I took the day and headed up to Brainerd International Raceway where a private track day was being hosted by Morries Luxury Auto. Upon arrival, Morrie’s had several new Bentaygas lined up and the all new Aston Martin DB11 for customers and invited guests to stare at and drive. The Bentley’s job for the day was to impress and impress it did. The task was to take guests back onto a dirt track and gravel pit to display it’s off-road prowess. After doing a few trial runs and getting it semi-stuck in the mud, we had a course which worked perfectly!
After that I headed to the track action to catch some cars attacking the track despite the 45 degree high for the day.
Being asked to photograph multi-day driving events in the peak of the Fall colors up the coast of Lake Superior with a group of super cars never gets boring. This was the Auto Vault’s second annual fall drive with several more planned for next year alone!
I never get bored of being a Minnesota car photographer with jobs like this, especially when we end up in Grand Marais with a Lamborghini Huracan, Audi R8 V10, McLaren 650S, Audi RS7 sedan, Porsche Cayman GT4, and Bentley Continental GT V8 S.
We got into town with only an hour to go before sunset and instantly attracted a crowd. Being a car photographer, naturally I started scoping out a great angle to photograph the car at with the Minnesota sunset in the background. I lined up the Lamborghini and added in the Audi R8 shortly after for some great shots.
Enjoy:
Over the summer of 2016 I was hired by HRE Wheels to photographer a special car here in Minnesota. The car is a Porsche 918 Spyder. While only 918 were ever made, three of them are here in MN and all owned by a single owner. This particular 918 I have photographed before while in its original blue state. The car has since gained many thousands of miles on the clock, HRE Wheels, and a matte black Martini vinyl wrap.
This story starts in 1977 with my mom, Donna Hway. In that year, she herself summited Mount Rainier with Lou Whittaker of RMI Guides, a bit of a Rainier Legend himself with over 250 summits. Setting foot on the top of Mount Rainier isn’t easy even with today’s gear and technology, let alone nearly 40 years ago.
About six months ago, my brother and I finally decided to begin preparations for a climb of our own. And while there are many great peaks in the Rocky Mountains and Canada, we could think of no other mountain but the one that would be the beginning of a family tradition!
We started by taking a slight detour into the backwoods of Oregon.
Breaking down our gear to make sure everything was accounted for.
Being avid campers mixed with our extreme thriftiness, we camped for free five of our six nights out there. The views were better anyway…
Training day. We hiked up a few thousand feet to the snow fields and got a rundown on mountaineering tricks of the trade.
We tacked on some additional hiking that evening to try and score some views of the Mountain for the drone. …yes, I brought the drone.
D Day.
We had a surprise visit from the Blue Angels during some of their training maneuvers.
The beginning of the snow field as we continue up to Camp Muir.
Mount Adams to the south.
Mount Adams left. Mount St. Helens right.
Our overnight accommodations at 10,188ft. Camp Muir.
Getting the low-down on our summit hike for the next morning at 12AM.
Unfortunately, our guides insisted that I keep my Nikon in my pack during the summit hike in order for me to focus on safety and footwork. I was allowed to snap pictures during our three breaks on the way up, but we had so many other things to do during those breaks that I never had a chance to focus on photography. At each of our three scheduled breaks we had to: throw our parkas on to conserve heat, drink water, eat at least 300 calories, and do gear checks. All within about 10 minutes. There simply was no time to fumble around with a my 8 pounds of self-inflicted weight until we made it to the top.
Our summit hike consisted of 50-75mph wind gusts, total darkness, nearly half of our total crew turning back, rocks falling above us, traversing ladders over bottomless crevasses, and beauty I have never experienced before. I am heartbroken I could not capture more along the way, but I would rather be heartbroken than have my neck broken.
Jump to the summit below. While seven of nine people in our crew made it to the summit crest, that is not the true summit of Mount Rainier. The true summit is called Columbia Crest on the NW edge of the crater. Of our 7 summiters, three of us and two guides walked the additional 1.5 mile trek and 240 feet in gain and loss to truly reach the top. 14,411.
Photo of our mom from 38 years prior.
Lots of fallen rock on this, the Cowlitz Glacier. When crossing these glaciers, the guides ask us to get the lead out and move quickly as it is a very unstable place to be especially when in rock fall zones.
Wheels of Italy is a long running Italian car/bike show on the shores of beautiful Lake Calhoun in Minneapolis. While the official car show is a blast for participants and spectators, the WOI evening in St. Paul Minnesota is equally fun! Its a night of good food, music, and beautiful cars/bikes hosted by Pazzaluna Italian Restaurant. Check out the photos from this summer’s event below.
And don’t forget to come out to the official WOI car show on September 18th 10am-4pm at Calhoun Square.
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I worked on a small project for one of the family’s businesses named Way To Go Canoe Outfitting up in Ely Minnesota. Ely is known as the canoe capital of the world because it is the gateway to the 1 Million acre wilderness area called The Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness. My parents have been helping people accomplish fun camping/fishing trips up there for nearly 40 years. After re-launching a new outfitting business just a couple years ago, they needed to start some marketing content projects with some drone footage.
Day one started by loading up the towboat with canoes, gear, and happy canoers. We found a nice spot on a local lake to start the footage rolling. High winds didn’t make it easy to get perfect footage but we managed to secure some great stuff anyway thanks to the stability of the DJI.
Day two started at 4:45AM before the sun rose. We got on the lake just in time to catch the sun rise above the horizon and captured some fantastic footage on the glassy water. Golden hour sunlight made for the best footage of the project, hence why I used it for the first video (See below). However, there is more on the way soon.
I worked on a small project for one of the family’s businesses named Way To Go Canoe Outfitting up in Ely Minnesota. Ely is known as the canoe capital of the world because it is the gateway to the 1 Million acre wilderness area called The Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness. My parents have been helping people accomplish fun camping/fishing trips up there for nearly 40 years. After re-launching a new outfitting business just a couple years ago, they needed to start some marketing content projects with some drone footage.
Day one started by loading up the towboat with canoes, gear, and happy canoers. We found a nice spot on a local lake to start the footage rolling. High winds didn’t make it easy to get perfect footage but we managed to secure some great stuff anyway thanks to the stability of the DJI.
Day two started at 4:45AM before the sun rose. We got on the lake just in time to catch the sun rise above the horizon and captured some fantastic footage on the glassy water. Golden hour sunlight made for the best footage of the project, hence why I used it for the first video (See below). However, there is more on the way soon.
