Saturday, March 19, 2011

Moon perigee...March 19, 2011

Lunar event makes moon look bigger

A lunar event taking place on Saturday will bring the moon closest to the Earth than it's been in the past 18 years.
The supermoon event is said to occur between March 16 and March 22 with the full moon taking place on March 19. 
Celestial bodies do not orbit in perfect circles as the earliest scientist thought. Johannes Kepler showed us in 1609 that planets and moons sweep out their orbits in ellipses. This means that, at some points in their orbits, they are closer to the body they orbit than other points. Whenever a celestial satellite is at its closest point, it is known to be at perigee and when it is at its furthest point from the body it orbits, it is at apogee. 
Even though this Saturday’s full moon occurs within an hour of the perigee, the satellite is still 356,577 kilometers away from Earth, only about 8 percent closer than its average distance from Earth. This full moon at perigee is a super moon and will appear about 14 percent bigger and 30 percent brighter than lesser moons that occur on the apogee side of the moon's orbit.
The best time to look is when the moon is near the horizon at moon rise in the east and moon set in the west. When the moon is near the horizon, illusion mixes with reality to produce an amazingly large view of the moon. For reasons not completely understood by scientist, moons hanging just above the horizon look unnaturally large when they are seen between trees, buildings and other foreground objects.  
Check out Saturday morning’s moon set, but do it before it hits the horizon around 6:30 am. The actual full moon will occur during the daylight hours on Saturday, so the next best time will be right around 7 pm on Saturday after the moon rise. Sunday morning before daybreak will also afford a quality view, but by Sunday evening, the moon will be starting its trip back toward apogee.
A perigee full moon brings with it extra-high "perigean tides," but this is nothing like the natural disasters predicted by Internet doomsayers.  The only impact of a slightly closer moon will be slightly higher tides. In most places, lunar gravity at perigee pulls tide waters only about an inch or so higher than usual.

Sunday, March 6, 2011

County Dog Parks

Pinellas County Dog Parks
Boca Ciega Dog Park


Fort De Soto Dog Park - Beach AccessMuch to the delight of dogs and their human companions, the Pinellas County Parks and Recreation Department operates several dog parks. These green-fenced areas allow unleashed canines the opportunity to run free. And, when the pet gets hot and thirsty, there are cooling stations complete with showers and dog-level water fountains to cool things off.

Owners are required to supervise and clean up after their four-legged friends, and all dogs must be on a leash when outside of the Dog Park area. Please see dog park rules below.

Note: The only Pinellas County park where dogs are allowed on the beach is the dog park at Ft. De Soto park.

Let's Play at the Dog ParkDog Parks are located at the following
Pinellas County Parks:

For additional dog park locations, check with your local cities.


Pet Rules & Safety Issues at the dog park:

  • Scoop the Poop
    Did You Know?
    Unscooped dog poop washes off into waterways and provides nutrients (pollutants) that may cause algae blooms and fish kills. Stormwater runoff may become your drinking water. Play video Parks Video
    Learn more...
    Animals other than dogs are not allowed in the dog park.
  • All dogs must be legally licensed, have current vaccinations and wear a visible license tag.
  • Dogs that have been declared dangerous or aggressive are prohibited (Pinellas County Code Section 14-64 or F.S. Chapter 767).
  • Dog owners are solely responsible for the actions of their dogs. Please ensure that dogs do not escape the fenced area.
  • Female dogs in heat are prohibited.
  • Keep small children and infants under strict supervision.
  • Please clean up after your dog. (pet owners are responsible for their own bags)
  • Dog owners must be in the fenced area and within the unobstructed sight of their dogs, which must be under the control of visual or oral commands when not on a leash. (Be aware that not all dog owners are watching their dog, which means when the dog is not acting appropriately, the owner might not know or care.)
  • Dog owners must immediately fill any hole their dogs dig.
  • Dogs must be leashed when entering and exiting the area. Dog owners must have a leash in hand at all times.
  • For the safety of the dogs and other users, please refrain from smoking and bringing food into the fenced area. Please do not bring treats in for your dog. Other dog will smell your treat and want one too.
  • Do not introduce a new puppy to the dog park until it has been vaccinated for a variety of diseases.
  • Be aware of the communal diseases that your dog can catch from other dogs in the dog park. Kennel cough, ring worm,……

Warning to Patrons:

  • Beware of holes dug by dogs.
  • Users of this facility do so at their own risk.
  • Pinellas County shall not be liable for injury or damages caused by the dog in question and/or the dog owner while in the park.

