D Street

The other week, my wife and I celebrated her birthday by watching "The Hunger Games" at Downtown Disney. After the movie we strolled around to some of the shops and found one called, "D Street" which featured this chandelier of upside down Mickey's. I had to capture an image of it. While there, I bought a cool, retro looking t-shirt with Donald Duck on it with the phrase, "The original 'Angry Bird'".

Where it all Began

My wedding was everything that I always wanted it to be. The people that I wanted to attend were there. The guys that I always wanted to be my groomsmen were. And, most importantly, I married the kind of woman that I had been waiting for.

Our wedding ceremony was held outdoors at the Royal St. Cloud Golf Links in St. Cloud, Florida. It’s a brand new place that Sandy and I fell in love with as soon as we saw it.

As I readied to walk down the isle for our 4:00pm ceremony, I noticed how beautiful the evening sky was. You may remember a previous post of mine where I talked about times when I would pray to God while walking under an evening sky. Many times, I’d talk to Him about the woman that He was going to guide me to eventually. Thanking Him for what I knew He was going to do. Now, I was getting ready to walk under a similar sky, preparing to receive that very woman I prayed for all those times in the past. It was a serendipitous moment that I never could have predicted.

As I found my spot on the platform, my best man, David Pentecost, looked up at me and said with true enthusiasm in his eyes and with a grin on his face, “This is nice, man!”

Of course, when the time came for Sandy to make her entrance, she looked amazing. As I stepped down from the stage to receive her from her Dad, I shook his hand and gave him a hug… and almost began to cry at that point… but I held it together.

Before we knew it, we were being pronounced Husband and Wife!

The reception that followed was held indoors at a venue that is right beside where the ceremony took place.

I really believe that the love that Sandy and I share, showed through and everyone could sense it. I had so many people come up to me during the reception and tell me how much they were enjoying our wedding. Some even said that it was one of the nicest ones that they had ever been to!

We spent our first night at the Grand Bohemian Hotel in downtown Orlando and then ventured down to Clearwater, Florida for the remainder of the week. It was a carefree time and everything a honeymoon should be.

The following Saturday night, as we were slowly making our re-entry into our new normal lives together, we stopped by Downtown Disney before returning home. After we watched “Yes Man” at the AMC theatre, I got my camera and tripod out of the car. I had to capture the image that you see above. It’s Sandy and I standing outside of the “Pop Gallery” at Downtown Disney. This is where we first met face to face on December 22, 2007 after finding each other on Match.com.

Once I met Sandy, I never looked back. I had no reason to.

$10

As I was listening to some tunes at the music store in Downtown Disney a few months ago, I looked up and saw these red signs hanging in a row. I had to photograph them.

It took a few tries to get them in this orientation though, as I had to wait for them to slowly rotate into the position I desired.

I made this image selective color to add to the effect.

Pop Gallery

I took this photo almost exactly a year ago. “Pop Gallery” is a store in Downtown Disney that features unique paintings, sculptures and the like as well as some artsy trinkets. The store is jammed packed with color and peculiar things to grab your attention as you navigate your way through the narrow isles as to not break anything. Most items inside feature a hefty price tag.

As you can probably tell, I did a little selective color here to add some intrigue to an image that didn‘t really have much to it. The two bulbs illuminated were the only ones on at the time I captured this image.

I was out with some really cool people on Saturday night and we spent a good amount of time in this store. As we all took our time exploring the establishment, I was surprised at the things I never even noticed before. There really is a lot to take in.

30

At times, it feels as if it’s staring me down.
Time used to crawl when I was a child, now it jogs. A year no longer feels like the eternity that it did when I was a boy. 12 months seem to feel more like six now. It’s as if time has doubled it’s pace. I can’t believe July is almost gone! “Attention, this is your captain speaking, we’re about to begin our decent into the Holiday season.”

As I stood listening to some good music on headphones at the “Virgin Records Megastore” in Downtown Disney Saturday night, the numbers above the CD selections represented something to me. Their intended purpose was to indicate where that particular album ranked on a “Top 40” list, but to me, they represented ages. I knew then that I wanted to capture an image with these numbers.

For the most part, I haven’t been effected that much by turning any age. Some of my friends have spoken about how turning 25 or 27 was hard on them, not me though. The only thing that has gotten to me in recent time is how much faster time is going. It was just yesterday that I was 27, now I’m almost half way through 28 and 30 feels very close.

A wise old man named Bob Snyder once told me that “it’s a blessing to grow old”. I took stock in what he said that day, it brought comfort to me. I surely hope and plan to grow old and wise like him.

