Category Archive

Crystals, City Center Las Vegas, Nevada.

Crystals is the new retail center in the heart of City Center.  Something tells me this isn’t the place to pick up a new pair of Carharts or Xtratufs!  The top view is of City Center from Las Vegas Blvd “The Strip”.

Below is an inside view – the wooden structure is actually a restaurant!  A restaurant that I’m sorry I didn’t get the name of and will be extra sorry when I go to keyword!

Crystals, City Center, Las Vegas, Nevada.

This tram connects the Bellagio and the Monte Carlo with the hotels, condos and mall that are the City Center, Las Vegas. The buildings in the background makeup a portion of the Aria Hotel and Casino.

We spent the last two nights and one full day on a very quick trip to Las Vegas.  I really needed to photograph the brand new City Center.  I have an extensive collection of Las Vegas photos, but not having images of the  brand new 11 billion dollar City Center was a giant hole.  Yeah that’s right 11 billion!  So with wildflowers a bit off here, we made the quick drive to Las Vegas.

I had hoped to photograph the City Center last October, but its planned opening was delayed until December, so I walked finding vantage points outside the project in which I could get distant images.  Now I was able to photograph the huge 76 acre project from within.

I usually try to pick “quiet” times to photograph Las Vegas.  I was once there during a cold, rainy mid week evening in which I had the Strip about as much to myself as possible in a place visited by more then 35 million people a year.  🙂  Well, visiting during a warm stretch of weather, during Spring Break, St. Patrick’s Day, and right before the biggest gambling sporting event of the year wasn’t actually quiet, but fortunately it worked out.

Silk Road restaurant at the Vdara hotel, City Center, Las Vegas, Nevada.

Panoramic photo of the Las Vegas Strip, Nevada.

I’m on an endless search for new and different vantage points for photographing the Las Vegas Strip, in the hope of improving on our Las Vegas photos.

I’m sorry to say that a few days of high winds and some business activity keep me from visiting Valley of the Fire, so to make up for it, tonight we are grabbing the tent and heading into Joshua Tree National Park – should be nice timing with the nearly full moon, warm weather and all.  Should be a big change from Las Vegas!

Janet Airlines Terminal, Las Vegas, Nevada.

This may not be the greatest photo, but judging from a search on the internet, it seems to be a relatively rare photo.  This is an aerial view of the secret government airlines (run by EG & G) that shuttles workers in unmarked planes to places like the Nevada Test Site better known as Area 51.  The planes are white with a red strip down each side, with very small, almost unreadable N numbers.

Now that we have moved from Las Vegas to the Palm Springs area today, I feel safe in sharing this here.  What?  I think I already hear black helicopters moving in – better go!  🙂

Laser show, Downtown Las Vegas, Nevada.

We found this vantage point last year after making our way through a 3 story mall on the south end of Fremont Street.  This year we returned, and found the mall dark and vacant, still physically open.  Now I gotta admit, there are a lot of people walking around downtown Las Vegas who I would rather not run into in a dark alley, or a dark mall for that matter, especially while carrying two expensive cameras and tripods (one was for shooting time-lapses).

We got set up and photographed the light show while nervously watching over our shoulders the whole time.  Once the show wrapped up, I quickly folded up the tripods and we bolted for the exit with a feeling of relief, when suddenly 3 young guys came around the corner walking right towards us,  saying something about cameras.  These guys looked like trouble and there was no one else around.  I gotta admit my heart began to race a bit as a put my hand in my jacket and readied the bear spray.  I smiled and nodded hi, acting as relaxed as possible, and they did the same.  Janine and I slipped into the elevator and watched the doors slowly close, breathing a huge sigh of relief as it began to lower us to the relative safety of the crowded street – one with plenty of police presence!

This a a combination of two images exposed 3 stops apart.

Vdara Hotel, City Center, Las Vegas, Nevada.

The grand opening for the Vdara Hotel and Spa and its 1,495 suites is December 1, 2009.  This is one of a number of properties scheduled to open in City Center this upcoming December.  I have about worn out my running shoes trying to find vantage points to photograph these properties while they are still under construction – I have tried just about every freeway overpass, parking garage and road within a mile or two in each direction!

I may have spoke (wrote) to soon on the assignment work yesterday.  The scope of the work doubled, while the budget shrunk, and so we are now going to pass.  Besides a lot of walking and scouting, I am getting a lot of key-wording and captioning done!

City Center, Las Vegas, Nevada.

Last winter when we were here in Las Vegas, a newspaper article reported that a good portion of the multi-billion dollar City Center project would be open by this October.  Well, it is far from open.  It is tough to photograph such a project and keep cranes, dump trucks and all the other commotion out of the scene – a telephoto lens comes in handy.

I actually picked up a few days of photography assignment work while we are here in Las Vegas (not for City Center).  As a travel photographer, it is always nice to pick up some assignment work while on the road!

Last nights sunset over Caesars Palace. The fountains of the Bellagio dance in the foreground, Las Vegas, Nevada.

We have now moved to Las Vegas.  I need to update some of my coverage, and hope to spend some time in Valley of Fire State Park!