Richie Valdez Sucks

12/21/2011

2011-12-21T22:08:00.000-08:00

I've been slacking on the blogging...it happens. Sometimes I feel compelled to write...sometimes I feel compelled to watch Beavis and Butthead at night. Other times I just don't feel like editing photos to post along with the written word. This time around I have the time, some photos, and some words far from sounding like they contain even the smallest trace of wisdom.

I have noticed a trend recently that I don't really like and it has to do mostly with girls. When did it become "cool" to be nerdy? Don't get me wrong, I have no problems with nerds. I have a lot of friends that I consider nerds...again that EYE consider nerds not that consider themselves nerds. The problem I have is hearing girls now a days referring to themselves as nerds. The way I look at it, if you have to refer to yourself as a nerd you're trying a little too hard. I doubt that a real nerd would have to tell you this because it's probably an unspoken kinda thing...you just kinda know. You dig?

I don't really know where I am going with this but I see some girls who one: don't look like nerds, act like nerds, do really nerdy stuff, but for some reason they still GIVE themselves that title. Shut the fuck up. How's that for a title? If you see me with a skateboard yeah I doubt I have to tell you I'm a skateboard. If I see someone shredding guitar...okay you're obviously a musician. If I see some hipster girl or guy claiming s/he is a nerd...okay you're obviously a fucking idiot. I think real nerdy girls are hot (always have)...and usually intellectually interesting. These new age nerdy types I've found myself running into in LA are neither intellectual or do they seem like they drown themselves in things like fantasy novels, anime, and video games. That's about all the ranting I feel I need to do at the moment.

I have some photos that I'm pretty stoked on right now. I am by no way saying that they are great photos or anything. Just saying that for the kind of crappy photos I happen to take well...I am happy with the way these came out. Shall we?

Earlier this year I met a girl up in Santa Cruz. We hung out a few times. Had some laughs. Had some good times. Then she got a boyfriend. Whatever. Girls come and go. I had some late night fun with her while I had the chance I suppose. This one time I brought my camera and hung back while I let her walk ahead of me. The setting/lighting/mood in this alley reminded me of a scene from the original Nightmare On Elm Street.

This one is probably self explanatory.

Eduardo Craig and Adam Bertolet talking and shit in Downtown LA. Love these guys.

This was the view that Micah Hollinger and myself had from one of the windows of our Washington DC hotel room during Maloof. Kyle Walker would be hanging with us most of the time at night up there with us and the 3 of us would be heckling every person walking by or at the bar down below us. GOOD TIMES! Except when we'd walk down to the bar and everyone would see that Micah and I were the ones yelling at them :o

Took this while flying to Washington DC. Location unknown. Oh how ugly we make this world look. A grid of ever spreading cancerous death that we call humanity.

I have some family out by Visalia in a town called Woodlake, CA. The last time that I was heading back to LA from Watsonville I stopped by Woodlake to visit some of my family out there and hang for a bit. Take a different route from the usually 101 trip (which I love). I found this ditch/aqueduct thing on a rural road while heading back to the freeway. I had to cross a hectic bridge and dodge cars to take this photo. It was worth it.

The drive continued on. I am not sure where exactly I was for this. I believe it was somewhere along the 99 freeway just south of Bakersfield I want to say. I pulled over onto the shoulder and posted up and shot a few long exposures and I think this one came out the best. The moon looked so ridiculous this night!!! It was huge and glowing bright. This photo really doesn't do it justice. I couldn't stop looking at it while driving. Love solo drives when the moon comes out of hiding like this. Enjoy the little things in life.

This is the photo I am stoked on the most as of late. I shot this one about 45 minutes to an hour before the moon one above somewhere along the 99 again. I pulled over to the shoulder for this one as well and shot tons of different looking photos here. Walked up and down the freeway shoulder for a few minutes but finally got to a point where the sun was behind the building out there and finally got what I needed. It was obvious that there was something cool there to capture. Without a doubt! After walking around and pondering it the apocalyptic image I saw in my head but couldn't translate to the proper angle, composition, exposure, and shutter release was finally found. The beauty of our natural world diminishing is saddening in a way. Trees > Metal pillars.