It’s odd to think that my twenties are waving good bye and that I’m about to begin a new decade of my life. I want that decade to be really good.

Have any birthdays affected you in some way? What advice do you have to offer this 28 year old?

Wall of Blinding Lights

This past Saturday evening I…you guessed it…went to Downtown Disney again to photograph. This visit however, went a little different than planned...

As I was contemplating going there again, during the day, one of our daily thunderstorms arrived outside my apartment around 3:00pm. I thought I’d give it an hour or so and see if the sky looked promising later. Well, around 5:00pm, it was still cloudy with a bit of drizzle. I decided to still venture in there with hopes of getting some post rain shots of the location later in the evening. Images of neon lighted reflections on the sidewalk filled my head.

As I drove the 40 minute trek on I-4, I was met with spots of rain and an endless overcast sky. Once at “DTD” I realized that I may have to wait to shoot for a while until the conditions became more friendly for my expensive little sidekick. So, I decided to kill some time at the mammoth Virgin Record store. I walked along the massive wall of listening stations and found a CD to demo. As I jammed, I began to notice “shots” that I could capture if only I had my camera with me. Once in a while I would glance over to a window area only to realize that there was no end in site for the rain.

Before too long, I decided to brave the falling water and jogged back to my car to get my camera and salvage this otherwise photoless night. I ever so carefully shielded my investment with my umbrella on the way back to the media store. I then returned to the same listening station and jammed once more but with my camera now around my neck and my trusty umbrella drying at my feet.

As I stood there, I took in the almost endless wall of light that was before me. The way it curved in the distance and resembled something from a U2 concert captured my imagination. The only problem was that the shot I wanted to get was one without any people in it. Let me tell you that this store is crawling with tourists and Floridians alike. I would only have a small window of opportunity to get a shot of the wall without anyone blocking the view that I was envisioning.

The image above was about as good as I was going to get that night. There’s really a more impressive view that shows just how far this wall stretches, but I was never able to catch it completely alone…maybe next time.

Spinning

As I was photographing the light show that “Stitch” was providing for me at Downtown Disney, I looked down on the ground and found this little guy at my feet. It’s a Mickey Mouse that has a spinning light apparatus attached to the top of his head. As the three stranded rubber propeller spun, Mickey would slowly rotate as he wobbled from the movement of the propeller above him.

Mickey Mouse is such a worldwide icon, did you still recognize this “blur” as “Mickey”?

Warp Speed

Yesterday evening, I made another trip to Downtown Disney to look for some good images. After walking around for a time, I passed by a Disney street vendor who was selling glowing sticks for the forthcoming night as well as a few character specific souvenirs. One that caught my eye was of “Stitch” the alien from Disney’s “Lilo and Stitch”. He was in his racing style space craft that featured three rubber strands of different lengths with lights at the end of them, serving as a sort of propeller. It was getting near dusk and I immediately thought of doing a slow exposure to capture a cool light blur.

At first, I walked on by, not wanting to draw attention to myself by photographing this toy that the vendor wanted to sell and that little children wanted their parents to buy them. But, I stopped in my tracks, thought for a moment, then turned around and walked up to the guy manning the cart and said, “I have to photograph this thing”. He very accommodatingly replied “Sure! Go right ahead!” So, I tried a few shots and as I began realizing that it was still too early to get the desired effect, the guy working the station said, “Are you gonna be here for a while? You can Come back later once it’s darker.” I thanked him and told him I’d be back.

So, I eventually returned and began shooting this little alien with spinning lights in front of his space ship. Once I thought I had captured what I needed, I thanked the vendor once again and went on my way, knowing I had probably gotten my “shot of the night”.

Bublé

This is an image I took during a visit to Down Town Disney, at a giant media store there. Because of the unique atmosphere of specialty shops, restaurants and a very big AMC theater, DTD is one of my favorite places to go with friends and has been a date destination on a few occasions. If you’re a girl who has been significantly in my life or at least somewhat significantly, chances are, you’ve been to Down Town Disney with me.

I saw this CD of Michael Bublé and thought it would be cool to incorporate it into a photograph. I don’t have any Bublé stuff yet, but I do think he sings romantic tunes. I like the simple yet truthful lyrics in many of those big band style songs that he covers. Songs like “Fly Me to the Moon”. “Fly me to the moon, let me play among the stars, let me see what spring is like on Jupiter and Mars…In other words…hold my hand…In other words…darling kiss me!”

Good stuff.