Thursday, March 3, 2011

Film or digital..from article at Beyond Megapixels ( great read by the way)

Beyond Megapixels



Posted: 01 Mar 2011 11:00 PM PST
Sometimes it’s fun to try to justify decisions you’ve made and things you’ve done. This is one of those. I hope it hits home with some of you.
A woman that works in my office loves nature and nature photography. Because of our common interest she and I talk about photography from time to time. What’s a little different about her approach to photography is that she shoots with film exclusively and doesn’t own a DSLR. She wants to buy a DSLR but doesn’t think she can afford it right now.
This got me to thinking about the costs of photography and I decided to write this article comparing the costs between film and digital photography. It isn’t intended to cover every cost but just enough to provide a comparison.
To go digital the first big expense she would have to face is the cost of the DSLR camera and new lenses. While it’s a significant capital outlay, it’s a crossover cost and similar for either format so I didn’t include this cost in the comparison.
MiNe-HD1A_100-6133H
When you take a photo it is stored someplace, either on the light sensitive film or on a memory storage device and a comparison of film and memory seemed like a good place to start. My camera, a Canon 7D, uses Compact Flash and when shooting in RAW my 16GB Sandisk Extreme 60 MB/s UDMA card will store 640 25MB images. I can fill the card, download the images and format the card to use it again. If I do this three times I will have 1,920 images and will still have the card to use again. Depending on where you purchase the card, the cost is roughly $92. At 1,920 images that figures out to be just under $0.05 per image and each time I use the card again, the per-image cost goes down.
DSC_2436.JPG
My co-worker uses Ektar 100 36 exposure 35mm color film. The cost per roll is 4.49 and processing (not including printing) is about $6.50, depending on where you have it processed. That is $0.305 per image and is a fixed cost whether you take 1 roll or 1,000 rolls. Fifty-four rolls of film would produce 1,944 images with a total cost of approximately $594.00. Last year I took about 6,000 images and if I were using film I would have spent close to $2,000 on film and processing for the same number of images. Depending on how many images she takes in a year, it wouldn’t take her very long to pay for a new DSLR with what she would be saving on film.
I gave her this information and she quickly pointed out that she would have to buy all that special software like Photoshop. That’s true to a point. Once I’ve taken the photos with my DSLR I can download the images to my computer using the software that was included with my camera when I purchased it. I can’t do anything with it but I have the image. This is the same as the film image you have after processing except with film you have a negative. If I want to make any modifications to the image it requires some sort of photo manipulation software. I could use Corel, iPhoto or some other economic photo manipulation software. I could, but I don’t.
The cost of the software isn’t inexpensive but there isn’t much I can’t do with an image. I have the following programs that can be purchased on Amazon at the indicated cost:
Photoshop CS5 – $689
Lightroom 3 – $244
Nik Software Complete Collection – $500
All this comes to a shocking total of $1,432.71 and I still want to get Photomatix for HDR work. Fortunately, because of discounts and special offers I didn’t pay that much for the software but it was still a big number.
The obvious argument is you can have a lot of photos printed for $1,500 and the cost of all this expensive software makes digital photography at least as expensive as film.
I think this argument is incorrect for a couple of reasons. First, the software cost is a one time cost (not counting upgrades) and with every image the per-image cost is reduced. With the cost of film and developing the cost of printing is the same for every image printed and the per-image cost isn’t affected. Second, if you just have the images printed and no other processing done with the images you still have a straight out of camera (SOOC) image which isn’t any different than you would have if you printed one of your digital images on your desktop ink jet printer without any software manipulation.
Beseler 23C Enlarger
I view all this software the same as I would a darkroom if I was still involved with film photography. Determining the cost of a darkroom isn’t as easy as adding the price of software but the largest single expenditure is easy to find. If I built a darkroom I would want the Beseler 23CIII-XL Dichroic (Color) Enlarger. A new one at B&H Photo costs $1,224.95. Then you would have to buy all the trays, tanks, reels, clips, tongs, etc., none of which are expensive but when you add them all together it would be a few hundred dollars. There are less expensive enlargers on the market, especially if black & white is all you want to do, and you can find used enlargers for less than the cost of a new one. However, if you want the same capability in a dark room as you have with digital processing you kind of have to go all out.
You also have to have a dark room and most houses don’t come equipped with them. I know that some people set up temporarily in a bathroom or a closet but I can think of two major problems with that approach. I don’t want to set up and take down every time I want to develop photos and my wife would veto any attempt to use a closet or a bathroom and I don’t blame her. That means you would have to figure in the cost of building a dark room as well.
My conclusion is that as expensive as digital photography can be and as heart palpitating as the cost of some equipment and software is, in the end it’s still less expensive than film photography approached at the same level. Now I feel so much better about the money I’m spending on this wonderful endeavor called photography.
As a footnote, for those looking to shoot holes in my logic, I didn’t include the cost of a computer because I’ve had home computers for longer than digital photography has been widely available.
Photo Credits:
Compact Flash Card by MiNe (sfmine79) on Creative Commons
Kodak Ektar 100 Film by lonnie127 on Creative Commons
Beseler Enlarger by Nesster on Creative Commons