John Edwards 59 Panhead

One of the perks of having friends who build bitchin bikes is being the first in line to photograph them. When John asked me to shoot his bike for Street Chopper my answer was automatic. "When do you want to do it."  I would be crazy not to shoot his bike.  When Jeff Holt said he wanted to put it on the cover I was even more excited and nervous all the same. I needed to nail a shot that was cover worthy and that is not easy, but in the end everything worked out and I was happy with the outcome.  Thank you John for asking me to shoot it, Jeff Holt for wanting to publish my work and the lovely Fawn for riding on the bike to get the shot. Here are a few pictures that were in the feature and few that were not. Enjoy.

The Process Behind The Cover Photo

I wanted to get some good riding shots of Jeff on the 38 Knucklehead so after we finished shooting the bike shots we took off and drove around the hills of the San Fernando Valley area. His buddy Grant was kind enough to come over to Jeff's and be my driver for the day.  

I drove up and down the hills and I snapped off quite a few shots and we were finished for the day. I thanked Jeff for letting me shoot his bike. Turns out Jeff Holt from Street Chopper wanted the bike for the next issue.  

I was happy with the bike shots, but wasn't feeling it on the riding shots.  I wanted to re do them. Jeff Leighton said we still had some time to turn in the photos so we set another date to reshoot the riding shots.

This time Jeff drove down to my house and I had Barry Lacour of Top Shelf Customs drive me around so I could get the riding shots around Long Beach.  So we took off for the 405 Fwy and headed towards the 710 Fwy and over to the Vincent Thomas bridge and back.

Between the Vincent Thomas Bridge and the 710 we took a turned off to a side route where there are a litttle less cars so we could do a couple of different looks.  I actually shot Chopper Dave down in this area which is how I knew to go down there.

This ended up being the shot they chose for the cover.

Jeff had a original steel helmet and wanted to try and get a few shots with that on. The helmet didn't have a chin strap and going down the freeway at 55 mph you can guess what happened.  Barry and I just started laughing cause you can just hear that helmet clanking down the freeway on the ground as it flew off Jeff's head.  To our surprise that thing was still in tact with no dents or scratches what so ever. Not to mention a eighteen wheeler coming down the road drove right by it.  So Jeff figured we better not try that again.   

A few shots with just the beenie...

...and then back with his original helmet on the way back home. This time I felt more confident about what I got.  Jeff and I met Jeff Holt down at The Pike a week later and I handed him the disc of photos. Thank you Jeff L and Jeff H.  One of the best shoots I've done.