Very impressive.

Wow...those are very good. Exceptional lighting conditions.


Karlo

Very unusual shots with the colour palette stranded somewhere between monochrome and colour. My pick would be No.2 as I like the central moonlit triangle with the offset lightning.

Well captured though.

Karlo

Just a 'Heads Up' to anyone who has forgotten or didn't see the original post by chris at SRS. The original thread is still active but a few pages ago for all the latest deals.

A selection of images taken last sunday at this Shropshire airfield, which also incorporates a small but interesting museum (free entry...but a donation welcome) dedicated to displaying bits of aircraft which have been excavated and recovered from local WW2 crash sites. Local aviation history at its best.

All images taken with my K-x using either a 50mm M f1.7 or Tamron 70-300 f4-5.6 LD.

1.Tower on top, cafe on first floor.



2. Museum exhibit



3. P47 Thunderbolt engine



4. Cessna 152 owned by Shropshire Aero Club



5. Cessna 152 returning from a training flight, taxying to park up.



6. Avid watchers



7. Trying out the new sunroof!



8. Piper Cherokee Warrior ready to go.



9. Fill her up!



10. G-GYAV, Cessna 172

According to spaceweather.com the figure for Bz is 18.2nT south...which means that the Earth's protective magnetic field has aligned itself with the sun's magnetic discharges allowing for conditions giving rise to this evening's Aurora.

I've been loosely following this figure for several years and this is one of the highest readings I have ever seen, hopefully this figure will reduce soon and our magnetic field turn back to 'north' polarity again as we are a bit vulnerable to extreme solar activity at the moment. Does make for 'once in a lifetime' scale auroras though for those of you with clear skies here in Western Europe.

Yes, the exchange rate will fluctuate a few weeks before the General Election...probably Sterling will weaken against other currencies...but regardless of the outcome of the election an even bigger influence will be the European Central Bank's decision to flood the Eurozone with 60 Billion Euros of newly created money every month for at least the next 18 months...a minimum in total of about 1.1 Trillion Euros. This is likely to keep the Euro weak and indeed to further weaken it against other currencies for the forseeable future.

Good luck with that Mike. Some neighbours of mine have just escaped from the same predicament. They bought in Spain many years ago when the Euro was even weaker against the £ than it is today and had to sell recently when the Euro was about 1.15 or so...took about 2 years though and they took a big hit...but they had had the benefit for many years and were just delighted to be finally shut of it.

Karlo

Some very useful information there guys...thanks for that. Its a bit of a gamble trying to guess which way the £/Euro exchange rate is going to go. If I had to jump I think the Euro will weaken a bit more maybe down to 1.45/1.46 over the next 2-3 months. It could even drop to about 1.50 to the £ if the Greek stalemate doesn't get resolved. Good news for UK purchasers of goods and services from the EU.

If there really is that much difference in the respective prices then I would expect the UK price to drop by a couple of hundred pounds soon after launch otherwise UK dealers will be left with stock they can't shift.

Does anyone know the cheapest method of paying for consumer gear costing hundreds of pounds bought online from the UK but in a foreign currency...particularly Euros?

When paying by credit card you seem to get hammered twice...once on the conversion rate (which might be applied days after the purchase using a different rate than applicable on day of purchase) and secondly there seems to be a 'fee' of typically 2.5%-2.75% which VISA or Mastercard charge on top.

To be on the safe side I currently assume the Euro to Pound Sterling rate to be 7 cents less than the 'official' exchange rate to allow for these charges and uncertainties. So today although the official rate is
about 1.40 Euros to the Pound I work on 1.33 when converting to compare prices.

It would be interesting to hear from people who have regularly bought photo gear from the EU as to their experiences and prices paid ultimately compared to what they expected to pay once all the extra charges were included.