends and help us get the word out!

2014 Rolex 24 in Technicolor & a Brief Lesson on Race Photography

Jan27

After a lot of work and a little sleep, I’ve managed to cobble together some of my favorite shots from our coverage of the 2014 Rolex 24 at Daytona for Top Gear. This was our first Rolex 24 and a bit of a last minute trip – compounded by a shoot back in Jacksonville smack dab in the middle of the race – but with a little creativity and even less sleep, I was able to be at the race during the day, at night, through dawn and into the morning. Above is one of my favorite photos from the race – a six second time exposure from high in the stands about 20 minutes before sunrise. With cars gunning through the front stretch at over 175mph, the moderate exposure time allowed for some great light trails.

Of course, what kind of endurance race photographer would I be if I didn’t manage to get the ever important ‘red-glowy brake rotor’ photo (above). The trick with these sort of photos is to keep the ISO as low as you can while maintaining a half-way manageable shutter speed (the above shot was an 80th of a second) – that and taking a near-infinite amount of photos because most will be somewhere on the spectrum between ‘slightly fuzzy’ and ”a blurry mess’. Below is another one of those ‘shoot it until you get something you like’ sort of shots. Crossing the start-finish line at nearly 200MPH, the car goes from completely outside the frame, to inside the frame, to out the other side in under a 10th of a second – meaning timing is everything. The trick here is a smaller aperture and pre-focusing on the rough location the cars are passing through. All joking aside, practice does help a whole lot with timing and smoothness on both of these type of shots – so go out there and practice and you’ll find before long that the ratio of ‘keepers’ to ‘if you squint can I call this artsy?’ will greatly improve.

The photos are all 1920 x 1080P HD wallpaper, designed to work perfectly with your widescreen computer, TV or other displays. As always, please feel free to download – and if you enjoy our photos, please share this blog with your friends and help us get the word out!

Sneak Peek – 2014 Rolex 24 gets Underway

Jan25

As I type, the Rolex 24 is entering it’s 9th hour of competition. Earlier this afternoon, I had the privileged of shooting the start of the race for our friends at Top Gear before having to head back to Jacksonville for a corporate shoot. The plan is to leave the house tomorrow at 4:00 to get back down to Daytona for the remainder of the race – including some night and dawn photography opportunities. Being as I am looking at 4 hours of sleep, I thought I would limit this blog post to one photo for the night. Hope it wets your whistle until I can get a proper post up!

This photo are all 1920 x 1080P HD wallpaper, designed to work perfectly with your widescreen computer, TV or other displays. As always, please feel free to download – and if you enjoy our photos, please share this blog with your friends and help us get the word out!

Amelia Concours 2013: Special Edition – The 1923 Locomobile

Oct22

Ever since this year’s Amelia Island Concours D’Elegance, I’ve been wanting to feature this great old car – and well, I’ve finally found the time. The car in question is an all-original 1923 Locomobile Model 48 Series VIII Sportif. As you browse through the photos, you may wonder what stood out to me about this fading, weathered and rather bleak looking car. The paint is faded, the seats are worn and ripped in places, and yet this 90 year old car is a survivor. You see, the vast majority of the cars at the Concours are pristine – they have either been flawlessly restored or vacuum-sealed from the moment they left the production line or coach maker. But this Locomobile is different. Just one look, and you can see this car has a history – a story that encourages investigation.

And history it has. Though over 90 years old, it has less that 25,000 original miles and on the RM auction block this spring, sold for $176,000. To see more details about the vehicle’s history and some great staged photos of the car, feel free to visit the RM website. Want to see more coverage from the 2013 Concours? Then visit the Concours section of our blog for a large collection of images from the weekend.

As always, feel free to download any or all of the images for use as desktop wallpaper! Enjoy!

Copyright 2013 Deremer Studios – Jacksonville, FL
Check us out at: Pro.DeremerStudios.com (Deremer Studios Pro Commercial Photography) or DeremerStudios.com (DS Photography Wedding & Portrait) | 904-744-1103 | nate@deremerstudios.com

Going Full Throttle at Ford’s EcoBoost Challenge

Sep17

This past weekend, we had the joy of spending an afternoon in Orlando with Ford’s line of EcoBoost powered cars. The EcoBoost Challenge consists of three tracks – hypermiling (where you compete to achieve the best mileage), side by side comparison, and the ST performance academy. Each track highlighted a different aspect of Ford’s vehicles, from fuel efficiency to fit and finish, to all-out performance. Needless to say, the event was not only enjoyable to shoot but also to participate in!

