Self Promotion: My Nikon D5000 for sale

I just picked up a factory-refurbished Nikon D90 camera body off of eBay and as a result I'm selling my Nikon D5000 and related gear. The D5000 was just recently discontinued - however, noted photographer and Nikon enthusiast Ken Rockwell thought so much of the D5000 that he called it the "For the best possible camera for just about anything, fun or serious, I'd get the Nikon D5000."

The D5000 is an excellent, highly capable camera - I just happened to want something that gave me a bit more hands-on control of settings. The D5000 is currently listed on eBay for a starting bid of $624.99. With the D5000 body you also get:

- Nikon D5000 12.3MP camera body

- two-battery Opteka battery grip with vertical shutter release button for portrait shots and increased control

- 4 D5000/Opteka grip-compatible rechargeable batteries(these work great! used 2 for almost the entire Petit Le Mans shooting 1,800 photos and 1 hour of video)

- Battery charger

- AV output cables

- All books and documentation

- USB to PC/Mac adapter

- Nikon camera strap

- Nearly unused Nikon camera bag

* An Nikon 18-55mm VR lens is also available for a bit more money if someone is interested

The camera has only 12,661 shutter clicks since I bought the camera around March/April of 2010. I shot the entire Petit Le Mans video and my photos on it. You can find the Flickr set of the Petit Le Mans photos and the video of Petit Le Mans below. Feel free to contact me regarding any questions!

A 10 Minute History of the Porsche 917

I've hit a bit of a slump with content and seem to continually fuel things with Porsche content. Unfortunately, I don't seem to be letting up as I found this clip about the Porsche 917. I've loved this car since I first saw it and not surprisingly due to the McQueen movie Le Mans. While 10 minutes may seem like not much time to cover the prolific history of the 917 - the hosts manage to quite a lot with little time.

The clip covers the development of the 917K and 917LH a bit but has wonderful insight from 917 drivers Brian Redman and Richard Attwood. What's especially interesting is to listen to Attwood's account of the 1970 24 Hours of Le Mans and how he and the team made the conscious decision to stick with the smaller 4.5 liter flat-12 engine over the larger, more powerful 4.9 liter flat-12. In the end, the tortoise beat the hare as the smaller displacement 917K of Hermann and Attwood was reliable enough to go the distance and take the overall win at the Circuit de la Sarthe.

The clip also goes into detail about Porsche's move into Can Am to steal the show from the dominant McLaren's with a turbocharged 917/10 putting out a frightening almost 1,000HP. Additionally, a bit of insight is given to Porsche's test of the 917/30 at Talladega with Mark Donohue behind the wheel to set the FIA record for average closed circuit speed record of about 221 mph. Sadly, Donohue, a very accomplished racer, would be killed a few days later in what was initially thought to be a minor injury in at Austrian Grand Prix.

Hope you enjoy it! Shame that outrageous cars like this are no longer fit to race - no modern racers seem to come close to the brutal, relentless 917.

Porsche 917 from Mee on Vimeo.

Nearly 50 Years and the Sound Doesn't Change

I found this up on Chris Harris' blog on evo's site. Harris and two other driver's competed in the 1,000km of Nurburgring this year. I assume in some sort of historics race prior to the actual competition. However, that's irrelevant.



This video is a bit of a testament to the 911 and it's lovely flat-6 engines. They've managed to sound the same and retain its original configuration for 47 years. Basically, the 911 still kicks ass - just check out this nearly 10 minute clip of Harris hooning a 911 ST around the ring. Enjoy the music!




(Source: evo uk)

I have other interests outside cars: Art!

It counts right? I mean, just because it's artwork of motorsport and cars doesn't make it not artwork.

I found this gem of a site today while looking at the TeamSpeed forums. It's personal blog/site of artist Miha Furlan who, quite obviously, has an incredible talent for capturing late 1960's through mid-1980's race cars. I particularly love the sort of "Pop!" factor his art work has looking almost cartoonish but with incredible detail and oozing with style. He manages to make the canvas look as though it was moving.

The best thing I could compare it to are the colorful, sexy Grand Prix posters of the early years of Formula One but with even better cars and more exotic locales.

