Making Magic with Enlight

This is a photo of Cinderella’s Castle at Walt Disney World’s Magic Kingdom, which I captured with my iPhone 6 Plus. I’ve been enjoying playing with Enlight’s photo editing app on my phone, so used it here to add the fairy lights and bursts of fall colored fireworks. You can find Enlight in your app store.

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earl harris photography
Photographing people, places, pets and ponderings
throughout Central Florida.

France, in Florida

France Pavilion, Walt Disney World EPCOT. Captured with my iPhone 6+ and edited with Snapseed. The trick here is to go at park open (times vary; check the schedule), enter through the International Gateway and head straight to France, where the pastry shop opens for breakfast service before any of the other countries are open to the public. No crowds and far better photo opportunities.

“French Pavilion, EPCOT”

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earl harris photography
Photographing people, places, pets and ponderings
throughout Central Florida.

Blue Skies, White Clouds and Palm Trees

“Life goes on
It gets so heavy
The wheel breaks the butterfly
Every tear, a waterfall
In the night, the stormy night
She closed her eyes
In the night, the stormy night
Away she’d fly.

And dreamed of paradise.”
― Coldplay

“Essential Elements”, Fujifilm X-T1, ISO 250, f/10 at 1/250th sec., 18 mm

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earl harris photography
Photographing people, places, pets and ponderings
throughout Central Florida.

Love Hate

“Hatred does not cease through hatred at any time. Hatred ceases through love. This is an unalterable law.”
— Buddha

[For Takami]

This five-tiered pagoda — goju-no-tu — is Epcot Center’s hyperrealistic landmark for its Japan Pavilion. It is a wonderful representation of a fictionally enhanced replica of reality, a premise around which the whole of Epcot Center has been designed. This structure is a Disney-fied representation of the famous Horyuji Temple in Nara. I took some liberties with the photo and hyperrealized the subject even further. I hope you like it.

“Horyuji Hyperreality”, Nikon D800, ISO 800, f/5.6 at 1/160 sec., 160mm
Click the image to view more detail. This image is available as a standard, canvas or metal print.

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Photographing people, places, pets and ponderings.
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Flowery Fashion

“You’d be surprised how much it costs to look this cheap.”
― Steven Tyler

Here’s another photo from my day at the Epcot Center Flower and Garden Festival. Enjoy…

“Flowery Fashion”, Nikon D800, ISO 800, f/5.6 at 1/160 sec., 160mm
Click on the image to view more detail/larger size.

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Beauty in Flames

Some new friends invited me to accompany them on a visit to Walt Disney World’s Epcot Center yesterday. I had not been to Epcot in at least 16 years, so the offer of a no-cost employee pass and a day enjoying good company was welcome. The 2014 Flower & Garden Festival is currently underway and much to my surprise, the flowers with real wow-factor were scarce. Based on past experience, I had much higher expectations from the Disney landscape designers. Thankfully, the fun surpassed the flowers, so I’m good — though I had hoped for a handful of striking flower photos.

In my opinion, this bromeliad was queen of the show. If my memory isn’t failing me, it’s a Vriesea ‘Tiffany’. I’d have called it ‘Flaming Queen’.

“Beauty in Flames”, Nikon D800, ISO 800, f/5.6 at 1/1000 sec., 145mm
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Lines and Cow

Drive just a few miles outside of Kissimmee and the sea of hotels, gift shops, questionable restaurants and theme park-related tourist traps disappear. These obstructions give way to Central Florida’s natural beauty, cypress swamps and pastures. This is by far the Florida I prefer. It is the Florida that surrounded me growing up, before “Disneyfication” completely turned the place upside down. In childhood, I often walked through the pastures and cypress swamps near our home with my friends. Those adventures revealed so many little marvels of nature; marvels that seemed to me then and still do now to be revelations of Divine planning and intent. It saddens me that my favorite childhood swamp is now a parking lot and apartment building. I suppose they live on, in a sense, having given life to the fascination I have today with observing and photographing the order from which our chaos is derived.

From a technical standpoint, today’s photo is about composition and using lines to draw and direct the viewer’s eye. I hope you like it.

“Lines and Cow”, Nikon D800, ISO 400, f/22 at 1/125 sec., 116mm
Click on the image for an enlarged view.

