Well hello there! Nice to see you again. Wondering what the hold up has been since my last blog post? Too many reasons to list but none are acceptable excuses for why I can't sit down and type a few words at least once a week. Wondering who I am? I am Tim Darby - a son, husband, father, attorney, photographer and all sorts of other fun stuff. I'm a poor blogger and only a slightly better photographer, but I'm back again!

I have been shooting this whole time but there has been a lot going on so the time necessary to edit photos and post just hasn't been there. My most recent adventure is post worthy as it has been over the past 3 years. May 12th through 15th I had the amazing opportunity to assist and shoot for the Florida Times-Union during the 2011 Players Championship. I really can't tell you how much fun I have and how much I learn each year and this year was no exception. Most on staff think I'm nuts but in reality I am just a huge golf fan with a couple of cameras, a zest to learn, and some energy.

I must admit that having a skilled (and patient) set of photo editors spoiled me within minutes and that is part of the delay but I will keep plugging along and edit each round as quickly as I can. There are some really exciting photos in this set as well as the following so definitely stay tuned!

Here's the link for the round 1 gallery.

Round 1 Photos

Be sure to check it out and let me know what you think. Glad to be back and you'll be hearing from me again soon.

Welcome back! Long time no post! Every time it has been a while I always lead off the post with apologies/excuses/etc, this time I'm just going to talk about doing it and not actually do it. Sorry, it's been a long Monday! ;-)

Everything is going great here! Had an amazing weekend and got to play some golf and spend some time with family and friends. I actually shot a 74 on Sunday morning which as it turns out is one of my lowest rounds ever! Actually made a 3 putt par on the 17th hole (ugh) but still shot 36 on the back 9 which is also a personal best. I have fun playing regardless of how I play but it is definitely more fun to play and play well!

This afternoon I managed to find a little time to jump into Lightroom again and import some photos and play with the new program (which I love). After some exploring I got back to editing and FINALLY finished editing the last of the photos from the final round of this year's Players Championship. I know many of my readers will be very sad that I can't bombard you with golf photos every post but keep your head up, next year's tournament is right around the corner! Here are some of my favorites:





























If I haven't overloaded you already or you're a golf fan be sure to check out the rest of my photos from the Players Championship 4th Round

In other photography news, today I got one of my favorite emails of the year from UF with the subject line: "Football Credentials: Approved" which means I will get to be down on the sidelines for the upcoming football season shooting for the University. I really can't express how much of an honor that is and I can't wait for the season! More to come on that!

Thanks for checking in today and I am very sorry it has been a while since I have updated. I definitely have some plans for some upcoming posts including a Riley update and hopefully a guest blogger or two. Hope to see you back here soon!

Hey everyone! Glad to be back and to see you back here! I know it may be the middle of the week but I can still talk about last weekend right? I had a great one filled with some golf, a lot of pool time, a close friend in town for the weekend, watching my Gator baseball team make it to the College World Series, and then more pool time. Really just what I needed.

This week has already had a busy start but I'm enjoying it and absolutely can't wait until Thursday - the first round of the 110th US Open at Pebble Beach! I am a huge golf fan (if you haven't noticed), I'm an even bigger golf major championship fan, and finally I think my favorite golf major championship is the US Open. The Masters is likely a close second but I won't put it in first until I am able to walk Augusta National and see it for myself.

The US Open also has some emotional connection to me as that is the only major championship that I have attended. My dad and I were able to get tickets to the 2005 US Open at Pinehurst #2 and it was a blast. Even cooler, my grandfather took my dad to the US Open (my dad's first major championship) in St. Louis in 1965 - FORTY years earlier. Too cool. While we were in North Carolina for the US Open I had some serious talks with my dad about my future career and life plans and the night before the final round we talked for literally hours (something pretty unique as my dad and I are usually fairly quiet) about what I should do before I finally decided that I would focus my efforts on going to law school and becoming an attorney. Even though at that point in my life I didn't, he knew I could do it, and just told me to do my best. Parents are always right.

