My journey to shooting professional sports in Nashville.

This was a blog post I intended to make a while ago, while I was contacting the professional sports teams in Nashville. However, after yesterday’s encounter, it seemed appropriate to write about it now.

I grew up playing a variety of organized (and unorganized) sports in Pensacola, FL. Baseball, basketball, volleyball, cheerleading, and soccer are the most notable. Each one holds a special place in my heart and in my life. Sports taught me to be respectful and humble. They taught me about winning and losing. I was taught to be punctual and learned that there were consequences if I wasn’t. One of the biggest things I learned, was what type of coach I enjoyed playing under and what type of coach I wanted to be myself.

I played soccer for 13 years. I was 14 years old when Major League Soccer had its inaugural season. With names like Tony Meola, Carlos Valderrama, Brian McBride, Alexi Lalas, Eddie Pope, and Cobi Jones, it was all we could do to not pretend to be our idols while at practice. We were growing up playing the most amazing sport in the world, while the United States was starting it’s first professional league. Not to mention, the classic 35 yard penalty shootouts in the event of a tie (I miss those days. Bring it back.)

Unfortunately, there was no MLS team near my hometown. My friends and I never really had a team to follow. We kind of just watched the games on TV and rooted for whichever team our favorite players were on. About a year ago, I started putting out feelers in an attempt to shoot the pro sports teams in Nashville. I sent an email to the Titans, Predators, and when I heard Nashville won the bid for the newest MLS team, I jumped all over it and sent them an email as well. Being their first season, I felt like it was the perfect opportunity to get my foot in the door to shoot the games. While the Nashville Soccer Club was the only organization to actually get back to me, the news was negative. Apparently I had to be part of a reputable media outlet, to get a press pass. I think Jared Polin was the photographer who said to start a website with a blog, in order to get a press pass for pro sports teams, but I don’t think that’s good enough for the NSC.

Fast forward to yesterday. I was walking through Costco, doing some last minute Christmas shopping and happened to walk passed a couple who both had Nashville Soccer Club logos on their shirts. I asked them if they worked for the NSC, and the man said he did. I explained that I was a photographer interested in shooting the pro sports teams in Nashville and that the Nashville Soccer Club actually responded to me, but declined the offer and stated that I had to be part of a reputable media outlet. I told the man I had no idea what that meant, and that I just wanted to shoot the pro sports teams in Nashville. The man asked for my business card and I gave it to him. He told me he would look into it for me and be in touch with me. I’m not actually expecting to hear from him, but I have to admit I went home feeling a bit better about myself. I feel like I’m on the right track now. I have a website, a blog, business cards, an email dedicated to my name, etc. Even if this doesn’t pan out, I do feel more professional than I did a year ago (even if I’m not being paid for my work yet).

Morning Coffee →

I’m a 37 year old who woke up one morning and decided to pursue photography as a hobby, and with a little luck, a source of income. This blog is intended to document my journey, for better or worse. So, for starters, a wrist watch check and shout out to Tristano (TGV), one of my many inspirations for doing this. I’m sure my other inspirations will be casually mentioned from time to time (no pun intended). I started my blog wearing a Dan Henry 1964 Gran Turismo Chronograph, which I bought as an homage to my dog “Banda”, due to it’s panda dial. Rest in peace buddy.

I grew up on the white, sandy beaches of Pensacola, FL. I took a few photography classes in high school, during the late 90s. It was the perfect time and place to grow up. My generation was fortunate enough to grow up during a time when we were all being introduced to the wonderful technology we have today. We had TVs, video games, and computers, but we weren’t walking around with them in our pockets. If we wanted to call someone, we had to go home to make the phone call, and we had to hope the person we were calling was home. During rainy days, we were allowed to stay in and watch movies or play on our Nintendo. We had computers, but no internet until we were in middle school. We saw the rise of CDs, DVDs, pagers, cell phones, the internet, Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, and many others. We knew what it was like to free play in nature, AND have access to modern technology. A rare thing today.

I took a few photography classes in high school. Most of my class was still using film cameras, while a few of them were just starting to step into the digital realm with DSLRs. I don’t remember how it worked with the “digital students”, but we were all required to learn how to develop black and white film in the darkroom, as part of my grade. That darkroom would soon become the bane of my interest in photography at the time.

I was using a Nikon film camera, which my father used in college. I loved the idea of shooting on film. The smell of the chemicals in the darkroom, taking black and white photos like Ansel Adams, and doing it the way my father did in college. It all sounded great on paper. In practice, however, it wasn’t very glamorous or fun. For starters, I seemed to have a consistent problem with winding my film back inside the film roll, before I even began shooting. Maybe it was the camera. More than likely, it was operator error. Buying brand new rolls of film, only to accidentally wind them back inside the roll, was getting old. Then there was the darkroom… When I did manage to get my film set up correctly, there was no telling how my photographs were going to turn out, until I actually developed them in the darkroom. Most of the time, they were underdeveloped, overdeveloped, or had some ghostly (ghastly) appearance, which only got worse as time passed. Some people will argue that the anticipation of what the darkroom was going to show you, was what actually made it fun. To me, doing all that work, before waiting around for an image which was probably going to end up looking like a hot mess anyway, was not my idea of fun. Another major issue with shooting film, was the limited number of exposures we could take. I’d buy a roll of film and have what? 24 exposures? 24 exposures that I couldn’t see until I spent time in the darkroom, and I’d be lucky if half of them worked out. I remember looking around at my fellow classmates with the DSLRs, thinking “these guys have the right idea”.

Captured during an afternoon at the dog park.