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The thrilling world of adventure photographer and filmmaker Jimmy Chin.
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Jimmy Chin has dangled from cliffs. He’s been chased by giant avalanches. He’s skied down Mount Everest, the tallest mountain on Earth. Why? It’s his job!
Jimmy Chin is a photographer and a filmmaker.
Mikey Schaefer
Jimmy Chin
Sharing With the World
One day, he used a friend’s camera to snap a photo of a mountain called El Capitan. An adventure company bought the photo, and soon, magazines were hiring Chin to photograph his fellow climbers.
He relished the opportunity. “I loved the people I climbed with,” Chin says. “They were from different walks of life, but they were all trying to do things that no one had ever done before,” he says. “I wanted to share that with the world.”
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Hanging On
As a photographer, Chin does whatever it takes to get the best image. His work has taken him to all seven continents!
Skill and Guts
Today Chin is famous for both his mountaineering skills and his artistry. He’s co-directed five movies with his wife, Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi, including the Academy Award-winning documentary Free Solo. The film follows a climber’s attempt to scale a nearly 3,000-foot cliff without using ropes. Chin and Vasarhelyi also directed The Rescue, about the dangerous attempt to save a youth soccer team trapped in a cave in Thailand.
Making such movies often requires Chin to travel to remote locations and film under extreme conditions.
So how does he push past the challenges?
“I take one challenge at a time,” Chin says. “
Plus, Chin notes, it’s the challenges that adventure athletes face—fear, danger, discomfort—that make their stories worth sharing.
“These stories are about the human spirit,” he says. “They’re about what it looks like to fail or to achieve your dreams.”
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This article was originally published in the September 2023 issue.
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