Here’s the Fine Nine winner, the Atomitron by John Saltsman, driven out from CA for the show. I love to see kustoms driven especially when competing for such a prestigious award.
Also driven out from CA was Keith Dean’s 40 Mercury
Another of Shawn Mundy’s Fine Nine qualified 35 Ford Pickup.
So a couple of years ago I hear of a new indoor show in the Wichita area. Coming just a month after the Starbird show, I wondered how it would work. Then I hear that it’s also a major bike show. How is this going to work?
Pretty damn well.
So it works, I’ll be. When I walked in the door of the Kansas Pavillions in Park City, KS I was greeted with some motorcycle vendors, I’m not typically much of a bike guy but I can appreciate a well built bike just like a well built car. As I walked around the first room of The Chill I saw every manner of bike on the planet. It was impressive. In building 2 that first year were some vendors, some cars and a stage area. Building 3 was chock full of cars, it was a pretty good turnout.
2011 Chill
So a year later I’m headed back to the show. I know now that it works, and I hear some changes are in store. Sure enough, the car area was expanded, the bike area was rearranged to allow the stage for some live music. The same high quality selection of bikes, hot rods, kustoms, trucks, drag cars, tuners, street machines, etc.
2012 Chill
So in a nut shell, I’m heading back. It’s been a good quality show, of course lots of my friends will be there, many who did not participate in the Starbird-Devlin show of a few weeks back. If you can make it next weekend I highly recommend coming to see The Chill (click here for more info on the show). The show will feature a Hooters Swimsuit competition, and a live performance by Warrant (the hair band fan in me just smiled). Should be a good time for everyone!
———————————————————————————————————————— One of the koolest build threads on the HAMB has been my friend Roger Jetter’s Caddy build (click here to see the thread)! I’ve been lucky enough to see the car a few times, here are some of the finished car.
————————————————————————————————————————
Another buddy Nick has been building a sick roadster (click here to see the thread), he got it all together last year and proceeded to enjoy the hell out of it driving all over the place. Now he’s blown it back apart so that he could finish it out. Just like everything he does, it’s turning out amazing.Â
Look, it’s possible, anyone can get a great ride eventually, it takes a little (or a lot) of money, time, effort and you’ll cuss alot while doing it. Go out and get yourself on the road, that’s where you find the good stuff of life. Speaking of that I’m going to get back to work on my Galaxie and try to get it back on the road.
Saturday I head out for the Starbird Exotic Car Show in Tulsa.
At the 2011 KKOA Leadsled Spectacular I was approached by my friend Mickey of Stray Kat Kustoms car shows with some good news. Our mutual friend and fellow Stray Kat, Krobe had been asked to do a feature of his beautiful 30 Model A Ford for Car Kulture Deluxe. Mickey and Krobe had been kind enough to mention to Alan Mayes of CKD that they knew a photographer at the show that could handle photographing the car, lucky for me that was me!
This coming weekend Feb.9-10th at Bartle Hall in downtown Kansas City is the World of Wheels show! Click here for info on the show, ticketing, etc.
I’ve been attending this show for years, there are usually a great number of cars, and a bunch that I actually like. The Drag display is always kool.
Last year these great kustoms were on display.
There were some great feature cars as well.
The South end of the building is usually populated by my friends the Los Punk Rods and a bunch of their friends. Great rides, great folks.
Hope to see you there! If you’re there and you see a goatee’d big man with a red rb hat, you better say hi! Especially if you want some photos of your ride this spring!
The 2013 Calendar for Charity has been a big success!
This is the first year that the calendars were professionally printed, a big investment up front but luckily the paper was donated this year so that printing was only major expense in getting the calendars off the ground. As last year these calendars are printed in the ginormous 11×17 size and each and every month features 2 kool car photos! Order at royboyproductions.com!
This year 6 copies were available (click on the thumbnails to see the entire calendar): The Trucks, Hot Rods, and Kustom editions all were sold to benefit the Wounded Warrior Project.
