Tuesday, August 17, 2010

The Wonders of Modern Out-Of-Date Technology

A few days ago Mrs The Millbrooker was taking the Cremyll Ferry to fetch young grandson NooNoo from the Plymouth side. She was waiting in the queue to board when she started gesticulating to me.
Eventually I worked out that she wanted me to see a pair of terns swooping and diving into the water.

To the untrained eye a tern will look like nothing much more than yet another blessed seagull, but Mrs The Millbrooker had spotted them plummeting into the water from ten or twenty metres up in search of their fishy prey.

I managed to snap a couple of shots before they sped away upriver; neither shot is that good. This is the better of the two, which does have just enough detail to confirm the bird as a sandwich tern (black bill with yellow tip).
I don't have, and have never used the famed digital manipulation program Photoshop, but I do have the antiquated 1998 edition of Ulead Photo Express which is pretty well enough for my needs. The photo above gets considerably clearer once a crop and a few tweaks have been made.

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