Day Nine: Boothbay Harbor

Apple iPhone 4S
There’s a lot of things the iPhone is good at as a camera. Most of all the fact that it’s with you at all times. But its flat form factor and wide angle enables it to do things like sit flat against a window and shoot through it with a minimal amount of reflection. In fact, with the standard Apple “bumper” behaving like a grip-inducing light gasket, the phone behaves like a kind of “light baffle”.

In the center of the town of Boothbay lies Romar Bowling Lanes, a candlepin bowling alley that’s been in service for longer than I can remember. For 66 years Charlie Rowe maintained the pin setting machines, until last year, when he passed away. The landscape of Boothbay as we know it will certainly change from this event, and this may the last chance to photograph this landmark.

So as my partner and I are walking back from picking up the Sunday New York Times, I pass by the west side of the Lanes and see the morning light passing through the windows on the east, perfectly illuminating the interior. With the iPhone, I was able to shoot right through the windows, as I If was inside.

The Snack Bar

The Head of the Lanes

The Back End

   The Pin Setting Machines

Nikon D90/AF-S 35mm f/1.8G
Our first real activity of the day is the Maine State Aquarium at the Maine Department of Marine Resources. For this I swap out the Lensbaby for my AF-S Nikkor 35mm f/1.8G “normal for APS-C” lens. Its incredible speed and sharpness make it perfect for the low illumination of the tanks in the dimly lit interior. It’s such a great lens I can forgive it not having a focus scale or aperture ring.

I switch to AF-C Area Mode to shoot through the glass and into the tanks to focus on the moving fish; not exactly high art, I know. But after all, I am on vacation.

This lens never ceases to amaze me. It makes everything look good with almost no effort, letting you concentrate on content and composition. It’s super light and has only one control...the auto/manual focus switch. It’s not entirely ideal for infrared work, as there’s no focusing scale or IR index dot. You’d have to auto-focus, switch to manual, and rotate the geared focus ring to the left by...some amount. But you’d get better at it with time and practice.