This is the final challenge.  I haven’t worked with this aspect of my camera, and I admit I didn’t check the book to see how to “do it right.”  I wanted to experiment with different settings to see what I could get.  I used “S” mode as well as EXR (the full auto) mode.  I used different ISO settings.

I can’t say there’s anything I really like from this series.  I was sitting on my back porch at approximately 8:30 pm.  I appear to only be able to add 2 seconds to the exposure time in manual mode.  I don’t think that was enough to really capture anything, but this first shot is tail lights of a passing vehicle.

This next one is at a monstrously high ISO of 12,800.

This last one is the same view, shot in full automatic mode (it took a couple of seconds to process):

I just set the camera on the back porch for maximum stability, pressed the shutter, and let it process.  It’s pretty close to the view I get with the naked eye — a shade darker and greener, but a pretty good likeness.

This concludes the photo challenge.  I hope you enjoyed seeing the photos as much as I did taking them or picking them out (in the case of selections from the gallery).  This will be the last regular update until the April A To Z Challenge kicks off on April 1.

Here are some more nostalgic shots.  These are from my trip to Riga, Latvia, in September, 2004.  I just returned from a deployment to Bahrain, and this NATO trip was on my schedule.  I was preparing to move to a division chief job, so I was handing my old job off to a co-worker.  The upper floor of the Reval Hotel Latvia (rebranded the Radisson Blu) had a bar with a panoramic scenic view.  You can see the reflection of the windows in the images.  After several months of 130F temperatures, the lovely fall weather of Latvia was just the ticket!

Okay.  Okay.  One of those is not at a distance, but The Bremen Town Musicians bronze statue is a classic, and it was fun to see.