View from the Terrace Pt. 1

A view towards the city of Calgary from the terrace just after sunset.

Calgary Street Performers 2

I like this photograph. I almost put it in my Photograph a Week Blog because I thought it was probably the best picture I got this week.

The subject is an accordian player in Eau Claire who was playing in the mall. I like the way he sounds and I think the photograph captures how expressive he is when he plays. I've seen him around a bit - good street musician - and I've seen a bunch of them. (Yes Megan, we gave him a donation).

I shot it with my new Nikkor 24-70 f2.8 (gift to myself which I richly deserved) wide open to blur the background. It didn't blur quite as much as I wanted so I cheated and blurred it some more in Photoshop.

Land of the Dinosaurs

This might look a bit cheesy but that is only because it is. The town of Drumheller, population 7,000+, north and east of Calgary is now mostly a tourist destination with a couple of claims to fame: dinosaurs, the "badlands", and a history of mining.

The dinosaur connection is from extensive fossil remains found in the area. It was once a shallow sea with semi-tropical climate. Not today. Anyway, there is is a museum and the town is full of fake dinosaurs, including this one, the "largest dinosaur in the world". We didn't make it to the museum, have to do that later.

To give you a taste of the area I've also posted a slideshow. Just click on it. You can see all my slideshows in the list at bottom left.

Brothers

from a statue depicting brothers
by the sculptor galts
in calgary

it reminds me of picasso
i didn't like the background behind it
so i superimposed it on a photo of some coarse bricks

Calgary Street Performers

So far I haven't been too impressed with the street performers in Calgary but this guy (Angel of Prosperity) was worth a picture. He is supposedly collecting money for the arts rather than his own pocket. There was one guy with a violin that I was ready to offer money for him to stop. Prince Island has some arranged concerts and theatre that promise to be good. For example, they had Shakespeare in the park this last weekend and that was free.

All I need now is Black Socks

This is how I've been wasting time this week.

I bid on this camera on Ebay and I won it! For only $6.01 this beauty from the early '60s is mine. It came with a real leather case and uses real 35mm film. It can be reloaded over and over again and doesn't need any batteries!

The Agfa Optima Ia is the ultimate in retro cool. People knew you were somebody when they saw you with a camera like this in 1962 instead of a Kodak Brownie. The height in family vacation style was a German camera, bermuda shorts, white T-shirt, and black socks at the beach. Ah... the good life.

A shot from a roll I shot this week is featured on my One Photo a Week blog.

Agfa Optima 1a

For those who want a closer look at the camera itself, here you go....

Waiting for the Train

One of the things I like about Calgary, and was nice about Brisbane too, is the public transport. It isn't quite London, but there is a train system called the C-Line and the bus system seems good. The C-Line has a stop about 3 blocks from our apartment. The portion in the downtown section including where we live is free!

Of course nothing is that far a walk in the downtown area. Another nice thing about downtown is the +15. The +15 is a enclosed walkway system that goes through buildings and crosses the streets at roughly 15 feet above the road surface. I'm about 3 blocks from that too so I don't have to walk too far outside when it is cold or wet when on my way to the office. The office is about 20 minutes if I take the +15 and 15 minutes if I walk along the sidewalk.

The picture is a young woman waiting for the C-Line downtown. It is part of a series of 4 that I took for my One Photo a Week blog that you might find interesting. Just after this shot the train stopped and she got on and left the station.

More on Ashcroft

StuMonkey asks how 2500 people could have lived in the View Hotel. In fact, there were many other fine buildings, not to mention the Blue Mirror Saloon which made this a very nice place to live.

Maroon Bells

The peaks in the background are the Maroon Bells near Aspen, Colorado. Colorado is glorious in the summer....

Ghost Town

Here is the View Hotel in the ghost town of Ashcroft near Aspen, Colorado. Founded in 1880 Ashcroft peaked at 2500 persons but had declined to only 100 in 1885 due to poor ore quality in the surrounding silver mines. Local mining took another blow in 1893 with the silver market crash. Postal delivery stopped in 1912 when the population was down to 50. The last resident was said to have died in the '30s of malnutrition.

Yellow-bellied Marmot

I also captured shots of deer, chipmunks, and birds. This handsome critter was on Pike's Peak.

Garden of the Gods

This shot is from the Garden of the Gods in Colorado Springs.

Becky's Koi Pond

A study in green, just like Becky. I don't mean the color green, but she likes the outdoors and care of the environment...

Bow River and Banff Park

Just another shot of the Bow River running through Banff National Park

Richardson's Ground Squirrel

When all else fails, I say post a picture of a cute furry animal. These little guys are sometimes known as "gophers" and this one lives in a small colony down by the river in Calgary. However, he does not live in a van, he lives in a gopher hole.

