Treasure Island

When I sat down to write a blog post today, the only thing that made sense was to write about my weekend at Treasure Island Music Festival. It makes sense, considering it took up my entire weekend, and is absolutely one of my favorite weekends of the year. So here we go. I'm going to share some thoughts I had about the weekend. I have yet to recover from it, as I'm in the middle of the crazy photo editing period now (and very little sleep) so hopefully these words will make sense!

This was my 5th year attending and photographing Treasure Island Music Festival, and it was so special, a magical weekend, just like all of the others have been. Each time is a different type of magic, though there are common threads that run through them.

Note: I've now been trying to find the time and the mental stillness to write this post for three days, which basically says it all about the insanity of my week in general. I've been so busy, ironically, trying to meet my photo deadlines for my festival photos, that I've barely been sleeping, eating, or keeping my sanity (also, ow, my running injury is still terrible, and no, I haven't seen a doctor). Anyway, one of my goals for today (Wednesday) is to actually finish this post.

So, magic.

It's not really about the music at Treasure Island, though sometimes it is, and I always end up discovering something I've never heard before that I really like. They also don't have overlapping sets, so you can catch every set easily (so wonderful). It's not a huge festival, which I also love. It's just a place where people who love music come to enjoy that music. Simple as that.

I love walking around in the non-stage areas, to the DIY camp, the art installations (some of them interactive!) to the small performance van (well, this year it was a van). I love watching the sun set. I love the electricity in the air. I love being a professional photographer and I love that I have actual working relationships (based on mutual respect) with so many other photographers in that pit. And there we are, year after year, building more memories, more of a repartee. It's so cool. It's actually something that, outside of Germany & M'era Luna, I've never experienced anywhere else.

I also attended this festival with Gabe, after attending the last two years alone, and with Scott & Megan (who now lives in Maine) the two years before that. I feel like I've had such a wide range of experiences at this point, and I'm so happy and grateful for that. To me, this is always a weekend that represents the best of my life, whatever that happens to be.

Here are some of my phone shots from the weekend.
Professional shots will be up soon at The Owl Mag and on my Facebook page.