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Santa Came Through With My Tokina

OK, here's the real truth about Santa:  He (or she depending on what circles you habitat) is real.  Go ahead make your list.  Make it as long or as short as you want.  Problem is, if you want some things on that list and don't have a spouse, child or friend that comes through for you, you have to subsidize Santa by about 100%.  

Remember I wanted the Tokina 11-16mm that takes in a whole lot more of the night sky for meteor, constellation and Milky Way shots?  Well, he came through for me.  All I had to do was find the cheapest one on Ebay, win it, and pay for it.  Voila!  Santa comes through.  

I'm not grousing.  I wouldn't nor couldn't have left it to anyone else since it was kind of specialized and expensive.  And I really wanted one, so I got it and wrapped it up for me.  Yes, Virginia, Santa does exist, if you have the sufficient funds for Ebay/PayPal.  North Pole connections ain't free.




I decided to try a late night, or was it early morning trip to Vinoy to try out my new lens.  I couldn't be more pleased with it (well, I could be more pleased if I was around darker skies, of course) as these pictures will attest to what it does. 


And what it does, it does very well.  The Tokina is one of the smallest millimeter lens for my camera.  What that means is it encompasses so much more land and/or sky space in a picture.  My other lens I use for these types of shots would be perhaps half of this shot.  And when you are looking upward for shooting stars that amount of space is valuable.  



One of the trade-offs is a bit of distortion on things up close, like these palm trees.  



The clarity is phenomenal, and even this shot looking toward Tampa and all the air pollution still makes for a pretty good picture.    My mouth is watering at the chance to get up North for some nice long shooting trips. Or maybe even Tybee Island.  



Just for your information, the three vertical stars in upper center are called Orion's Belt.  It makes up the constellation Orion and is seen most of the year in the Northern Hemisphere.  I like the taking sky shots and all that but I'm not really a constellation person.  When I look at the sky I don't see hunters or snakes.  I don't go, "Oh look, there's Betelgeuse in Orion's left shoulder, and look!, there's Canis Major chasing Lepus the Hare."  I don't unless I've had a few beers too many, that is.  Nope, I'm strictly a Big Dipper guy.



The long light in lower left of sky is a plane.  I mean, if you were a UFO and travelled 300 billion miles to see what was going on in this little blue planet, would you really go to Florida?  



This isn't a very good shot:  too much "noise", but it gives you another idea of the kind of lens the Tokina is, almost but not quite a fish eye look due to the aspherical lens.  



Sure, Santa's new gadget is kind of specialized and one wouldn't use it at the next gathering at Wimpy's, but for sky picture taking and the annual meteor showers each year, this is a great worthwhile purchase.   


And finally, the last picture taken on this chilly night at the Vinoy in December.  That's the shore on the other side of the Bay, the moon rising and the old Inverted pyramid of the abandoned Pier on the right.  

My Kingdom for Dark Skies. 



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