Miha also has an eye for cars with iconic paint schemes like the Gulf Porsche 917's, The JPS Lotus 72D's, Martini tri-color Porsche 935 and Lancia Integrale, and the teapot Ligier JS. Basically, if you love the golden age of motorsport then there is undoubtedly a picture for you. What's most impressive is that it seems he manages to create such beautiful imagery through only colored pencils and markers!

I'm angling with the wife to possibly land some of his works of art as Christmas gifts for me. Guys, I recommend you do the same!

I've included a few of the photos of Miha's work below definitely work a look!

Porsche 908/30 vs. Ferrari 512 @ Targa Florio


Ligier JS5


Ferrari going for it on the Targa Florio


Giles & Jody at Monaco in '79

The Way of the Future

While I was in the BMW pits at the 2010 Petit Le Mans, I happened to wander down near the Porsche pits and ran into JF Musial of Tangent Vector while he was shooting video for Porsche of North America (or just Porsche). I spoke to him briefly about his camera rig and it turns out he was using a Canon 7D to shoot the video listed below.



This Porsche GT3 R Hybrid is of particular interest to me as it bucks the trend of the normal, battery-based hybrid in favor of a fly wheel-based system. While at the race, I was aware that Porsche had run the GT3 R Hybrid as a bit of a test bed from all they've learned from the Williams KERS system( incredibly much like the one they were co-developing with BMW during their F1 partnership days!) but I wasn't very aware of the technical prowess this car manages to sport. While the hybrid system apparently only weighs an additional 103 lbs. ( a relatively small weight) it can return up to 163HP in additional power when charged up to the 4 motors Porsche fixed to each wheel. From my understanding, Porsche fixed the 4 motors to the wheels as a way of letting them add torque vectoring to the GT3 R Hybrid. Thus, they can now somewhat regulate how much power is focused on specific wheels to help increase cornering speeds and straight-line acceleration.

Overall, the GT3 Hybrid did OK for its first outing on the track in the United States by placing 18th overall in the race. Pretty impressive considering it was leading the 24 hours of Nurburgring when it has major mechanical issues. As a hybrid, the GT3 R is fairly innocuous towards motorsport fans. When it passed me numerous times at my perch on the track all I could perceive was the sonorous sound of of a Porsche flat-6. That's all I wanted too, so if this is the way of the future, I think I could be onboard for that. Check out this great technical write-up of the Porsche GT3 R Hybrid as they go into much better detail of how the GT3 differs from a Prius hybrid.

BMW RLR - Video Straight from the Pits!

I posted a write-up and video of my experiences at the 2010 Petit Le Mans embedded with BMW RLR. The race was absolutely incredible. For those that enjoy motorsports, the GT2 class of the ALMS has provided non-stop action between BMW, Ferrari, Porsche, Jaguar and Chevy. Many of the nine races this season have been insane sprint races requiring the teams all be on-point all the time as the cars were all setting lap times within seconds of each other.

I compiled this video that highlights the experiences in the pits with BMW RLR as the M3 GT's rocketed 'round Road Atlanta. It also captures some of the low points such as the #90 car being falsely penalized and then a mechanical issue with the starter motor that resulted in a loss of major laps. Thankfully, the 90 car bounced back and got out on track to work with the 92 car to find a fourth place finish. How did the finish come about? Well, the Risi Ferrari managed to run out of fuel on the last lap - two corners from the finish line giving the BMW M3 GT room to jet past and take the Manufacturer's Championship from Porsche by a single point.

The video was shot with a Nikon D5000 and a handful of Nikon/Nikkor lenses. Overall, I'm happy that the video came together but still disappointed with the Nikon video mode over that of rival Canon's. I'm contemplating a Nikon D7000 with autofocusing and full HD video or a Canon T2i or 60D. Any constructive criticisms are appreciated!

Just back from Petit Le Mans

Porsche GT3 Hybrid, originally uploaded by Murph32256.

Working on a big piece for BMWBlog - but I should have content up here afterward! Hats off to BMW for a great season and interesting to see this Porsche Hybrid running as an "exhibition" of sorts.