A little about the journey incoming
As a kid, Tony read survival stories the way some kids tore through comic books. Robinson Crusoe taught him how to imagine resourcefulness. Treasure Island made him crave discovery. Every page suggested the same thing: the world was bigger than the one outside his window, and it was waiting for him to step into it.
Childhood was full of support, encouragement, and curiosity. Family taught him the value of hard work and gave him the freedom to explore. Organized sports filled the early years, but eventually gave way to skateboarding, where every trick, every fall, and every success was entirely his own. That independence carried into other pursuits. He tore apart cars just to see how they worked, taught himself design on a computer, and discovered photography as another way to test limits. Every experiment reinforced the same instinct: growth came through effort, and progress had to be earned.
Late teens and twenties began with website and graphic design, which grew into leading a large Texas based marketing company, pioneering the modern desktop publishing model to monetize social followings, growing one of the first pages in Texas to over 1 million followers. This eventually evolved into a tourism agency with 100s of websites, a print magazine, building digital campaigns for tourism boards and small business, and helping brands refine their presence online. At the same time, he was building custom cars with friends, projects that blended engineering, creativity, and plenty of grease under the fingernails.
The rest was a whirlwind: video productions, managing and running live events, workshops, and countless late nights turning side projects into functioning businesses. From the outside it might have looked scattered, but each new challenge built range and adaptability. By the time the decade closed, Tony had a hybrid skillset that allowed him to move seamlessly between creative direction, technical execution, and leadership.
Then came the pandemic. The marketing company he had built couldn’t survive the shutdowns. Health challenges stacked on top of financial losses, and everything that once felt steady collapsed. Rather than retreat, Tony gutted an old Hummer and rebuilt it into “H2Roam,” his version of the van-life dream. What began as a gamble became a lifeline.
He hit the road during a time when the world itself felt unmoored. From Big Bend to the West Coast, from Utah’s arches to Death Valley’s salt flats, he traveled for months at a time, living from the truck and chasing light across landscapes he had only imagined. The camera stopped being a side project and became the center of his work. That season of upheaval was also the start of something permanent: a commitment to photography and storytelling as both profession and purpose.
In the desert
In 2023, the journey led back to Big Bend. Tony became General Manager at The Summit, one of the largest adventure lodging destinations in the country. Calling it “remote” hardly covers it. Deliveries arrived days late. The power grid flickered. Water supply ran thin. Standard systems rarely applied. This was truly like running a hotel on Mars. Elon himself might even hire the Summit team one day to run the first one there.
Rather than roadblocks, Tony saw puzzles to solve. He led an expansion of accommodations, created digital systems to support off-grid operations, and developed marketing that translated the desert’s raw beauty into stories that reached people far beyond the canyon walls. It was adventure, responsibility, and creativity all rolled into one.
Today he remains the Summit’s Creative Director, still leading the digital side, but now with the freedom to travel again.
Now, Tony splits his time between fine art projects, commercial campaigns, and teaching. Some weeks are spent under dark skies guiding students through their first long exposures. Others are spent capturing properties and brands with authenticity and precision.
The common thread is restlessness, a sailor’s instinct to keep scanning the horizon for the next venture. Tony has never been content to stay in one harbor for too long. At his core he is an adventurer, but also a builder, someone who wants to leave places better than he found them. That extends to the clients who trust him with their projects. He is determined to exceed expectations and deliver lasting value for the time, trust, and hard-earned money they invest.
The story isn’t finished. And for Tony, that’s exactly the point.
Check out my current workshops and Adventures. Let’s get out there and shoot together 📸
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