Portrait of Lori Nay, the Mayor of Gunnison

Meet Lori Nay, Mayor of Gunnison, Utah.

I met Lori’s daughter Amy a few years ago when I spent three days doing headshots for all the employees at Fox 13 in Salt Lake (Amy’s one of the evening anchors, there). Then Amy, bless her heart, told her mayor mother to come to me for her official mayor portrait. She’ll choose from the images I send her which one will hang in the hall at their city office building along with all the other mayor portraits from years past. There will be one difference with this portrait, however. Lori is the first woman mayor in the town history.

We had a lovely time talking about small towns and I asked her why she’s so darn ambitious. I told her meeting people like her and being able to photograph people like her, is the reason I love being a photographer.

Ken Potts is 102 today.

Today marks Ken Potts' 102nd birthday. He is a remarkable survivor of the infamous Japanese attack on the USS Arizona during the Pearl Harbor bombing. The ill-fated ship was carrying a total of 1,512 people when it was targeted, tragically resulting in the deaths of 1,177 individuals. Ken managed to survive the attack and is now one of only two remaining survivors still alive to this day. Here’s a portrait I made of Ken just a few months ago at his home in Provo, Utah.

Happy Birthday, Ken.

Ken Potts, photographed at his home in Provo, Utah, September 2022


Portraits of the BYU Broadcasting employees

It took four days, but we got it done. In September, I photographed every full time employee at BYU Broadcasting (nearly everyone--some were out of town). 

I really love how these turned out, and I've got to hand it to BYU Broadcasting for not settling on the safe, straight-forward, head and shoulders shot, but instead, be willing to get something with a little more personality, pizazz, and quirkiness. They told their employees they could bring a prop if they wanted that reflected something about their personality, job, or outside interests (so that's why you may see a dog or fly rod in some of these, among other things).

The shoot was set up so that I'd have a decent amount of time with each person. Long enough for me to learn something about their life, their job, their personality, and then make a portrait that was a reflection of that in some way.

Meet the folks at BYU Broadcasting! Click on any image to view it larger.

High school senior portrait photography

Here's Andrew, about to graduate from high school and head out into the world to do great things, no doubt. Andrew does a lot of things well, and one of those things is photography. Over the past year, I've enjoyed seeing his work, and talking through some photography conversations with him.

Meet Andrew.

Photographed at my studio in Provo, Utah, and downtown. 

Women In Film - Cast of Extinct

In February, I visited the set of the upcoming BYU TV sci-fi drama, Extinct, to photograph the female cast and crew (actors, wardrobe, script--you get the idea). The images were part of a promotion for the Geena Davis Institute on Gender in Media. 

Click on any image to view it larger.

Family portraits - The Gochnour Family

One of the best things about working as a photographer is the people you get to meet, hang around, associate with.

Back in the early 19...well, a long time ago, I worked for company in Salt Lake called Gastronomy and one of the coolest people in the world was my boss, Mr. Jeff Gochnour. As a boss, he was fair, funny, honest, a good example of how far hard work can get you, and a thousand other worthy ideals.

After leaving the company, I never really saw him or heard from him, but last year, he was a guest at a wedding I was photographing. He said he was following me on Instagram and wanted me to photograph his family.

It was an honor for me to photograph the family of someone I admire so much, and after being around his kids, it's obvious that all the things I like about Jeff are rubbing off on his offspring.

Meet the Gochnour family.

Justin Hackworth photographs blasts from the past, former bosses, happy families, and he wants to photograph you. Interested? Let's talk!

Film images scanned and developed at Alpine Film Lab.