What is EcoBoost you might ask? The idea is pretty simple – take an efficient engine, add two asymmetrical turbos, and get the best of both worlds – increased horsepower and torque with some rather splendid fuel economy. Because of the asymmetrical pairing of a larger and smaller turbo, the lag often found in turbo engines is greatly diminished, and the power curve is really quite impressive. For instance, the 2.0L EcoBoost engine puts out 240HP at 5500 rpm and peak torque (270 lb ft) all the way from 750–4500 rpm. So, what’s all this mean, you might ask? As Jeremy Clarkson would put it, “Powweeerrrr”! BTW – he favorably mentions the spry little Fiesta ST in his latest rambling: Jeremy Clarkson on having too much Power.

But enough with the numbers and technicalities – you want to know what it was like. In a word – fantastic! Despite weather hot enough to cook a prime rib (or my Nordic skin) on the pavement, the opportunity to push these cars was quite delightful. Even the hypermiling course was a challenging bit of fun – I reached a staggering 262 MPG on the course with just a tiny bit of cheating… When I went back to do it correctly, I still managed 51 MPG, though others who were able to follow the rules better than I scored in excess of 140MPG. On to the autocross track – where i felt a bit more at home. Though I’ve had similar track time only once before (See our Jaguar Alive Coverage from earlier this year), I was able to manage a respectable 5th place in a group of about 60 people, with a time of 29.1 seconds. The top time, just 1.3 seconds faster, was achieved by a semi-pro autocross racer, so all in all, fifth sounded pretty good to me. What a fun day!

As always, feel free to download any or all of the images for use as desktop wallpaper! Enjoy!

Copyright 2013 Deremer Studios – Jacksonville, FL
Check us out at: Pro.DeremerStudios.com (Commercial Photography) or DeremerStudios.com (Wedding & Portrait Photography) | 904-744-1103 | nate@deremerstudios.com

Amelia Island + Ritz-Carlton + BMWs = FUN!

Jun22

Just last night, we had the pleasure of spending our first non-work night at The Ritz-Carlton, Amelia Island, and boy was it awesome! As always, the staff at the resort was so kind, generous and helpful. For a car guy like myself, the added bonus of being able to briefly enjoy two great BMWs was icing on the cake! After a lazy afternoon around the resort, we took the Z4 (above) out and about in Fernandina for a great dinner at Timoti’s (food pictured below). I tried the blackened fish and shrimp and Bryn gave the fish tacos a go. We highly recommend a visit!

After a wonderfully bacon-filled breakfast at the Ritz-Carlton’s Cafe 4750, we were energized for a quick drive in BMW’s new 650 Gran Coupe. And so, we set off down A1A, headed toward Jacksonville, turned around, and enjoyed the panoramic views of Florida’s scenic marshland. From there, we returned to the resort, just in time for a quick visit to the Salt store, where we picked up a few momento’s to remember the weekend!

While the visit was quick, and the cars even quicker, it was a really wonderful getaway. Thanks again to all our Ritz friends who make the resort, and our stay, so wonderful! As always, feel free to download any or all of the images for use as desktop wallpaper! Enjoy!

Amelia Concours 2013: Shooting for McLaren

Mar12

During the Concours weekend, we had the pleasure of providing coverage for not only The Ritz-Carlton, Amelia Island, but also Top Gear (See our coverage here) and the subject of this post, McLaren. If you follow the automotive world, you know McLaren made a big splash a few years ago with the unveiling of a brand new supercar, the MP4-12C. McLaren has since launched 10 dealerships throughout key US markets and has quite a head of momentum going in this hard fought market. And this is where McLaren, the 2013 Amelia Concours, and Deremer Studios intersect.

For 2013, McLaren ramped up their Amelia Concours presence with a static display and executive test drives both Friday and Saturday, as well as a large show display featuring the venerable McLaren F1 and the new Can-Am spec MP4-12C for Sunday. The results, at least from my perspective, were rather fantastic. The McLaren camp was swamped with onlookers and admirers each day, and as you can see from above photo, youngsters were overjoyed at the sight of these stunning cars. It reminds me of my own love of the McLaren f1 when it came out during the early 90’s.

As a car guy, this shoot was an especially enjoyable time for me. All in all, the Concours weekend was a stellar, memorable event! I encourage you to check it out next year – you will not be disappointed! As always, feel free to download any or all of the images for use as desktop wallpaper! Enjoy!