That is all for now my fellow folks, skate rats, acquaintances, and NERDS. I hope you all have a good Christmas and get to spend it with family (and or loved ones). As much as I love to be a misanthropic, nihilist at times...I do cherish holidays and time with the family. Take care of one another and let us hope that 2012 brings less corporate greed, less government corruption, and a less violent world to live in. I only say this now because I'm covering my ass incase I don't blog until then :P

Theresa's new movie: Pete Smalls Is Dead

2011-11-12T12:26:00.001-08:00

Last night I had the pleasure of attending a screening of a new movie that Theresa starred in called "Pete Smalls Is Dead." I didn't really know anything about the movie going into it. Didn't know what kind of movie it was, what kind of role Theresa was playing, or just anything about it...period.

I have a rather weird, twisted, deranged sense of humor and I found myself laughing during most of the movie. I will refrain from divulging any real details and leave it up to you to watch the movie. There are some amazing people in the movie including: Mark Boone Junior, Tim Roth, Rosie Perez, Michael Lerner, Seymour Cassel, and the one and only Steve Buscemi. The movie is complex, well written, and shot well. Good stuff through and through. Find it. Watch it.

Here is a photo of Theresa and myself at the party thrown down the street after the movie :)

Black And White

2011-10-28T16:29:00.000-07:00

I know I haven't posted in a while...things had gotten crazy there for a few months. Real crazy. But now life is starting to kind of fall back into place. Slowly but surely.

Been super busy as of late. I no longer live in Culver City! I have since moved to Westwood and am settling into my new place at a snails pace. I am about to head to 6 Flags with Dylan Witkin and Andrew Langi so I have minimal time to write about all that has happened since my last post...which is going to take a long time for my fingers to transfer the data to this screen you're reading.

I was up super late going through photos I have shot over the last few months and ended up editing a ton of them. I ended up with a handful of black and white photos so I figued why not post all those desaturated photos together. So here you go!

I caught my brother walking out of my parent's house...

not the best framing. I know! But I wanted to blog him so whatevs.

Buster O'Shea.

Dominick Walker looking haggard after putting in work.

Elliott Murphy hanging out in Chino Hills, CA.

John Motta does it.

Kyle Walker about to grind at Rincon.

Marquis Henry has got "the right pop."

Micah Hollinger on his computer in Washington, DC.

Ryan Reyes and Nico Magalhaes.

Ryan Reyes.

Micah Hollinger reads the plane away.

That is all for now. The homies are here. Drinking has commenced. We are about to get on the road. Peace ya'llz

BLACK LIGHT

2011-08-22T11:40:00.000-07:00

I thought this day would never come...but it alas it has! This is the top secret project that Clint and I had been working on for a while. That random Arizona trip I took with him resulted in us shooting this. We kept it hush hush. The great Micah Hollinger and myself shot this in one night. I edited it in the confines of my room with no one knowing what I was cutting besides Allen and Clint. A few people got to see little glimpses of things here and there, but it was pretty much kept completely in the dark. It took a long time to finish this because it was mentally taking it out of me working on it. It took so long to make such little progress...but it was all worth it. BEHOLD:

WATCH IN HD ONLY!

There will also be a behind the scenes type video that will accompany this at some point. We all did interviews after we had finished shooting and talked about the experience. I need to take a break from the editing table for a while because I had been working on this non stop for the last 3 days. I've gotten very little sleep and now I'm moving on to finishing shooting my next "secret" project, haha. This one however is not skateboarding related at all...:0

Best Coast

2011-08-05T23:02:00.000-07:00

Best Coast is one of those bands that I feel is easily accessible for most of the general public. They're one of those bands that you can usually assume most any girl likes. You gotta find a way to "connect" on some level with girls when you first meet them right? Why not ask if they like Best Coast? ;) But on the real, I do like this band a whole lot. They remind me of a Americanized version of Camera Obscura with less of a cynical, misanthropic view of the world. Camera Obscura...although sounding sweet and mellow tends to have some really dark, and edgy lyrics despite the tone/mood of the band. Okay, okay, they're not very similar at all really...the singers just kinda, sorta sound the same is all. Whatever!