The 3 Show specific editions went to individual causes. The Stray Kat Kustoms Edition benefitted the Red Cross, as Mr. Stray Kat Kustoms himself (Mickey) said, they were here to help when we had a tornado, and they’re still there help folks like Joplin last year. For info on the Stray Kat Kustoms shows go to straykatkustoms.com Order at royboyproductions.com!
The Greaserama Edition went to benefit the Punk Rod Todd Memorial Fund. The world suffered a loss last year when Todd passed, his vision and drive helped focus the Greaserama into the kool kulture event that it is today and he was one of the good guys. Thanks again for being a great guy Todd, we all miss ya, even those of us that barely knew ya. For info on the Greaserama go to greaserama.com Order at royboyproductions.com!
The Hannahs Heart Edition went to benefit the Helping Hannah’s Heart Foundation. Please take a minute and go check out this great cause. Hannah’s daddy John is a good friend and I’m glad to be able to do a very small part of helping out. Support Vintage Torque DVD’s, Torque Fest and Iron Invasion! Order at royboyproductions.com!
Total money raised this year for all 6 calendars has been over $1,100.00 so far! With less than a week left there are still 27 copies left. The Hannah’s Heart and the Stray Kat Kustoms editions are sold out but there are handfull left of the Greaserama, Kustoms, and Trucks Editions. As of the time of this writing there are only 2 copies of the Hot Rod Edition left!
To order go to royboyproductions.com These will pulled from sales on February 1, so if you want one, order today!!!
Just a quick sneak peek of some of the photos coming Sunday evening!
Rob Parker’s way wild Chevrolet roadster pickup, rear mounted turbo feeds the 261 inline six engine.
Love this simple hot rod that has everything a fella needs except a Betty by his side. Bill Hines chop on this 1947 Ford, the chop done at the KKOA Leadsled Spectacular.
In Part 1 I went through some back history of the show from my cameras up to 2010.
So now on to 2011
Something I wrote at the time: “In the dead of winter each January it’s a pleasure every year to get together with my hotrod and kustom family and spend some time inside WITH a bunch of cool cars. The Darryl Starbird Rod & Custom show in Wichita, KS typically pulls about 400 cars max for a 3 day indoor show. As the name implies rods and customs show in abundance, but so do stock restorations, survivors, 4×4’s, lowriders, rat rods, and various types of racers.
A couple of very cool front engine dragsters were on display this year, as were some very nice traditional built hot rods. Traditional built rods are not rats, and this show had both build styles represented nicely. The car count and the vendor count both seemed down this year, but that was a blessing instead of a hinderance. Less cars means more room to get around the cars, and it seemed that the cars that didn’t show were the ones that I normally don’t shoot anyhow, so the show’s overall quality went up as a result.
The Marauders and Fundamentals had great club displays with the Marauders taking home the prize for best display for their “model” car display complete with giant exacto knives and Testor paint bottles to complete the look. The Fundamentals went with a beach theme and rumor has it some Marauders may have been involved with an incident involving Baby Ruth candy bars being dropped in the Fundamentals “sand” (kitty litter). I’m not going to say where the story came from or how hard the person who told it to me was laughing when he told how they did it.”
Last year I produced a Best of 2011 PhotoBook of all of my favorite images of 2011. Starting with about 14,000 images they were narrowed down to about 1,000 and then about 800 made their way into the final book. There were 21 feature chapters in all, each with a few hundred words describing the chapter and lots of photos of each event featured.
It is available as a hardcover, softcover and ebook if you’re interested in checking it out.
So the plan all along on this end was to do another for this year, however this time would be different, 100 or so photos on as many pages, each one with a sentence or two about it. More of a coffee table book.
So what say ye? Would that book be something you’d be interested in? Unfortunately these are a bit pricey compared to your normal Barnes & Noble type book, but they are made on demand specifically for you as you order. For a HardCover with a Dust Jacket, they’ll run about $51 plus shipping, $41 for softcover and $9.99 for ebook version. Leave a comment here to let me know what you think.
I’ve had my 1963 Ford Galaxie 500 since 2004. When she first entered my life she looked like a 70’s cruiser. Stock body, dark tinted windows (80’s probably), Cragar S/S wheels and some fairly large raised white letter tires.
