From hitchhiking through Iceland on a shoestring budget to becoming a renowned adventure filmmaker and YouTuber, Danny McGee's journey is a testament to unwavering passion. We caught up with Danny for our latest Creator Spotlight to dive into how he transformed a love for the outdoors into a thriving career, the magic behind his immersive FPV drone footage, and the critical role reliable tech plays in capturing his breathtaking expeditions.
If you met a stranger at the airport and they asked what you do, how would you describe yourself to them?
I tell most people I’m an adventure filmmaker / YouTuber. YouTube is sort of my “main job” and how I make a living - but adventure filmmaking is what I’m really passionate about and I try to make as much of my work stuff fit in that genre as well.
Can you tell us about your journey from being a kid with a passion for the outdoors to becoming a full-time adventure photographer and filmmaker?
I first got into this whole world back in 2015. I had just graduated high school and had this burning passion to get out and see the world. At that time I was just starting to do photography. I had saved up some money from summer jobs like construction and mowing lawns and decided to take a 10 day backpacking trip to Iceland. I tried to convince a bunch of my friends to come - but in the end it was just me, my backpack and some camping gear. I had never traveled out of the country before so I was terrified, but I felt like if I didn’t go I would always regret it. I was on a TINY budget (like $1000 or less) so I hitchhiked, slept in my tent and ate instant noodles the whole time, but that trip completely changed the course of my life. I fell in love with travel and my mindset after that was “I don’t know how, but I’m going to turn this whole travel / photography into a career”. I went back home and started college, but only made it one year before dropping out to chase after the career I’m doing now. I truly had no clue how to do it but I’d work for a few months to save money, go out traveling until I ran out and just repeat that process. While I was traveling I was constantly shooting and building my portfolio and reaching out to other creators / brands. Ended up meeting a ton of amazing likeminded people and started to slowly work with brands (for free at first) and that eventually snowballed.
Travel and exploration are at the core of your work. How has immersing yourself in different cultures and environments, from the mountains of Colorado to the streets of Asia, fueled your creative process?
I always equate travel to feeling like you were a kid again. Everything is new and everything is different. The sights, the smells, the faces, the food, and that just wakes your brain up. When you’re at home it’s easy to just find yourself in a routine and days or even weeks go by just running on autopilot. In my experience - the stranger the better. Whenever I’ve visited somewhere completely foreign to me it allows me to think outside the box and look at things from a different perspective.
Your FPV drone footage has a very distinct and immersive feel. How did you develop this signature style?
The beauty of flying FPV is that you really feel like you’re in the drone piloting once you put on the goggles. You can fly off cliffs, through tiny little gaps, up to the top of huge mountains and surf back down - the possibilities are endless and to be honest it’s just way more fun flying in an immersive way. So wherever I am I try to get as close as I possibly can to the environment whether it’s flying close to trees, through small little gaps or down tiny canyons. It’s so much fun, and a byproduct of that is more dynamic shots.
You've worked with some high-profile clients. How do you approach a collaboration with a major brand like Red Bull or Google to create visuals that align with their identity while still maintaining your unique creative voice?
I think one of the biggest things that I realized over the years is that when brands hire you (especially big brands like that) hire you because they love the content you already create. Something about your style or own unique voice spoke to them so I never try to completely morph to their brand, but take certain elements that they obviously like and do them in my own style. Some of my biggest mistakes throughout the years were moments when I abandoned my own personal style. One good recent example of this was a couple months ago Sony hired me to shoot a short video about one of their cameras. So I went to their Instagram, found all the top performing videos from the last few months and then found common themes between them all. From there I just made a video that I’d make for my own page but used the themes that performed well for them.
Tell us about a project that was particularly challenging, like your expedition to film the active volcano in Iceland. What were the biggest obstacles, and how did you overcome them?
The volcano I got the opportunity to shoot in Iceland is a great example of this because the opportunity we got was pretty rare. After about 800 years of being dormant this region in Iceland became active again in 2021 and there have been 12 eruptions since, but most of them you aren’t allowed to film. Some of them are dangerously close to the town in that area so you’re not allowed to film, and others are in unsafe areas. But I had always dreamed of shooting a volcano so when I heard about the one near Litli-Hrutur my girlfriend and another friend of mine took a risk and booked flights and an Airbnb for 5 days. Some days they shut the road to the volcano down, and other days the gas in the air was dangerous. We ended up getting 2 opportunities to shoot the volcano but the first time was a bust because we entered on the wrong side and were too far away to fly our drones. It was a 10 mile hike with 40lbs of camera gear, so it was so frustrating but we kept being persistent and ended up getting another chance to shoot right next the active crater. We showed up at 8pm and slowly burned through all our batteries until about 5am the next morning. Those volcano shots ended up getting over 200 million views across all my platforms, and honestly completely changed my life. But looking back there were so many logical reasonable excuses I could have made to either not go, not stay long enough or not try to hike in again. The actual filming wasn’t too technical, but being persistent and looking at problems as challenges to overcome rather than reasons not to keep pushing paid off.
