Pic Spocket

It’s been a while since I brought the camera to one of our (many) walks with Newton. Today was the perfect day to do so. The sun was out and it was a very nice day.

Here are a few snapshots of my 2 loves

There was some kind of dog day at the park with agility demonstrations. One of the poor pooch was tinted in pink. Quite funny actually!

Please take a few minutes to look at the other pictures in the album!

Newton at Malden Park

Following tradition, we passed Labor Day on Pelee Island. We have been doing that for the last 3 years. In 2007, we went with our friend Patty and we did the island by bike (see the blog post here). Last year, we went with the car abd our dog Newton.

This year, we invited our friends Craig and Tracy (and of course Trails) to join us. The weather was not as nice as the last 2 years, but we still had a very decent day and got the chance to do some beach time. We did the Fish Point hike in the morning. It was so hot! Everybody was happy to stop at the winery for lunch after that, where we fired up the barbecues.

After the beach, we quicly stopped at the lighthouse. Newton took the opportunity to do his favorite activity: digging! Fortunately, the rain only hit us on the boat during the return trip.

This was a great day!

Here is the complete album:

Pelee Island 2009

We’re back from out annual Christmas trip to Quebec City. That’s about a 12 hours drive from where we live. We brought Newton our dog with us. Turns out he travels really good! We did the 1st trip in 2 days, to give him a chance, but came back in one shot. We did not hear him for the whole trip. We just had to stop every 3 hours and let him run a bit.

Newton is still a handful sometimes, and I could not leave it too much alone at my parent’s home. The first time we did, it did not go too well. So we did not get to see all of our friends as we usually do.

We got away one night for our annual dinner with my friends that I know from the university. We see each other at least once every year since our graduation in ‘96. Steve and Isabelle were unfortunately unable to make it since they have a newborn (Congratulations!!!)

The dinner was awesome, and the party had a lot of energy afterwards for the 6 persons that we were. Thanks to Jean and Renette for the invitation!

With 2 photography enthusiast (with Martin), we did take a lot of pictures that night! We also played with my new wireless flash controller that allowed us to use the flash off-camera.

Here are a few pictures from that night!

Bigger versions and much more in the album linked below.

Yesterday was actually very nice. There was a small snowfall and we went to Ojibway Park with our good friends Craig and Tracy and of course Trails!

We got there a little bit before them, and I could catch a few birds.

Woodpecker, Female and Male:

Chickadee and American Goldfinch:

Here are some pics of the group:

The album is linked below.

Snow Walk Ojibway

A week and a half ago, we were invited to the wedding reception of our friends Craig and Tracy, in Windsor. We’ve known them for several month now and they really fun to have around. We missed the ceremony, but the reception was great! They had a live band playing Beatles songs. I was not convinced that I would enjoy it as much as I did. Even the staff of the reception hall started dancing at some point. Great atmosphere!

We of course brought our new 50D camera. This type of event is really not easy to shoot because of the very limited amount of light. So the ISO sensitivity must be cranked up. We kept it at ISO 800 for most shots, and few shots at ISO 1600 and we still have our share of blurry pictures when not being careful. I should have left it at ISO1600.

Event photography is also a completely different world. My wife Corinne has actually a much better feeling about it than me. It’s instinctive for her. She is really good at capturing emotions. Here are a few pictures she took.

I am more of a ‘technical shooter’. I find it hard to be at the right place at the right time while staying out of the way of the actual professionals hired to photograph the event. My approach is to shoot a lot. And I do get lucky and take a few good ones also! Here are some of mine.

So the night went really well and it was a great time. We wish them all the best in their new life together.

They are now on their honeymoon in the west, and ‘we’ are currently now babysitting their dog, named ‘Trails’. It’s a Brittany spaniel, Newton’s BBF (Best Buddy Forever). I wrote ‘we’ because technically, Corinne is actually taking care of both dogs because I am currently in Mexico. She has her hands full. Corinne is crazy: she made a special website for Trails, keeping a journal of his ‘vacation’. Clink the link below!

For the more pictures of the wedding, see the album link below.

Our good friends Eric and Lyne from Quebec were visiting few days ago for the weekend. We went to visit ‘The Henry Ford’ Museum in Detroit.

The Henry Ford is really something to see. Of course, there are cars and other vehicles there, including some very rare pieces like the limousine in which JFK was shot. But it’s much more than cars or even planes. There is also machinery, famous homes, and other artifacts and inventions from American History. More details on the museum on Wikipedia.

On a Friday this early in the year, the museum was very quiet, good for photo opportunities. The only drawback was the very low light situation. This called for big apertures and high ISO settings. Here are a few samples. As usual, more are available in the album linked below.

We went to Toronto for the 2nd weekend in the last month, where this time we met our very good friends Jean & Renette. The weather was not great for picture (overcast skies) but we can’t complain much since at least we did not get caught in the rain!

We did a lot of walking, and went to the CN tower. I have been in Toronto a few times before, but never went in the tower which is one of the most visited attraction in the city. The point of view from the CN Tower was quite impressive. Even skyscrapers looked small from that altitude.

On sunday, we went for a walk in the neiborhood “The Beaches”. This easy to see why so many people are attracted to this area when relocating in the Toronto area. The beach is great and it hardly feels like you are so close from the city.

Overall, it was nice to escape from Windsor for the weekend, especially in such good company!

See pictures in the album below.

Just a quick link: the pictures of Michel (my uncle) & Helene’s wedding from August 25 2007 in Quebec City are still online. Use the following address to reach it:

http://www.tguertin.com/pub/mariage_mh/

p.s. Sorry it was down for 2 weeks. I did not realize that some of my server manipulations broke the link. It should be fixed now.