It is my goal to continue to share the great people and cars of the Midwest with all of you around the world for years to come, so far for the last few years this has been a very expensive hobby. Thank you to those that buy hats, shirts, photos etc because you help to pay the bills for websites, cameras, gas, hotels, food, etc. to keep the machine rolling.
I do hope to someday make this a full time occupation since it is a passion that occupies so much of my mind so much of the time. I do not want to charge people to see the photos, but I am looking at ways to add sponsorship to the site to help pay the bills. The goal is to have royboyproductions.com a self sustaining entity by the end of 2013.
The future of the site as I see it today means more articles on show coverage, more feature videos, a series of videos on the construction of a kustom from barn find to boulevard beautiful. Stay tuned, buy some photos, a shirt, a hat or just tell your friends where to find a source for kool. royboyproductions.com
See you at a show, Travis
Here’s a shot of my good friend Jeff Myers’ shop Premier Body & Paint in Arkansas City, KS. Jeff has just completed a kustom paint job on my 63 Ford Galaxie (you can see his Galaxie in the photo).
The schedule for 2013 is already filling up! This post will be a breakdown of some of the shows of the first few months, have a look at the info I provide, check out the photos from years past and pick a couple out to attend!
January
Jan. 18-20th Wichita, KS Starbird-Devlin Charity Car Show “The Wichita Tradition” See the 2012 photos here Â
So as I sit here typing we’re a couple of hours away from the 3rd Annual Mid Decembrrrr Run. Folks from hundreds of miles away are now on their way to Salina, KS to meet up and go on a long drive in our classic cars. It’s been a really good time so far, hopefully this year is too!
This will be it as far as 2012 goes for me and my cameras. It’s been a fantastic year, went new places, met new people and had a great time throughout it all. For 2012 there are 33 galleries with 7,987 photos so far, whew, my shutter finger is tired! To see them all go here:Â http://royboyproductions.smugmug.com/Cars/2012
Some of my favorites are
Fuel Altered “Black Mariah” doing a smoky burnout at the 2012 KKOA Leadsled Spectacular, see more from that weekend here.
About a year ago I joined Instagram, it’s been a fun way to give new life to some old photos and spread the word about what it is that I do here. http://instagram.com/royboyprods is where you can find those photos if you are not already on Instagram.
Have a great weekend, I’m off with a bunch of my rod/kustom friends for a road trip. Merry Christmas and I’ll see you at a show,
Like the KKOA Leadsled Spectacular held in Salina, KS the Hotrodding Hullabaloo features Friday Run What Ya Brung Drags. Being that the show has a smaller attendance the drags were a bit let crowded.
They do wear some weird head gear in Texas racing…
Now on to the show Saturday held at a downtown area park.
I think that this show could grow back to a really great celebration of Kustoms in the years to come. I really like the town, the people, the venue, I think we should all strive to get to this one next year and just over run the park with kool kustoms.
The show was a lot of fun, a small show but a great collection of kool kustoms and hot rods. The town was fantastic and I hope to be back for years to come.
Night shots back at the hotel
That’s it, there are more pics but that’s it for the posts here, to see the entire gallery click any of the photos in this blog post.
The first stop for my Saturday Sept. 22nd was at the Last Run in Arkansas City, KS. I’ve heard about this show for over a decade, it was time to finally check it out. Enjoy the slideshow and click any photo to go to the full gallery.
For the last few years each Labor Day weekend have been a double header in Kansas City. The Goodguys Midwest Nationals take over the Kansas Speedway and the Los Punk Rods Greaserama invades the Boulevard Drive In for a weekend of good times, cool cars & great people.
Here’s the coverage from 2011’s Greaserama,
And here’s the coverage of the 2011 Goodguys Midwestern Nationals,
Look for new galleries on Monday from the 2012 shows!
A few months ago it became apparent that a new feature needed to be added to Royboy Productions. Photos do a good job of conveying the car show experience but something else was needed. Starting at the end of 2011 video was captured of a few really cool cars, interviews shot with the owner or builder explaining the cars in their own words, in their own voice. This is episode number 1. I hope you enjoy it!
 
 
 
 
 