What are three pieces of gear, software, or even non-technical items that you absolutely couldn't live without on the road?
It’s so hard to pick just 3. I usually travel around with my camera, multiple lenses, at least 5 drones, a solid tripod and an insane amount of small little things that keep the show rolling, but for top 3 I’ll have to say my MacBook that I edit off of, my editing software Final Cut Pro, and good SSDs. The real magic of content creation is in the edit, and even if you have $100,000 worth of gear if you’re not editing it properly or editing it at all it’ll never see the light of day. I’ve seen people shoot films on iPhone that are way better than some people using these insanely expensive setups. So, a good MacBook and a good editing software are critical. And I’m not just saying this because this is going on Glyph’s blog, but good SSDs are SO important. I’ve lost footage in the past and it’s the worst feeling in the world. So knowing that I’m not going to lose the footage I just worked so hard to create gives me so much peace of mind.
Can you tell us about a time having a data storage strategy prevented you from losing important work?
When I travel I always travel around with 2 SSDs, and make sure I have my footage backed up to both. Then I store those in different parts of my luggage to make sure that if one gets lost or stolen I still have one version. Right now I’m doing a motorcycle trip to the end of South America in legs, so we ride 4-7 weeks out of the year, store our bikes for the year and return to push further south. We’re making a travel series out of it, so we’re really diligent with our backups. Each of us have 2 SSDs, and we make sure that both of us have a copy of all the footage so that if god forbid something happened where our gear was stolen we still had all the footage. Luckily we haven’t had anything happen but it’s way better to be safe than sorry!
What are some of the biggest challenges you face as a travel filmmaker, from a logistical, creative, and even personal standpoint?
To be completely honest some of the biggest challenges I face are balancing my work and the rest of my life. I’m a very passionate person and get really sucked into things like projects and travel. So I constantly have to work on slowing down, not packing my schedule as full as it possibly could be and not working 100% of the time haha!
If you could go back in time and give your younger self advice when you were first starting out your career, what would you say?
In my head this conversation is taking place in the lobby of one of those $3 / night hostels I used to stay at as I backpacked around Southeast Asia. Younger me would be about 15 lbs heavier (on a paid thai only diet) and sweating because he didn’t want to pay an extra $5 to get a room with AC. But I’d just tell myself to really soak in the present moment. Especially back then I was a man on a mission. I was desperate to turn my passion for cameras and travel into a fulltime job, and looking back I think I took for granted the freedom that I had. I didn’t have anywhere I needed to be, no upcoming shoots, no obligations to anyone. I am super fortunate to be able to have the career that I do, but like any job my life is busy. I have a house now, an amazing girlfriend and tons of work coming in. But sometimes I miss those days where my future felt uncertain and I had no obligations to anyone but myself. Those early transformative years are so fun and exciting. Then I’d finish off by telling myself to hit the gym more and eat less pai thai haha!
What project are you most excited about right now?
Ever since I got into filmmaking my main goal was to always create long form travel content. As life got busier and busier I stopped making as many passion project films. But a few years back 2 friends and I decided to buy motorcycles and ride to the southern tip of South America. My friend Jonah and I decided it was the perfect time to create the travel series we’d always dreamed of making, and that was the genesis of Southbound. So far we’ve released 2 episodes and we’ve been blown away at the response. They’ve racked up over half a million views, won awards at various film festivals and have been the most rewarding thing we’ve ever worked on.
Danny McGee's journey reminds us that passion, persistence, and reliable tech are the ultimate tools for any creator. As he continues to push boundaries with his captivating "Southbound" motorcycle travel series – with Episode 2 touring festivals and Episode 3 now in the works after filming in early 2024 – we can't wait to see what epic adventures he'll share next, both on YouTube and beyond. Keep an eye out for more breathtaking content from this incredible adventure filmmaker!
You can follow Danny's adventures on Instagram and YouTube
