Pic Spocket

I was in the area of Chicago last week for a few days for business. I wanted to photograph the famous ‘chrome bean’ (the official name is the ‘Cloud Gate’) of the millennium park for a while, so I rushed downtown after work one day. The bad thing about this time of the year is that days are very short.  By the time I made it there, daylight was vanishing. I had planned for this and brought my tripod.

The park is relatively recent since it was completed in 2004. The cloud gate is a sculpture that is now probably the most well-known of the city. It is nicknamed ‘The Bean’ by the residents due to its shape. The exterior of the sculpture is made of highly polished stainless steel that reflects the sky, the surrounding buildings and visitors. The original estimates of building the sculpture was about 6 $Millions. Final estimated costs: over 23 $Millions. Crazy! This is something really special to see in person.

Here are some of the pictures of the Cloud Gate.

Other pictures from the park:

After taking hundreds of pictures of the park, I walked a little bit downtown and took a few more shots.

Bigger pictures and more in the album lined below.

If you would like to read more about the Millennium Park, please see the links below:

• Millennium Park on Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Millennium_Park
• Cloud Gate on Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cloud_Gate

Just a quick note. You may have missed it if you come in the blog directly, but I have just installed a cool Flash image carousel on the welcome page of my site at http://www.tguertin.com. If not done already, have a look!

It is also ‘mouse interactive’: move the mouse in the animation window to affect the motion direction and speed.

 I think it looks sharp! Hope you like.

When I went to Santiago, NL, Mexico, I saw many butterflies in a small field. Of course I took a lot of pictures. There was a lot of the common ‘Monarchs’ like we have at home, but some species I had never seen before.

Here are a few pictures from that shoot.

More pictures in the album linked below.

Mexico Butterflies

I was in Monterrey Mexico again in October for work, for 2 weeks. It means I could do a little bit of sightseeing on the weekend. That happened on Saturday only because Sunday I was really sick from something I must have eaten.
I headed south of Monterrey, in Santiago, NL. This is a cute little town.

The reason I went in this area was for the main tourist attraction of the region: Cola de Caballo, which could be pretty much means ‘Pony Tail Falls’. The size of the fall is quite large, and it is easy to see how it got its name in the pictures below.

This is a small stream right below the fall.

And this is the main Water Fall. Light conditions were not optimal (too much contrast mid day), but I combined several exposures to avoid blown highlights.

At the hotel near the falls, you can do Bungee jumping. I thought of trying it for a second or 2, but then realized it’s probably not the safest place to try this

You know the drill.. More pictures and larger versions in the Albums below!

Santiago, NL	Cola de Caballo Falls

Took the camera a few times to the dog park this fall. This is a dedicated place when the dogs can run without a leash. Here are a few of the good pictures.

Here is Newton, enjoying himself:

Here is Trails, our friends Craig and Tracy’s dog we are doggysitting. In the bottom picture, he is nagging Newton with the ball and running away from him. What a little devil

Newton playing with Zoey, keeping her from stealing his wood stick:

Jack running, and Mac, the little boss at the park. He is photogenic.

Larger sizes and more pictures in the album below.

Dog Park Fall 2008