Photographing Dew Tour was an absolutely incredible experience. I spent four days there and every day was unexpected and amazing. After arriving  at Copper Mountain and getting settled in to shoot this major Olympic-qualifying event,  I talked to the ski patrol and caught a snowmobile ride up to the top of the superpipe.

I started the day shooting up at the start area with the athletes and then hiked all up and down the entire side of the superpipe, leaning over the edge to get shots of the men’s snowboarders flying over my head and over the edge of the pipe. It was absolutely incredible to spend my first day watching some of the biggest names in snowboarding throwing huge tricks over my head as if it was nothing. 

The second day I went back to ski patrol and got a ride up to the bottom of the slopestyle course where I shot men’s ski slopestyle finals. I started at the bottom of the course and eventually hiked my way through thigh-deep snow up the outside of the course so I could get access to multiple big-air jumps and the rail garden up top. The third day, I shot men’s snowboard slopestyle finals and hiked a little bit up the other side of the course to get shots from the opposite angle, again through snow that was thigh- to waist-deep. I spent the afternoon editing the photos and then spent the night shooting street style finals, running back and forth between the two media corrals. As it got dark the lights came on and the energy really increased as the crowd got more and more into it. After finals was a massive fireworks show. 

The last morning was the men's and women’s snowboard superpipe finals. This was my favorite day of the entire event because it felt like everything had really come together. The sun was shining and it was nice and warm. I got a ride up to the superpipe and spent the whole day on the sides of the pipe photographing finals. I finally got the shots I had been waiting for. There was not a cloud in the sky and the sun was out. I got to play with the riders flying over my head in front of the sun for the whole morning and into the afternoon. These were the shots I wanted to get from the first morning I arrived at Dew Tour and I was so happy to be able to finally get them.