Following the advice from previous comments, I tweaked my settings and reshot another of these little guys; I’m also revising my guess at who this is, because I’m told it’s probably from the genus Theridion.
Much nicer.
Pharyngula
Evolution, development, and random biological ejaculations from a godless liberal
Long story* why I happened to know this, but Jonathan Edwards, associated with The First Great Awakening and American evangelicalism was also very into spiders. http://blog.nyhistory.org/jonathan-edwards-and-the-flying-spiders/ His take was a bit different, needless to say, and I’m not sure how accurate his observations were. Maybe as much as other 18th century naturalists.
*I was reading about the Pew survey showing, among other things, that atheists and agnostics did better on a religious quiz than evangelical Christians. After taking the long form of the quiz out of curiosity, I had to guess one answer as “Jonathan Edwards.” My guess was right but I did a little more research. The flying spiders thing is an odd connection. What’s clear is that he really liked spiders. By “flying” I think he means the way they make strands that pull them away in the wind, but some of his speculation is very strange. He believes that they all eventually blow into the ocean if I read this right.
“Sinners Caught in the Web of an Angry Spider God” would have made a much better sermon title. Maybe I need to start my own Great Awakening.
Nicely done! If i could insert a “thumbs up” emoji I would.
What changes did you make to the camera settings?
Shorter exposure, smaller aperture.
“What changes…”: Basically, poopyhead banged it (the camera (probably)) on the ground and hit it with a hammer, possibly also using a generous dose of WD-40 and lots of duck tape, until he ran out of film taking the occasional “test” photograph. He then chose the “best” image by throwing all of then into the air, and grabbing one as it fell.
Previously, he didn’t whack the camera (probably) as often or as hard, omitted the WD-40, and used duck tape to snag an image as it fell…
I’m ready for my close up Mr. DeMille.
Sweet!
In the news: https://www.abc.net.au/news/science/2019-07-26/super-tough-spider-silk-protein/11349072
“Now a team of US researchers is starting to figure out why silk produced by one orb-weaver species — Darwin’s bark spider (Caerostris darwini) — is so tough.
“This spider is famous because it’s been shown that one of the silk types that it makes, called dragline silk, is the toughest spider silk that’s ever been measured,” said evolutionary biologist Jessica Garb of the University of Massachusetts Lowell and lead author of the study.”
Unusually for MSM, there’s an actual link to the study.