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SEVENTEEN-YEAR-OLD Humza Deas is a certified daredevil.

The teen, recently profiled in New York Magazine by Adrian Chen, is what Chen calls an “outlaw Instagrammer”, a kid who explores the forbidden, dangerous heights of Manhattan without abandon, snapping photos along the way.

Deas, with nearly 30,000 followers on Instagram, climbs bridges, scales buildings, and slides in and out of off-limit locations, all with a camera in hand.

Chen writes of Deas and the “outlaw Instagrammer” community in NYC:

The best outlaw instagrammers have a specialty that sets them apart, and Deas’s is climbing bridges. In one photo he balances at night on a suspension cable at the top of the Manhattan Bridge as cars streak below him. In another, a friend sits on the sloping steel beam of what appears to be the Queensboro Bridge, his face lit by the glow of a smartphone he’s staring into.

Up until last month, Deas and his friends were an underground entity. Then, a white flag mysteriously appeared on top of the Brooklyn Bridge, replacing the American flag. Immediately, Chen writes, Deas was fielding questions right and left from his Instagram fans. Deas says it wasn’t him, but in an attempt to clear his name, he just ended up putting himself on the radar of the NYPD.

You can read Chen’s profile on Deas in New York Magazine here. Meanwhile, take a look at some of his awesome photos, all posted to Instagram.

Deas is part of a community of photographers that scale buildings and bridges in NYC, looking for the perfect photo.

For them, photography is more performance — or competition — than visual art, Chen wrote of Deas and this community for New York Magazine.

Capturing Times Square

Most all of the places Deas shoots from are legally off-limits.

He's hit most of the bridges in New York. Here's a shot looking downtown from a building around 25th Street and 5th Avenue.

-Caroline Moss

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