Back to the subject at hand. I love this video. A Lot. Apparently Drew Barrymore directed it? I guess that's kind of cool right? I'm indifferent about that little fact. I wonder how much of this she actually conceptualized herself...or if she had minions do all her dirty work and then just slapped her name on it. I'm not saying that's the case at all, just assuming things for the sake of assuming. Who cares. This came out great. Kudo's to her and to this band for writing such a great song. Watch it!

MTV Supervideo - Music - Best Coast

The crazy thing about this is that for a while now I have been wanting to edit something to this. Pretty much since I heard the song I knew I wanted to use it for something. I'm on the verge of wanting to start a new video project and I was thinking about putting together some kind of "thang," for lack of a better word, with this song being part of this so called "thang." I think I still want to! I can see it in my head already and know what I want to make. Just something to remind people that me and the homies are still doing what we do...if that makes any sense. I got all this HD footage laying around and I wanna put some of that stuff to use. Nothing too crazy...just tricks that may not make the cut in a bigger project. I don't want to get too deep on the subject because talk is cheap...

I have a slight headache and I feel like I am having major problems just forming complete thoughts/sentences. Just watch the Best Coast video. That's all I can say. Just watch it <3

Warpaint Stuffz

2011-07-25T22:29:00.000-07:00

A while back my boy Theodore Robert Newsome directed a video for Warpaint's song "Warpaint," and he asked me to come out and shoot the behind the scenes clip that would accompany the video. Of course I was down.

Five days before Ted's shoot I had ended up going out to Arizona with Clint (on a drunken whim at midnight) and we planned to come back the night before...we almost ended up running out of gas in the middle of nowhere coming back from Phoenix the night before said shoot! Needless to say, Clint's Hemi got us to a gas station (barely), we fueled up, and made it back to LA! I got home and went right to bed. Woke up less than 4 hours later and had to drive to Echo Park to go shoot this behind the scenes stuff...I was in a daze to say the least. Five days of non stop hanging, staying up all night, and shooting out in Arizona, followed by the long drive back did not quite put me in the proper mind state, or mood to go shoot this stuff on little to no sleep (sorry). I was hating life and the zombie state that I felt was going to last all day/make my brain devoid of basic functions. As soon as things got rolling at the pool though...it was on.

I think it's safe to say everyone had a lot of fun the day of the shoot. It was a long, and hard day (haha long and hard) but it was all well worth it! Click and watch:

That was, what now seems like, a long time ago. Because of this though it allows Theresa and I to even dive back into the "Shadows" video and maybe make it that much cooler. Soon enough that one will be done, I swear. I have so many projects that are close to being done at this point and planning on shooting a comedy skit with 2 of my friends this week. When will the madness end? Hopefully never because madness is too fun.

Last weekend I did some other random Warpaint related stuff as well. When will I ever pull away from these kooks? Time will tell, I guess. Theresa and Stella got asked to be a part of some art instillation in Europe. We basically rearranged Stella's whole livingroom and I set up a green screen area all up in there. We got a little weird to say the least. I will not divulge any details other than these photos.

Things were about to get interesting...

I tried telling Theresa not to exfoliate during shooting but would she listen? No.

Stella looking she could be on the cover of a kvlt black metal album.

Peep dat footy.

Stella spinning the digital turn tables.

Powder.

Who knows if people in The States will ever even see what we did that night. To be perfectly honest...don't really care either. It was fun doing this though...that's all that I DO know. I'm too busy laughing at Derek and Brandon's dogs to write anymore regarding this subject.

Here's two more photos I shot that same weekend over at Theresa's place. Emily stopped by and got Tiger ready to take a dip in the kiddy pool and run around the backyard naked.

The grass is greener on the other side...of the backyard.

Let the naked anticz begin!

I've been lagging super hard on posting as of late...that mean's I'm busy having fun. Remember fun?

Insta.Posts

2011-07-14T00:21:00.000-07:00

I found a way to download all the photos from your instagram profile to your computer today. Exciting...right? If you'd like to do the same I urge you to go to here to do so. Now you can share instagram photos easily with non-iPhone users :0

I was glad to see this thing go. It's been a month since it got cut off and I'm still not back to normal yet...

This was my first instagram photo taken. I see this cat more than I see most people in this world.

I got flown out to Maloof along with a few other heavy hitters this year to camera operate the webcast. A day before the contest I got to watch Evan Smith skating the course for fun. I knew he was going to kill it from the looks of it at the moment. This photo was a make. Kickflip in...with ease!

