Lunar Eclipse in August, 2007

This morning at approximately 2:52 AM PST was a lunar eclipse – best viewed around the Pacific rim. These were some incredibly difficult shots, but it was worth just viewing with my own two eyes.

 

The lunar eclipse shots are taken at 8 second exposures at f/16 with 400 and 800 ISO, respectively. These images were then cropped because even at 200mm the moon takes very little print real estate. At these high ISO speeds and long exposures, the images did turn out a bit grainy on my DSLR. Still, I hope you enjoy them if you didn’t stay up quite so early in the morning.

Seafair 2007

Tracy and I finally got to attend Seattle’s Seafair – a large event where the Navy comes to port bringing along their Blue Angels, and filled with additional activities such as the Unlimited hydroplane races.

On Saturday we toured a Navy vessel but, unfortunately I don’t remember its name and the Navy promptly locked the public out of the information page. Below are a few pictures of these ships.

On Sunday we went to watch the Blue Angels on Mercer Island and actually found decent parking near the East-bound exit ramp. They close the I-90 bridge down for people to walk out and watch the Angels. I shot in burst mode so I had a lot of images to go through and apparently had some dust on the inner lens so I still have some touch-ups to do, but below are a few images for now.

Now on Facebook

After months of friend’s telling me I should join Facebook, I have finally caved. Heath Stewart is now on Facebook. Tracy is too.

I have to say, though, it is quite nice. It’s much easier to use than Live Spaces, faster with the update (a problem with slow corporate giants), and lately I have had problems with Live Spaces. I won’t go into details because their support staff handle the situation quickly, though I did start my frantic quest for support internally since I work at Microsoft who owns Live Spaces.

I will still blog here but it will be reflected in my Notes application on Facebook. Frankly, Facebook just got social networking right (not that I’m a social butterfly). And tagging is a cinch – often even automatic. Tagging helps keep things organized and discoverable without a lot of fuss and is a major component of Web 2.0 (if you’re been wondering what that is).

If you’re not on Facebook I encourage you to join. You don’t have to publish your life like on I do on this blog, which I mainly do only for family and friends, but it does give you a place to tie your relationships together and even post little blurbs on your Wall which is kind of like blogging but is used more for little blurbs like that I got Adobe Photoshop CS3 – THE premier 2D graphics editing application – for a mere $50 through a mutual friend who works at Adobe.