Back to the post at hand! I wanted to get back to some of my golf pics since this week is pretty important in the golf year. An important part of my golf year is shooting The Players Championship up in Ponte Vedra Beach at TPC Sawgrass. This year was my third year and it is really one of the highlights of my year that I look forward to as soon as I see the 2nd week in May nearing. It's taken me a while to get to all of these photos because of time constraints plus I don't want to overload you all with a ton of golf posts in a row. The third round of the Players championship was definitely one of my best all time as far as getting images that were used and as always I had a blast doing it. Kind of fitting it was my 3rd year shooting the Players and the 3rd round was my best. Sometimes my life seems to revolve round the number 3.

When I met my editor (and ride) on Sunday morning I noticed there was a newspaper on his dash and a familiar (and very large) photo of mine on the front of the Sports page. Below that picture was a set of four more, another of which was mine. Wow, 2 on the front of Sports - this was a dream come true already and I hadn't opened the paper yet. Inside there were 3 more of my shots. What an amazing feeling! I knew I had a pretty good day but to see the photos in print and know that others (and even editors back at the office) appreciated them was such a cool feeling. I really can't tell you how jazzed up I was and ready to get back out there and do it all over again in the final round. A fellow photographer working with me that day started calling the Sunday edition the Tim Darby edition Sports section because of how many pictures of mine were used on Sunday. I do have to say it was a bit weird and exciting all at the same time seeing that section laying around the media center with a huge picture I took on the front page. Some seasoned photo journalists may see this as no big deal but it was certainly a special day for me.

Here are a few of my favorite (and best) photos from the third round:



































and here's the one that ran as a large print on the front page of Sports leading into the final round of the Players:



more on this shot in a post coming soon.

If you're a true golf fan, or just want to look at some more photos from the Players Championship Third Round gallery.

Thanks for stopping by and reading a little self gloss but it truly was a great day in my "career" as a photographer. I plan on writing a few posts later on explaining how I ended up with certain shots from this day and the story behind them so stay tuned. Thanks for checking in and if you're a golf fan enjoy the US Open - I know I will!

Hey everyone! Man, this really has been a short week. It's already Wednesday night! That's a good thing I guess, as long as you have done something with the first half of the week. Tonight I'm going to post a few more shots from the 2nd round of the Players Championship that I took a few weeks ago while helping the Florida Times-Union. I have been a little slow at getting some of these published 1. because I haven't had a ton of time to edit and 2. I don't want to have 4 consecutive days of golf posts. I love golf, and taking photos of golf, especially at the highest level played, but you may not.

My second day shooting the Players went a lot better for me. I'm not exactly sure what the deal was my first day shooting but I just wasn't feeling it yet and was just trying to get acclimated with the tournament after a year off. I also didn't get an inside the ropes credential and that is my fault since I didn't ask for one. Big lesson here - if you don't ask, you never know. Turns out I was on the list the whole time but I neglected to ask so I wasn't as close to the action. With that said, I did manage to work my way inside the ropes a few times and was close enough to get some shots but it just didn't feel right and it showed as I didn't have many photos I was blown away with (or my editors for that matter). Anyway, for day two I was ready, inside the ropes and much more in the mood to properly cover the action and it showed in my work.

The more I read this as I type the more I don't like the feeling I'm getting from my explanation about the first day of shooting. I did my best and worked as hard as I could and definitely got some usable shots but I knew I could do better and I got my attitude in order for day two. Enough of that. On to the photos:















If you'd like to see the rest of the set be sure to click here

Thanks for stopping by and be sure to check back in for at least one more post before the week is over! See you soon!

The Players Championship - Round 2



Day two is in the books and it was another hot one! Seemed like today there wasn't as much cloud cover or a breeze so the breaks in the air conditioned media room was a welcome relief. Got to see a lot of the big names again today and saw some great golf, including an eagle from the rough on #5. It was an amazing shot! Can't believe we're already halfway done with the tournament. I only have half of my photos today because I left one of my memory cards in the media room to be uploaded and looked at later tonight. I do have a few to share, first off the Times-Union used a few of my shots in their web gallery today and if you'd like to see those click here and be sure to look at some of the other great galleries on the page. Here are a few more that I edited tonight when I got home:

















If you don't already follow me on Twitter be sure to check me out as I am posting some updates throughout the day while I am out on the course. Thanks for stopping by!