The Four Ages Of Sand

Bordered Patch (Chlosyne lacinia) with background removed

I'm having loads of fun removing backgrounds from my Venezuelan butterflies. 

This is a Bordered Patch, Chlosyne lacinia. No, really.

Painted Lady justification

ok, I got it wrong, I admit. I mixed up a Painted Lady with a Red Admiral. But in my defence, they are of the same genus ( Vanessa) and the wing pattern is pretty similar. Here's one I posted a couple of years ago

Who wants to live forever?

A fascinating article sent in by David.

Computer model reveals what would happen if humans became immortal

http://io9.com/5844172/computer-model-reveals-what-would-happen-if-humans-became-immortal

Extreme Macro revisited: butterfly antenna

I'm experimenting with extreme Macro photography again. This was taken with my Chinese bellows and a reversed Shneider lens:

 

Not bad for a first attempt

Answer to "What is it? 226"

Some inspired guesses for this one

 

but none quite close enough for the chocs.

It's....

... er what are they called? Wind turbines?

Anyway, the French ones appear to have cabins in them, unlike any Brit ones I've seen

Ah yes, looking online, the specs are here: 

http://www.nordex-online.com/en/produkte-service/wind-turbines.html

And the cabin things are called nacelles

http://www.nordex-online.com/en/produkte-service/wind-turbines/n100-25-mw.html?no_cache=1

And the USS Enterprise has them too ;-)

(half way down the page)

http://www.scifi-meshes.com/forums/showthread.php?63291-New-USS-Enterprise-Profile/page4

 

Better moth shot

I posted one of these Venezuelan moth shots the other day but this one is sharper

And allows a lot more zooming in. Mmm nice detail...

VJ Day in full colour with sound

Tom sent this in some time ago, but I was just reminded of it as I sit waiting for my own colour 9.5mm film to be processed and returned. 

The quality of this home recording is almost unbelievable. I'll be happy if mine is in focus and correctly exposed (there was a lot of guess work, so I have my doubts...) 

Similar to your film collection, this invoked in me a sense of the distant past and distant culture. Innocent, young full of vim and vigor:

VJ Day, Honolulu Hawaii, August 14, 1945 from Richard Sullivan on Vimeo.

Ear Manicure Sir?

This just in from Alan R, taken at Kings Meads, Hertfordshire:

Hummingbird Hawk-moth (Macroglossum stellatarum) or something very like it

This was zipping about in the flowers outside our hotel room in France. I only got one shot at at, and very unusually, it turned out to be sharp and in focus, well the body anyway; even with flash, the shutter speed was nowhere near fast enough to freeze the wings.

I'm assuming it's the famous Hummingbird Hawk-moth, Macroglossum stellatarum. (previous post)

 

 

Peacock Butterfly in France...

...though given recent embarrassments, I give an ID only tentatively.