Blast From The Past

The above image comes from a new photo gallery I launched over the weekend. It's called Tampa nightlife assortment and is a combination of nightlife images from various venues in the Tampa Bay Area.

If you're wondering, no, I didn't make a return trip to Tampa to tear up the town and frequent past nightlife haunts. I'd love to do that sometime soon, but for now I'm just relying on memories.

The truth is, I've been moving coast to coast and back with hundreds of nightlife images from Tampa that I never posted anywhere. I felt it was time to take advantage of the cold winter days and finally get these archived on my site. They aren't the greatest of images, but they represent the beginning of a two-year run in Tampa that saw me produce on hot little nightlife column for TBO.com.

The story goes like this...
When Dan and I arrived in Tampa, we were well aware of the nightlife options in Ybor City. We also had the pleasure of having some local DJ friends who told us about other venues in more hip neighborhoods worth visiting. But we both realized there was a void of information on all the nightlife venues themselves and your best options for figuring out where to go came from the beer girls standing on the streets. Not to mention, if a world-class DJ was spinning locally, only those tied to trance/house music message boards got the word.

So I started writing. I started doing research on these venues and the performers they were bringing in. I quickly found a solid rotation of clubs that threw big parties every week and fortunately got my name on the right lists to hear of other big parties not well known to the general public. I got invited to NFL parties. I got invited to Derrick Jeter's big bash at Hard Rock. And when a new venue opened their doors, I was on the guest list as one of the first to see the new digs.

It was fun. It was a life I could've only dreamed of a few years earlier living in Greensboro, NC. So I quickly realized I needed to do two things while covering all these great parties. One was to bring a camera to document the chaos. Two was market my column and get readers. We all know guys love looking at pretty girls. The internet has made that a billion dollar industry. So I pocketed my wife's little 3 mega-pixel camera and started to shoot whenever I went out. Some of the images in the gallery I've linked to above reflect that little D-Snap camera. They're small, grainy, and could be confused for a cellphone picture these days. But this is where it all began.

After several months and her desire to reclaim her camera, my wife got me a nicer point-n-click to use on my nights out. What was happening at the time, and I didn't even realize it, was I started to develop a passion for photography. Of course I took standard shots of girls and people having a good time. That was all about marketing my column so these kids would go looking for their picture and find details on the next big party. But I found myself fascinated with what the camera could do with the lights, smoke and elements of a nightlife. I started seeing things I never noticed with the naked eye, like how light can cast a DJ in a wild silhouette or how movement is captured with a longer exposure.

All of this sounds elementary today with my Nikon semi-pro camera, multiple lenses and tripods. But the Tampa nightlife assortment gallery tells a story. And it also brings me back to some of the most enjoyable moments in my life. Progress is wonderful, and no doubt I've done what I could to take my photography to the next level. But we shall never forget our roots!

Labels: Clubs, DJ, Music, Nightlife, Tampa, Ybor

posted by DVS @ 11:07 AM