James Blakeway is founder, president and chief panoramic photographer for Blakeway Worldwide Panoramas, Inc., in Eden Prairie, Minnesota. Blakeway was born and raised in Fargo, North Dakota, and received a B.S. in marketing from the University of North Dakota. After holding several marketing positions with Procter & Gamble, he decided to start his own business. Unsure which direction his business should take, he seized an opportunity to travel to Australia, thinking that he might find a business idea there. Indeed he did: he met two men who had created a phenomenal panoramic photograph of the Sydney Harbor. Blakeway worked with them until his visa expired, sold them his share of the business in exchange for a few hundred posters and returned to the United States to start his own panoramic photo business.
In California, Blakeway and a partner began selling photos from Blakeway's garage and from the trunk of his car. Later, he moved the business to Minneapolis and then to Eden Prairie, where the company is now located. Today Blakeway and his team travel the globe creating some of the most beautiful cityscapes made by anyone in the world. James Blakeway is known for going to extreme lengths to get the picture he wants. This can mean hanging from helicopters, or being suspended by a crane 800 feet up in the air. From these crazy exploits he has managed to take some fantastic city scapes of many of the worlds most famous cities, historical landmarks and golf courses.
James Blakeway uses unconventional ways of getting the panoramic shot he desires. He has hung from a helicopter and been suspended 800 feet in the air from a crane. One of the world's premier skyline photographers, Blakeway makes it his business to get the shot nobody else dares. The result of his aerobic exploits is an impressive collection of more that 120 panoramic lithographs of U.S. and world cities, historic landmarks and golf courses. Blakeway's collection is marketed worldwide through art galleries, framing and art retailers, photography studios and on the Internet.