Don't worry Gonzo...weed isn't a drug? No need for the thumbs down?

The only name in my phone that's in ALLxCAPS. Since day one (no pun intended).

My little nephew stole the west.

I wish I could bring you down south with me every time I go home.

Ryan Reyes doing the first of many of this pose in different places.

Cerebral Ballzy music video shoot.

Theresa foaming at the cup.

It's good to know that when the DSLR is too clunky to bring along my phone can still put it down. Us iPhone owners have quite a powerful little tool in our pockets. Put it to use!

7/12/11

2011-07-12T22:16:00.000-07:00

I want to edit right now. I want to blog right now. I want to edit photos right now.

I don't feel like spending much time doing either of them right now (if that makes sense) so I don't know what I'm going to do. I guess this is what I ended up doing since I am laying on the couch typing this right now. I have a headache and ultimately that is what I blame for creating this sense of "I want to do things but I don't want to" feeling. There are a bunch of photos that have just been laying around on my hard drive for a while that have yet to be posted. This is the time where I dump them all out and then I hope edit a new batch of stuff. Time to unload...haha I said...

2/3's of MEECHabartALET.

Mike Abarta and his little buddy.

Adam Bertolet and Jesse "The Canadian Stefan Janoski" Landen relaxing after shredding.

Westside Ryderz.

So glad to have that thing off.

Adam broke 2 boards in 5 tries.

Daniel Knapp brewing it up.

San Francisco photographers, Ken Tadashi and Brad Burt, posted.

Watsonville Skate Park OG's reunite!

Laban and Vito.

Laban lurking in the outskirts of Joshua Tree.

ChriSlambert reflecting on ones self.

Tosh.0 is on and my attention is fading from the laptop to the TV screen. BAI!

New Maneuver?

2011-07-11T21:50:00.000-07:00

People say that you can't teach an old dog new tricks...well I say fuck you and fuck that old dog. I learned a new trick after not trying to do tricks for weeks because of my wrist. Elliot, thanks for making me try one more after I had already given up!

I lucked out.

Warpaint "Warpaint" Music video

2011-07-08T01:33:00.000-07:00

The illustrious Theodore Robert Newsome's music video for Warpaint's song "Warpaint" dropped today. In the US, NPR is hosting the video at the moment, however in the UK Youtube's VEVO is handling viewing duties...haha I said duty. Check the moving imagery here:

"Warpaint" Music Video

Everyone involved did a band up job and all contributed to making this project what it is. A lot of the people on the crew were my friends and it was so great to see the people I went to school with, and "came up with" working with the people that I "work" with. Kudoz for all! Especially Ted, Brad, Brant, the girls, and anyone else who had to withstand the weight of liquid form H20 for hours upon hours on end.

The "behind the scenes" video that I made to accompany Ted's masterpiece should be out rather soon. I will post it when Theodore posts it!

In other news...the wrist is still fucked up. Pretty bummed at this point because I'm done with physical therapy in 2 weeks and I already know that I will not be recooped by then. My range of motion has just about returned, however I canNOT put any weight on my wrist still. The break went from...well a BREAK to a fracture after having spent months in the cast. I probably should have taken it easy while I was in the cast but I skated just about everyday and maybe did this to myself. The pains of having to do nothing could drive an active skateboarder into insanity. Sudden spurts of random factoids:

- Kyle Walker's been raping and pillaging the streets with his trusty 8.4 sized skateboards.
- Dan Roberts got his knee surgery...FINALLY!
- I missed the Panic at the Disco LA show :(
- Ryan Reyes is getting instagram UPS like a madman.
- CARmageddon is about to become a reality when the 405 gets shut down.
- Ladytron is playing at the Wiltern in September!

I can't wait to be skating again instead of just filming. And on that note...I'm going to dive back into doing some editing for my Warpaint video for "Shadows." Since Ted's barely came out that means that there's some time to let this one penetrate the world and give me time to double click a certain Final Cut project file and go back into crazy editing mode for "Shadows" now that I know there's a lil more time to maybe take it even further?

Stay weird.

Ryan Reyes on Creature!

