“Bringing it back” with my first experiences post, and giving myself the chance to catch up and document some of the work I’ve done on various trips. First up was a day long drive to Fort Lauderdale, FL with a pit stop in Charleston, SC to see the Virginia Tech Men’s Basketball team take on Charleston Southern. After that it was an overnight drive to the Miami area, where we were just a few days away from my first bowl game – the 2009 FedEx Orange Bowl.
Side note: I had to go through and process almost all of these again, since for some reason I thought deleting my Lightroom catalog was a good idea. All my edits went along with that…sigh. Anyways. So starting things off, this was a newly acquired lens for me at the time:
Canon 400mm f/2.8L. I actually bought it back in October, but had only used it at a handful of football/soccer events. I packed this, two cameras, my 70-200, and a wide angle or two, then me and my friend Kyle were on the road to Charleston, SC. Not as long as a drive as anticipated! Explored a little downtown before the game.
Some guy was weaving these crazy baskets – I wanted to get a better shot of this but I didn’t really want to bother him too much…I don’t think he liked pictures.
After downtown we went out to the coast for a little. Took this shot from a pier. Headed over to the stadium soon after, and as you can see this game was absolutely packed. At least there was pizza?
Wandered around the Colosseum a bit, then started using my 400 2.8 (for the hell of it, mostly). Every time I use this lens for basketball I get some weird looks – people think it’s a telescope or something. While we were there, Kyle and I met up with Mike Shroyer, also from Virginia Tech.
A closer shot of Jeff Allen from the Virginia Tech team. I didn’t take tons of photos at this game, partly because I was just excited to leave and wanted to get to Florida. The Hokies won, then we all left and embarked on an overnight drive to Miami. Only had to stop for coffee once!
We arrived around 6am, but unfortunately couldn’t check into our hotel. Hotel ended up being a dump so we switched to the media hotel anyways. Met up with Brian Sewell after switching hotels to explore the area.
I made an HDR version of the picture above, but personally I’m not too much of a fan of HDR so decided to keep it simple with this. Mostly took it easy and hung out in the media lounge that night.
Next morning was one of the press conferences with the head coaches, plus some awesome complimentary breakfast.
There’s the trophy with Frank Beamer in the background (foreshadowing much?). There was this photographer at the press conference (not in the picture below) that seriously took probably 5,000 photos. Not joking – he probably could have made a sequence of the entire hour. I might have taken 20 photos…20 uninteresting photos at that matter. Kind of a limiting environment.
Paparazzi. After that was over we enjoyed the rest of the day on the beach and around the hotel.
The building next to our hotel (on the right) was condominiums…they started at 3 million or something ridiculous (but prime location).
Did I mention that I’m the master of ping pong?
Cameras went off for most of the rest of the evening…our hotel hosted a “casino night” for the media on the 31st, so that was part of our new years eve activities. A group of us also went into Fort Lauderdale for further celebrations, then met up with some friends and went to the pool. Got a decent night’s sleep because the game was the next day.
January 1, 2009: We had a police escort over to the stadium!
Cliche FedEx shot? Took this from the bus on the way over to our gate. Once inside the stadium, we set up shop in the media room and took a walk around. This is the same stadium that they played the 2010 Superbowl in…as well as others. I guess that’s kind of cool I’ve been on the field there.
17mm on full frame – not wide enough! Should have gone up a little higher for this one. After grabbing some food, Brian and I went over to the Bud Light Fan Fest to see what was up.
The Virginia Tech and Cincinnati bands both played, people were drinking, and there were cheerleaders…that about sums it up. Made my way back to the field where the players were warming up.
Virginia Tech quarterback Tyrod Taylor waving to someone in the stands.
Macho Harris.
Some more pictures of the players getting ready. The white balance seemed way off no matter what I did, seems like this stadium had a nice orange glow. I noticed something funny down the field…
FL = Florida. Yep. After another bite to eat and taking some surveys for the Orange Bowl Committee, the teams were about to run onto the field.
The downside? Photographers weren’t allowed out there and the sidelines were PACKED.
So that happened, some fireworks went off, and then the game was underway.
Another of Tyrod Taylor. Thought this was cool with the Cincinnati player blurred out in the foreground.
Darren Evans dragging a few guys down the field.
Cincinnati was the first to score, but it didn’t take Virginia Tech too long to catch up and eventually surpass them.
Obie, the Orange Bowl mascot!
These guys were trying to get the news guys’ attention seriously every ten minutes. For the reference, the Hokies also attended the Orange Bowl the year before this.
Half time show was played by the Doobie Brothers. Got some cool shots of the band with my longer lens, but nothing really exciting. I usually stay out on the field during half time since I don’t have pictures to transmit or process immediately, usually end up doing all that right after the game.
One of the dancers in a group performing during the half time show. Second half kicked off, and I headed into the VT end zone.
After a few plays Darren Evans scored, and I was right there as he ran the ball in. Got kind of lucky!
Another shot as he briefly celebrated in the end zone.
During fourth quarter, Virginia Tech was up 13 points and was able to hold it. Final score of the game was 20-7, Virginia Tech!
Took some pictures of the team as they celebrated and the stage/media area was being setup. At this point nearly everyone had left but those few faithful fans wanting autographs.
Frank Beamer and Darren Evans. Evans was awarded MVP for the game.
Shot of Evans during the post-game press conference.
And here’s the Planet Blacksburg crew for the game – myself, Brian Sewell, and Neal Turnage.
This was a really fun experience, and I’m glad I was able to repeat some of it by attending another bowl game this year. But the Orange Bowl was on a completely different scale – and Florida was a whole lot nicer! We headed out on the morning of the 2nd for a 13 hour drive back to Virginia.
College was some good times.