Photograph info: This photograph was taken last Sunday at a neighbor's farm during a huge Independence Day celebration. The display was incredibly impressive and long! (The turned over & beat up cars in the shot are leftovers from the demolition derby that took place before the fireworks display.)

Yes, you CAN get a pretty crisp, hand-held night shot with a very slow shutter if you're happy shooting at a ratio of 100-to-1, ha.

Camera settings and post-processing: Shot with the Canon EOS 5D Mark II and the Canon 70-200mm f/2.8L IS lens at 70mm, ISO 1600, f/2.8, shutter 1/15s. Curves for de-saturation and contrast.

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A big THANK YOU to everyone who notified me of site problems last week. This site was hacked (again) last week and it took (too) many hours of detective work & labor to clean it up.

The silver lining is that I'm designing a brand new site, on a new blog platform, hosted on a new, more secure server. It'll look/feel/behave in a similar way, but much more modernized with cool, new features. I hope to have it up and running by the end of July. In the meantime, things may look a little wonky around here - if you see anything out of place drop me a note at info at durhamtownship.com. I appreciate it!

Thank you for visiting Durham Township!

--Kathleen

Welcome back Kathleen! Quite the appropriate (and beautiful) photo for having been burned by the hackers... My site was also attacked this past week, but I was only down for a day.

my, how we've missed you! I'm having the "hackers are mean" tshirts printed asap! Looking forward to your new site...

Happy you are back online again. Nice shot!

YAY!!! I am so glad you are back! Hackers suck rotten smelly eggs!

The smoke in this one is awesome. Love the pink hue to the scene. Very cool.

Good luck with the site re-vamp. I know it will be fantastic.

Website fireworks. Smoke Clears. Now it's Welcome Back Kotter.....er....Connally with two feet and four wheels firmly {?} on the ground.)

Actually I was gonna drop the blog form my list, but if your seriously promisin' TOTALLY spiffy NEW features, count me in!

(Kiddin' Ms K, the images you produce are the only "features" your site needs in my book!)......well, maybe a few special itunes downloads like a "Tune for the Capture" or a Pandora link that loads a random selection of songs matching the theme of the image......like some Tiny Tim here, or "Smoke Gets in Your Eyes," or some Pink Floyd....or..."Purple Haze"...or, ...a link to some Independence Day movie trailers......or.....maybe Earth, Wind and Fire behind a JPH contribution...or some Mark O'Connor backing up a cameo by Willow?...a little "Green Onions" ala Booker T or Cash's "I Never Picked Cotton" for those Jakey shots? ....or Judy Collin's version of Dylan's "Dark Eyes" for a Jenn moment? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3hW-J5Gyvt8

.....OK, as long as you do what you do, the rest of us Durham Websters will have a blast, 365. So God Bless America, AND that K woman, and may the Great Wheel of Carmel soon crush those North Korean Hacker Devils who have no business coming over here and..........(Now where'd I put my Starbucks iced-frapped-double-pumped-mega-vente artery-liner?) .......oh yeah, and thank you for all the kinds of fireworks (both loud and soft) that you find and share with strangers...(In the Night....see, there's another one could be used) Now where IS that vente?.......

Glad to see you up and running once again, Kathleen. I didn't know how contact you so I left a "comment" on an image posted at Flickr, notifying you of your "attack site" status. Those people need to get a life and do something worthwhile!!

I love fireworks I just hate trying to take pictures of them with my cheap camera but you did a wonderful job with yours!

For me, a night shot like this is the hardest. You have such wonderful photos on your blog. I have watched your pics for a long time now.

By day these guys might be farmin'.
For the holiday they crash cars - quite alarmin'!
Then to celebrate that night,
The fireworks carefully they light.
Party on, 'cause no one we're harmin'.

i use pixelpost, which I am pleased with for a free service. I'll be interested to see what blogging engine you end up using.

Very nice full picture ...capturing the brightness of the lights with detail to the color of the grass and the detail below. don't know how you do it.

Missed the blackout but glad you are back. - Have tried many times to catch the fireworks and just not quick enough to capture what you manage without an effort. It is great. Thanks.

...ever notice how the pink thingers upper left look like candles, and the thin smoke curls just left of center along the horizon line clearly form the letters JPH.....and today is the 17th.....and Independence Day rhymes with Birthday.....and.....naaaaa.....too obvious.....

You mean we missed celebrating a birthday for JPH (better known as GPS) Dang! I was looking for someplace to party this weekend.

A stunning fireworks shot! I love the way you have captured the action on the ground!

True, it was yesterday. No fireworks, but THE SONG was sung by almost a gross of folks!....

Only one different letter changes the word millstone into milestone. I think my "Heinz" birthday (figure that one out!) was the latter. :)

Just want to say THANK YOU to K & K Racing for a GREAT SHOW, no burning cars this year (the fire company was on site this year). It was definately one of the best firework shows that I have seen. Sorry some people had to ruin it with unacceptable behavior and disrespect for the property. Again thanks to all of the K's for a Fun Redneck Family Vacation!

wow, i love this one. It brings up images of the band Ween & their songs. So cool with the smashed and crashed cars there.