Hoodoos on the Bow River

These are hoodoos on the Bow River near the town of Banff. What are hoodoos? They are formed when a hard layer caps and protects the top of a formation and the softer rock underneath is carved away by wind and water.

Castle Mountain

Castle Mountain is in Banff National Park, the first national park in Canada. I hope I'll be posting lots of Canadian landscapes and wildlife in coming months...

Happy Father's Day

This one was taken a while back at Disney World... Note the cool Houston Marathon T and the ultra cool running shoes. Oh yeah, the cute kids too. Thanks for making me a father Teresa :-)

Security Crisis Averted

A security crisis was prevented today when a photographer (me) was stopped from photographing a building from a public sidewalk. Local security kops spotted me and made sure I knew "unauthorized photographs" are not allowed!

As I walked back to my office the full extent of what could happen started to sink in. What if somebody sneaked a shot as they drove by in a car! What if they were acting like they were using a cell phone near the building but were actually taking a picture! And me, someone who has been carrying cameras around the world for 30 years, shouldn't I know better than to take a photograph from a public sidewalk in plain daylight that had a building in it?....

I have done some research and the full security threat from photographers is only now being realized. The following investigative report exposes the risk all too well (warning - this is a graphic video and not suitable for young children):

==> CLICK HERE <==

Holy guacamole batman! I just looked up the building's address on Google and there is a picture of it right there on the internet along with the tenant's name!

V = 14,400

Korean Ball Joint Dolls

You can always count on me to find and document for you the latest in style, fashion, and anything hip. Actually, I may be a bit late on this trend... In doing a quick internet search this seems to have been going on for several years and started in Korea / Japan.

These two young women said they get together monthly to take pictures of their dolls. The dolls were made in Korea (you can special order them and they aren't cheap) and then dress them in various fashions and styles.

Here are some web sites if you are interested in more information. They recommended the first one and the others turned up in a quick google search:

http://www.denofangels.com/
http://www.samuraifiles.com/tsumi/samuraifilez/ningyo/store/esthetics.html
http://www.bluefairyint.com/

Apparently there was a Korean horror movie made about ball joint dolls. After all, there have been plenty of horror movies about puppets. But they seem a lot less threatening than a puppet to me (was Chucky a puppet or a doll?). I mean, these dolls can be posed but they can't actually move like a puppet.

Japanese Lantern

This lantern is inside the Japanese garden in Hermann Park and is beside the pond that has the turtles (and the koi) (and the minnows) (and maybe some frogs but I didn't see any although there were some ducks). The small bubbling fountain beside it does not look right to me. It is of a new and modern design while the lantern is a very old design. To my eye, they should not be together. Click on the picture to bring it to full size and you can see a spider's web...

Turtle & Turtle

Haiku for two turtles at the Japanese garden...

In warm green water
the still days float by slowly for
turtle and turtle


Observation: moss grows fast on a swimming turtle.

Calgary Architecture

There is something neat about this picture that you are going to have to click on and enlarge to see. In the center top of the penta shape of the walkway sculpture in the middle of the photograph is the crescent moon! A bit of modern stonehenge. It is more visible in the original (I've downsized it a lot here and there are JPG artifacts) but you should still be able to see it.

It was taken along Stephen Avenue which is the center of t he old business district. Today it is a pedestrian way for the most part with a lot of the old facades still present but skyscrapers behind them. Nice, especially since not much of old Calgary was visible (to me anyway). It is a bit like Houston in that way.

Space Needles, what's the big deal?

Just what is the thing with space needles anyway? This one is in Calgary (more to come on Calgary). Called the Calgary Tower, it is 191 meters (627 foot) free tall and is said to have been built for the Canadian Centinnial in 1968. I was there last week and took this picture.

Tower of the Americas

This snap of the Tower of the Americas in San Antonio, Texas was taken this morning. It is 229 m (750 feet) tall and was supposedly built for the 1968 World's Fair.

Coincidence that these two towers both appeared in 1968? Coincidence that I just happened to be in these two cities on the same week 41 years later? I want to believe.... In any event, the truth is out there.

Bye Bye Skippy

Kangaroo beside the golf course on the Gold Coast...

Little Corella

This corella was in a flock of a dozen or so on the Gold Coast. They are so common as to be pests in some areas.

Brisbane on a Tuesday Morning

Here is Brisbane from the Story Bridge in morning light. The weather is cool and nice right now.

Last Trip to Australia (and Japan) (and PNG)

It has been a while since I've had time to make a blog post - I've been on the road a lot lately. I just finished a trip to Australia for the project I have been working on for the last two years, as well as the last trip to PNG and Japan. Not that I might not go back sometime, but not on business for that project probably. So, here are the people I have been working with - do you see me?

Next month I start a project in Calgary, Canada! New adventures, this time in the mountains (and cold). Can't wait...