That's It, That's All

Recently I watched the most highly anticipated snowboard film ever. The film is a Brain Farm Production titled, "That's It, That's All." The movie is sponsored by Quicksilver and Red Bull, and features the riding of Travis Rice, Mark Landvik, Nicolas Muller, Terje Haakonsen, Jeremy Jones, Scotty Lago, John Jackson, Danny Kass and Pat Moore. The movie was filmed over two seasons, which is longer than standard one winter snowboard film. They filmed this movie year round for two years by traveling the globe for the most incredible conditions and scenery. In filming this movie they traveled to New Zealand, Germany, Japan, Canada, and all over the United States. In this movie they did not slide one rail or session any street spots. They filmed in some parks, but mostly just helicopter accessed terrain. At all times in this movie they were flying around and filming with two helicopters. They even went as far doing follow cams of one helicopter with another helicopter. This movie was filmed entirely in HD and will also be release on Blu-Ray. After seeing the movie, one would say it appeared that the camera crew from Discovery-HD's Planet Earth went out and filmed this movie. They have unreal shots of nature and landscape. One thing that is extremely impressive is that the about 90% of all the snowboard shots are of just Travis Rice. He legitimately does every aerial maneuver you could possibly do on a snowboard, and then some. He lands a triple corked spin and rodeo-taps a 50 foot tall tree. I would recommend this movie to everyone. All aspects of the movie are incredible. It is the best snowboard film ever, and I don't think anything will ever compare. In rating this movie, I would give it 5 snowboards out of 5, and then some. 

Familia

Today I watched the Technine team video titled, "Familia." Familia is filmed and edited by Cole Taylor and Jeremy Miller for Finger On Da Trigger(FODT) Productions. Technine, the brand, manufactures snowboards, snowboard bindings and outerwear. The Technine brand takes an urban/hip-hop approach to snowboarding. The outerwear and snowboard designs reflect an urban/hip-hop style. The video features riding by: Jonah Owen, Lucas Magoon, Kyle Cartwright, Dylan Thompson, Dave Munoa, Tommi Ylianttila, Chris Bradshaw, Eric Messier, Jake Devine and Derek Dennison. The filming in this movie is incredible. Everything is filmed in HD with multiple angles and lenses. This movie features a great deal of "rolling dolly shots." Rolling dolly shots are shots captured by a camera resting on a tripod that is fitted on a track to move smoothly to the left or right. This extra motion adds a great deal of flavor to what would normally be a generic shot. In years past, these FODT videos have featured primarily hip-hop and some reggae beats. This year the movie features a variety of music: some classic rock(ELO), some radio-rap(The Game), some hip-hop(Snoop) and even some Barry White. In comparison to years past, I didn't think this movie flowed all that well, and the transitions from part to part were very basic for such a high-budget movie. Also, some parts were extremely short consisting of only a few shots. Another thing I didn't like was the fact that all but a handful of shots had no audio at all. In snowboard videos the audio is often essential. In conclusion, I would say the FODT crew definitely stepped up their filming and editing game, but they need to get back to true hip-hop beats and hammers like years past. I would rate this movie 3.5 snowboards out of 5.

I Ride Park City

Another high profile snowboard video that I recently saw was Park City Mountain Resort's team video titled, "I Ride Park City." This is the sequel to a video released two seasons ago by Park City titled, "City Park City." All of the riding done in this movie is at the Park City resort. There are both inbound park shots and out-of-bound back country shots. This video also features the world's longest terrain park cable cam ever. For the filming of this video they ran a cable cam from the top to the bottom of their park. The cam stretches over a massive 4 jump line, and a variety of 3 rails. This allows the camera crew to get super steady, uncut shots of an entire run through the park. The music in the video consisted of 90's pop, euro-techno, and some rock. The movie features the Park City all-stars: Shawn White, Marc Frank Montoya, Torstein Horgmo, Scotty Arnold, Aaron Bittner, Stevie Bell, Drew Fuller, Erin Comstock, Torah Bright and a few others. I would argue that Torstein Horgmo's part in this video will be the best part of the entire year. I would rate this movie 5 snowboards out of 5 because I don't think it gets any better.

The Eastern Boarder Movie

Anyone who follows snowboarding knows that every major movie filmed from the previous year is released in the fall. Recently released was the Eastern Boarder snowboard team's first video. It was titled, "The Eastern Boarder Movie." Eastern Boarder is a snowboard, skateboard, and bike shop with 5 locations in the Northeast with the original being in Massachusetts. To anyone who doesn't know, Eastern Boarder typically sponsors the majority of the pro snowboarders that come from the East Coast. Anyway, the video features the riding of Chris Carr, Teddy Lavoie, Shane Fortier, Tanner Pendleton, Colleen Quigley, Brandon Reis, Sam Hulbert, Big Mike Gonsalves, and more. A few of the team members are recent alumni of our very own Plymouth State University. The alumni are Chris Carr, Ted Lavoie and Big Mike, all of which have their degrees and are now pursuing a career as professional snowboarders. The movie is filmed all over the U.S. by team member Tanner Pendleton and Matt Roberge. The sponsors of the movie are Forum Snowboards, K2 Snowboarding, Oakley, Red Bull, Ride Snowboards, Waterville Valley and Snowboarder Magazine. In my opinion, I think this movie is one of the best to come out this year and I would rate the movie 4.5 snowboards out of 5.

Halloween

This past Friday a group of us traveled to Bethel, ME to get some early season shredding in at Sunday River. Their orignial opening was supposed to be November 7th, but with it being cold enough to blow snow they were able to open one trail for the die-hard skiier and rider. With it being Halloween and all they were giving free lift tickets to anyone dressed in a costume. Everything from a Mexican bandito to giant bottle of Guinness could be seen carving down the hill. They had one lift and one trail with 3 terrain park features. The 3 features consisted of a 20' down box, a C-rail, and a rainbow rail, all of which were slayed. It was sunny and nearly 60 degrees, one couldn't ask for a better opening day. Footage of opening day can be seen on reelcomp.com.