2011-06-30T08:18:00.000-07:00

The cat is finally out of the bag! The one and only Ryan Reyes is an officially on Creature:

Congrats, my amigo. You deserved this. Be on the look out for Ryan in the new iPath video which will be dropping sometime near the end of the year.

D3

2011-05-17T16:15:00.000-07:00

Last week I had a mini get away from my home of West LA. I went down to Fullerton to stay with Clint and get some hang and skate time. The trip was 4 days of shit talking. Just the way I like it. That's basically all you get when you hang out with this damn character. Kyle Walker, and Trevor Vaughan (the peeps Clint lives with) aren't in California right now so having a bed to use in the Treehouse (the name given to Kyle and Trevor's room) was the bomb! Kyle and Trevor have a bunk bed, and for some reason I think that's so awesome. I've spent nights asleep on the floor of the Treehouse, but this time around I took the bottom bunk since no one was there. The first morning when I woke up, staring at the ceiling of the bottom bunk I was greeted with this:

Unfortunately, if you wake up to this you did not have a comfortable bed to sleep in.

I'm just kidding, Trevor. I slept alright...I think! Clint and I met up with none other than Gonzo, and Myles Wright. I love skating with Myles because he will always surprise you, and he likes to talk shit back as well. Love getting him fired up. Not only that, but the fellow loves to quote the movie Friday! Any person who can drop lines from Friday in any and every situation is a great person in my book.

Myles thinking about the next mixtape he's going to download to his phone.

There's always a kick back period of time that tends to go down once you finish skating a spot. If legit tricks were made there is a celebratory vibe that you can't deny floating around in the air. If you're at a high bust spot you get in and out. When you're at chill spots you can't help but hang out for a bit and take in what just went down. We sure as hell always do this. Sometimes we stay longer than we'd like because we're always trying to get to hit up another skate spot. But either way, it's good times.

Skateboard tailgate party is what I like to call this.

My car has seen many of these things I call "skateboard tailgate parties." Almost every day that we go skate we pretty much open the back and post up at spots. Not everyone decides to skate the spots you end up going to and when a person doesn't have a trick for the spot they either kick it on the sidelines or pop up the back and post up. Enjoy skateboarding and all that it has to offer...on and off the actual board itself.

Peer pressure's a mothafucka. (Friday quote...for those who don't know)

After skating and dinner one night I started to troll Netflix to try and figure out what to watch. If you have Netflix you know that it can actually end up taking you longer to FIND / DECIDE what to watch than it takes to actually watch your flick. This night I came across Titanic 2 and it was on. I know what you're thinking...how can there be a Titanic 2? I'm about to get Yoda on that ass and say: "Don't think. Do." Watch the movie and see for yourself. Maybe James Cameron didn't sign on for this gem (I know I'm just as shocked as you are), but you're still in for a treat because Celine Dion recorded a great song for the soundtrack of this one as well. Do yourself a favor...

Brian Hanson : DSLR face off

My last day at Clint's was a rather mellow one. We kicked it at the Ambiguous office and went out to lunch with those dudes. Osiris had sent a package their way and we got a chance to peep the goods...

D3's and G-Bag? All the fixin's you need to be the coolest kid in high school 10 years ago.

In other news. Just yesterday I got myself a white iPhone 4. I kind of miss my Blackberry...not going to lie. I think I'll miss BBMing with a few people more than anything. You know who you are Miss Theresa Wayman and Mr. Barrett Sweger. Well, I'm sure I'll miss having a keyboard at certain times as well! If you have a nifty iPhone and use Instagram then lets "follow" each other @richievaldez. I don't use Twitter so I feel weird using the term "follow" but I guess that's just the term you gotta use. Hello 21st century.

BARK-BARK-BARK

2011-05-11T02:43:00.000-07:00

I am way behind on photos and stuff...I haven't been shooting as many photos lately so I have to make up for lost time soon here because I am running low on back catalog photos. I may have to start digging in the archives for photos that I shot back when I had my Nikon DSLR :0

A while back Dylan Witkin, Eduardo Craig, Norman Woods, and myself went out to the IE and met up with Daniel Knapp. The day started with a sesh at the Chino park. It was actually my first time going there and I had tons of fun. We all did! After that Eduardo took us to a spot that he had been to a while back and we messed around with it. Dylan and Norman got clips there, wee!

