Photography . . . Travel . . .

Tuesday, July 31, 2012

San Diego Museum of Art - Balboa Park

The San Diego Museum of Art in Balboa Park is always a fun place to spend a few hours. Here are a few shots from this past Sunday afternoon.








I'm not quite sure what this next one, the headless person sitting at a desk, is all about. All I do know is that it's part of a temporary exhibit, and this is sitting in one of the permanent galleries. I also found out - right after I took this shot - that I was not supposed to take pictures of it.




Sticking with the headless theme, this is part of the permanent collection.






There is a particularly good special exhibition going on right now called The Invention of Glory, featuring the Pastrana Tapestries, which were woven in Flanders for King Alfonso V of Portugal in 1470. They are pretty amazing to see, and will only be there until September 9, 2012. If you are in San Diego they are worth the trip to the Museum of Art to see them. No photography is allowed in the exhibit, so all I got was a shot of the sign at the entrance.

     

Monday, July 30, 2012

Saturday Afternoon Walk Around the Zoo

I stopped in to the San Diego Zoo on Saturday late in the afternoon for a quick walk. In addition to all of the animals they have one of the best botanical collections around.




That's a carnivorous plant, but I can't remember what it is called. Speaking of carnivores . . . 




The Malayan Tiger cubs (now over a year and a half old) were out. Mostly they napped, but I waited a while and they did perk up every now and then.






The tiger cubs are almost as big as their mother now, but it's nice to see them still together for a little longer.


Here are a few reptiles to close out this batch of images.




These Gharials are fun to watch. I think they got about 10 of them recently from India.




     

Saturday, July 21, 2012

The Baby Jaguars Are Getting Bigger . . .

The San Diego Zoo's baby Jaguars are getting bigger, but they're still basically kittens . . . even if they are looking like they're almost as big as Aldo and Calli. I just happened to get there just as they were coming out to play for the day.


They don't seem to be afraid of climbing into the trees, and their keeper mentioned today that they are even going in the pool occasionally.


The brother and sister cubs Tikal and Maderas chased each other around quite a bit. If I've got it right it was Maderas, the female, doing most of the chasing. By the way, many of these shots have been cropped quite a bit to make them bigger and get rid of distracting parts, but sometimes I just couldn't completely get rid of the out of focus tree branches that were between me and the cubs.




This looks like a little baby jaguar face-off.


The cubs' mother Nindiri was right there the whole time - occasionally they would all 3 get together.


It looks like she's got little Maderas in a headlock here.


Here are a couple shots of Nindiri as she was wandering around the enclosure.



Click here to see more images (mostly of the Jaguars) from this morning at the San Diego Zoo.
     

Sunday, July 15, 2012

Comic-Con 2012 San Diego

A few of us spent the morning in the Gaslamp Quarter of downtown San Diego yesterday. It was probably the most crowded day of the year there - the main day of Comic-Con 2012. We didn't have tickets to get inside, but that was okay, there was still plenty to see outside the Convention Center and on the streets of the Gaslamp. 


There are a lot of very creative people in the world - and a large portion of them were in San Diego this weekend. Here are a few images from Saturday morning at Comic-Con. Lots of colorful and creative costumes and lots of people having a really good time.




















There was no shortage of promotions, whether it was for movies, websites or TV shows.





The girls promoting the movie Iron Sky got a lot of attention. Apparently they're Nazi's, from the dark side of the Moon. Really, that's what they said. But they did also say that they've come in peace; and they certainly seemed friendly enough to me. The movie is not out in the US yet, but from seeing the trailer on their website, it looks like a lot of fun.




More Iron Sky girls.




It looks like there is a new TV show coming up on A&E called Coma.




My friend Robert tried to interview one of the guys in a coma, but I'm not sure he got anything intelligible out of him.




There were a lot of people in the area around the end of 5th Avenue near the Convention Center.




I'm not quite sure why the religious protestors were out there, or who they were trying to get to, but there were a lot of them.




Some of the convention-goers came up with signs of their own. This guy obviously didn't have quite as large of a sign budget.




All in all it was a great time, and I think the look on this girl's face pretty much sums it up.




Click here to see more images from Saturday, July 14, 2012 at Comic-Con San Diego 2012.
     

Tuesday, July 10, 2012

Some Really Nice Early Evening Light

I spent a couple of hours late in the day on Sunday at the San Diego Zoo. The early evening light was very nice. Here are a few images.

I had to wait quite a while for the Fishing Cat to turn her head towards me, and she only stayed that way for a brief moment, but it was worth the wait.


Here's a Swamp Monkey.


All 3 of the Amur Leopards were up in the far back of their enclosure. This image is cropped heavily.


The sun was pretty much gone from the enclosure where these Gharials live, but there was still enough light (barely) to get this.

      

Saturday, July 7, 2012

MIssion San Juan Capistrano

A friend and I took a drive up the coast this morning to do some photography at the Mission San Juan Capistrano. No shots of the large central courtyard this time, as they were setting up for a concert this evening, and there were tables and chairs everywhere.


The big stone church was destroyed by an earthquake in 1812, and some of the bells were damaged. Here are two of the original bells, which are now hung in the spot where the belltower used to be. The casting dates on these say 1796.
















The Mission has a particularly nice collection of flowers of all sorts.








Click here to see a few more images from our trip to the Mission San Juan Capistrano on Saturday, July 7, 2012.
     

About Me

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San Diego, California, United States
About me . . . When I'm not working I like to be out exploring and photographing. I do this blog just for fun, and to be able to share these images with friends. I hope you enjoy viewing these images as much as I enjoyed creating them.

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All of the content and images on this site (c) Frank B. Baiamonte. If you would like to use any of these images please contact me via email at frank@frankbaiamonte.com to discuss terms of usage. Note that images from the San Diego Zoo and Safari Park are not available for commercial usage. You can also see more on my Instagram page @frankbaiamonte.

Header image: Cibola National Wildlife Refuge, Cibola, Arizona. End image: Downtown San Diego, California skyline from Coronado Island. Profile picture: Craters of the Moon National Monument, Idaho, by Heather Baiamonte.