More butterflies, and a big bird

At the Museum of Life and Science in Durham, NC, mentioned in my last post, there is a terrific butterfly house, where tropical species live, breed, and roam freely. There is also one family of birds which are not a threat to the butterflies. I photographed many of them yesterday, and have a few to show here now. First is the Paper Kite (Idea leuconoe, from Southeast Asia). It think it may be the very one that I pictured emerging in the previous post.

Here's a section of the same shot to show you the details of the head ("facial features", to anthropomorphize).

This adult bird (maybe a variety of Guinea Fowl? Sorry, I need to research this!) ran through the underbrush with two young in tow. I barely had time for this one shot, which is not artistic but should be good for an ID.

A pair of owl butterflies (Caligo memnon, Central and South America) posed in proximity.

Here's a Postman (Heliconius erato):

I'm not sure what the next bunch are. I hope to get back to the site soon to find out. If you know any of them, please leave a comment below! I would make a terrible field lepidopterist, but I love to photograph them.

The top and bottom of this species (pics above and below) are equally fascinating!

Finally, and I think fittingly as an homage to the Curiosity mission to Mars, I photographed a relic of a much earlier part of our space program. This is one of the first boosters used to launch sub-orbital flights. Astronaut Alan Shepard rode atop one in the Mercury Capsule, May 5, 1961. The later orbital flights used a two-stage Atlas rocket.

Although North Carolina famously has a lot of red clay, this is, as far as I know, the only location in the state that has a true Redstone, i.e., a Redstone rocket!

To get the perspective I wanted, I shot with a 15 mm fisheye lens. I positioned things in the frame ("aiming" the rocket) in a way that minimized the curvature of straight lines, but showed the actual curves of the fins and got in some of the sweep of clouds in the sky. Unlike a "normal" (rectilinear) lens, this fisheye curves straight lines in order to get in a 180º angle of view across the diagonal limits of the frame. However, lines that intersect the center of the lens axis - that is, lines radiating from the center of the picture - remain straight.

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Curiosity lands, curiosity makes us who we are

To quote Phil Plait, "Science makes the world a better place, and it makes us better people.

It’s what we can do, and what we must do."

The Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter captured a picture of Curiosity on its way down to a soft, precision landing on the surface. Imagine, carrying more than ten times the mass of scientific instruments of any previous rovers, having traveled hundreds of millions of kilometers, Curiosity landed at the projected minute, in a target area covering only a few square kilometers. What an homage to Newton, Einstein, and all the scientists and engineers who have made such magnificent use of what we have learned and continue to learn! We've become jaded about rocket launches, shuttles in low Earth orbit, and so forth, but this - this is flat out amazing! We should be proud, we should keep the excitement, and we should continue to explore! The value should not be balanced against the need to work for humanitarian causes. We need to do both. The fruits of science cannot be foreseen, but they always seem to exceed our expectations if we take a long historical view. Curiosity is one of the best things about being human.

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