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Be Social

You’ll find me on Instagram at @earlharrisphoto, posting photos captured and edited on my iPhone. I post a lot of photos of cats there. #herekittykitty #instagramcats

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The Laughing Place

There is a spot in Kissimmee that sits hidden just feet from Highway 192, the main road through town. It is a place that has somehow beat the odds against the so-called progress resulting from having Walt Disney World in your back yard. It is fortunate to have kept most of its pristine natural beauty. It was a favorite spot to bring my camera as a teenager back in the 70’s; in fact, I won a 1st-place ribbon in my first photography contest in high school with an infrared photo taken here. At some point, I started referring to this as my “laughing place”. Of course, I took that name from Joel Chandler Harris’ “Uncle Remus” story with the same title. In the story, Br’er Rabbit explains that his laughing place is where he goes when he wants to forget his troubles. I’ve killed many hours forgetting my troubles in the shadows of this cypress swamp, watching leaves drift silently by on the mirrored surface of its black waters. Back then, as now, I would often find myself wishing I could somehow just hop aboard one of those leaves and let the slowly moving current quietly pull me away to wherever it wants me to go.

“The Laughing Place” [Click the image to enlarge/reduce its size.] Nikon D800, ISO 640, f/11 at 1/100 sec., 16mm
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Let’s Get Socially Engaged

Follow me on Instagram at @earlharrisphoto, where I am posting photos (and a bunch of kitty pics!) captured and edited on my iPhone. #herekittykitty #instagramcats

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Street Portraiture: Faces of Kissimmee, #35

We moved back to Kissimmee last September after spending nearly 10 years in Salt Lake City. Driving out of our new Kissimmee neighborhood one day, I noticed an individual standing in his front yard. Although I only saw the back of his head, there was a twinge of recognition. I started paying attention as I would pass that house on my trips in and out of the neighborhood, in hopes of seeing him again and getting a look at his face. I saw him a couple more times, but in neither instance did I see his face. Still, I had  a growing sense of certainty that the man I was catching glimpses of had been a favorite coworker during the many years I spent working for Disney in Information Technology. I hadn’t seen nor heard from Tom since I left Disney 15 years ago.

Then finally, as I was heading out one afternoon to work on this project, I got a clear look at him. Pulling the car over to the curb, I got out and called his name. There was a brief look of puzzlement upon his face as he looked at me. That expression turned to disbelief as he spoke, turning my name into a question. It was a fun and somewhat comical reunion; one in which it never occurred to me to grab my camera from the car.

Recently, as I was returning from a downtown photo shoot, I again found Tom in his front yard. This time, he was hard at work on a house painting project I would never want any part of. Thinking it would be merciful to get him away from his miserable chore, I pulled the car over to the curb once again. I didn’t get out this time. Instead, I called him over to the car, raised my D800 and shot him.

“Tom”, Nikon D800, ISO 1250, f/16 at 1/320 sec., 85 mm

Wow. Tom’s the 35th “face” in the on-going Faces of Kissimmee series! Over the time I’ve been dedicating my blog posts to this project, I’ve shot a lot of other photos – some of which I’d like to start sharing. I typically capture 2 or 3 of these street portraits per outing, because there are many days I don’t get the opportunity to go downtown to take photographs. Thus, I’ve been thinking to intersperse the Faces of Kissimmee posts with some other photographs just to break things up a bit and return to more regularly-spaced posting intervals. So, if you are really enjoying following this series as much as I’m enjoying doing it, don’t fret. I’m not abandoning the series; if it were a doughnut, I’d just be adding sprinkles. And you can always filter and view all images in the series using the “Faces of Kissimmee” tag.

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Street Portraiture: Faces of Kissimmee, #3

The Kissimmee train station is a fairly active place. The trains come and go with scheduled regularity. I like that I can clearly hear the whistles and rumbles that announce them from our home a few miles from downtown. Norris was waiting on a bench near the station. Her small suitcase told me she was a traveler; I wondered if she was coming or going. With Walt Disney World, Universal Studios, and so many other tourist destinations nearby, one can look at anyone in Kissimmee and wonder pretty much the same thing.

Good journey, Norris. Or perhaps it should be, “Welcome home”.

 “Norris” [Click image to expand or shrink its size.] Nikon D300, ISO 320, f/4.0 at 1/2500 sec, 85 mm

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