Welcome to Harris Photography

Welcome!

I have to admit, I've never been much of a blogger until now. I suppose that I've never really had a specific purpose for one until I realized it might be a good way to share my business and passion for photography.

I've been a photographer since around 1988. I went on a trip to South America - Quito, Ecuador specifically. I was there for a little over a month, which included a week in the rain forest. My dad had let me borrow the only camera he had, which was a little point and shoot that was very old and had not been used in some time.

I saw so many amazing things there. Two images stand out in my mind. One was we went to a resort on the edge of a volcano crater in the Andes mountains. It wasn't active of course, and a lake had formed in the crater from hundreds or thousands of years of daily rainfall. The water in the lake was like crystal. Very pure and undisturbed. You could see the bottom from the edge of a pier where the water was over 10 feet deep. I also remember there was a small island in the middle of the lake, and as the sun set a rainbow formed that appeared to be going from the island to the elevation deepened blue Andean sky. Of course I snapped a ton of exposures. The camera was clicking away so I assumed everything was alright.

The 2nd image I remember was in the rain forest. The lime farmer we were staying with was an American veteran of WWII. His name was Tio Day. He had taken a bayonet in the face during a battle then killed the Japanese soldier who stabbed him. He was also a POW for a while - but those are other stories for another blog. He asked one of his farm workers to guide us up a creek to find its head waters. I remembered we made a turn where we literally had to hold trees on the edge of a small grotto. As we made the turn I saw one of the most amazing things in my life. The grotto widened to an opening where the creek flowed through a jumble of large boulders that were a dark grey in color. The boulders were covered in this bright emerald green moss and there were hundreds of bright electric blue butterflies on the rocks. I think I remember the farm worker telling us they liked something either with the moss or the rocks, I can't remember, but the view was stunning. Again I clicked away like mad with the dusty old point and shoot. Click. Click. Click.

In the end, when I got home, I had taken 9 rolls of 36 exposure film (ah, remember the film days). I eagerly ran off to get them developed. A couple days later I went to pick up my film and guess what, one exposure had something on it - everything else was blank. I was crushed. All those incredible things I'd seen would have to live on in my memory.

I entered my sophmore year of college the next year and had some electives to fill. I immediately decided that I would learn how to use a camera. That trip had awakened both my desire to capture images as well as a desire to become competent at doing so. That elective ended up becoming my major, and I've never looked back since. :)

Since this is a photography blog, let me post a few pictures from my portfolio. I particularly love taking pictures of people. Sometimes I even get paid for it. :) Honestly though, what is even more gratifying is watching people get excited about their pictures. There's nothing better than that.