... some time ago john asked me if i'd like to go with him to swans island for his planetarium presentation ... thursday we drove up to bass harbor to take the ferry to the island ...
...john gave his "don't poke your fingers against the sides" spiel ... the school had invited everyone on the island to attend, this group contained several mothers with their little children ... one tiny girl was vibrating with excitement, another was rather afraid and probably would've never entered the dome if it wasn't for her mother's gentle reassurance ...
... even my fancy nikon d7000 can't record usable images when the inside of the dome is dark, so i snapped a shot as john was settling the kids in for what i found to be an excellent presentation ...
... after three shows we packed up and drove back to the ferry slip ... the nice d.o.t. lady told us we had time to take a little trip over to the lighthouse ...
... the was ample evidence of the strong sea breezes which constantly sweep across the island's rugged landscape ...
... i couldn't find a perspective of the lighthouse i liked, so i settled for snapping a portrait of my fellow photographer ...
... i finally found a vista i wanted to share ...
... i worked hard to find the perfect vantage point from which to take the picture while at the same time also not fall into the sea, a rather exciting idea but something i knew would've for sure caused us to miss the last ferry to the mainland ... unbeknownst to me, john surruptisiously recorded my efforts ...
... as we crossed river in bucksport john suddenly became extremely animated ... "the moon—the full moon—shining through the structure" ... we pulled over and spent some time admiring the beautiful penobscot narrows bridge ... (an editorial opinion i feel compelled to add, pretty as it is a rather excessively expensive public project) ... i didn't have my tripod, so i improvised by bracing my camera against a road sign for the five-second exposure ... i got lucky when a car turned around and for a moment illuminated the foreground with its headlamps ...
... these would've been much better photographs, but, forgetting that nikon "improved" upon my old d200s by taking off several of the control locks, in the darkness i managed to push a couple of buttons so that the 16-megapixel high-dynamic range sensor of my d-7000 was accidentally adjusted so that it became the equivalent of a cheap one-megapixel snapshot camera ...
... no matter, it was a most wonderful thing to witness ...