Apparently Johnny Layton got a line here that contained this ollie.

Rick James, DWit, R Kelly.

I've been making Eduardo shoot double angles for me. He's came through hard! The guy has a good eye. I just tell him where to go and he'll almost always get a legit 2nd angle. If you come skating with me and you're not skating a spot I will put your ass to work ;)

We skated about in the area for the day and had fun. Skated some super random spots, and even found an unskated gap that everyone ended up getting a trick on. Don't you love it when that happens? The day ended at a crazy gap to manny to drop that Jason Vanzant told us to check out...it was insane and no one messed with it but we had fun putting our trucks on the edge of red curbs at high speeds while at the spot.

Norman flips his lucky coin as the sunsets out in the Inland Empire.

Clint is flying in tomorrow from Oklahoma tomorrow and I'm picking his ass up from the aereoport. Looking forward to hanging with this dumb ass, as always! We're going to be handling biz in the streets for the next few days. I can't wait. My wrist feels stupid. The cast is still on. I hope it's healing properly. Today was also a fun day. I will stop these short sentences now.

This never seizes to make me laugh. Enjoy!

Arizona in March.

2011-05-09T18:51:00.000-07:00

The last few days of March turned out to be an interesting few days. My roommate Allen, and I had spent the day of March 25th hanging out with my good friend Derek Rydquist who had just recently moved back to LA. We hung out, went to lunch, and then proceeded to get our day fade on. The day fade continued on into the night. Around midnight I had received a call from none other than Clint Walker. What I wasn't ready for was Clint to ask me to leave for Arizona with him THAT NIGHT! Derek was taking off for a tour with his band The Faceless the next morning so he was going to be spending the night. I had to ponder the idea for a bit and had I not been drunk for hours on end my decision may have been different...but I decided to go! I started parking the moment I got off the phone with Clint and was geared up for a spur of the moment road trip. And Derek got to sleep in my bed that night instead of on the couch in the living room...win/win.

Clint showed up at around 2AM, we made a quick stop by my favorite convenience store in the world, FAMIMA, for a few beverages, and then we were Arizona bound! We drove through the night straight to the Bangarang house in Phoenix. The home of Micah Hollinger and Lobster aka Jerry Smyth! By the time we had pulled into the garage it was already sunny outside. The height of the sun did little in terms of keeping us from catching that lucid rapid eye movement state that I love so much. It was the best sleep I had had in a while. Chevy said it best. "Like a rock."

Clint. Standard "wake up" procedure.

We woke up at who knows what time that same day and just kinda hung out and allowed our brains to catch up to the rest of the world. It took longer than usual. Eventually everyone at the Bang house gathered and we nerded out even longer...

All the sizes were accounted for here...uh huh huh huh.

Because this trip was over a month ago I don't really remember exactly what we did our first day there. I know that I had a great time every single day though. I think the first day we just hung out mellow style with Micah, Lobster, and Steven Schneider and skated a plaza that night. At some point we met up with Thrasher photographer Joe Hammeke and Clint's fellow Birdhouse teammate Shaun Gregoire.

Joe with this crazy iPhone contraption.

Clint and Shaun at the Cigna banks. Ryan Reyes shut this spot down.

Clint gripped a board for me and used the surroundings as tools.

Skate Birdhouse.

One thing about skateboarding that I love is the fact that you can get in a car, drive to another state and meet up with friends and just let whatever happens happen. The time we spent on our boards, as well as the time spent off them, were all enjoyable. Being in the company of friends is what really matters. Clint and I weren't really stressing over filming bangers, or trying to stack huge amounts of footy. We were there because we felt like escaping California for a bit and wanted to kick it with good folk! We kicked it, skated, watched movies, filmed, went to a contest, and I got to see one of my favorite people in the world...Ryan Reyes. I live for times like these.

This was just as fun as anything else!

You better believe he's got that duck footy.

At this point, I've realized that I'm trying extremely hard to not talk about what the trip turned into. The trip turned into a serious mission to accomplish something crazy. The mission was in fact accomplished...however I cannot divulge what it was that Micah, Clint, Steven and myself got ourselves into. Boys have to have their secrets, you know. In time you will all know, and see, what it is that I am talking about. I just had to get that off my chest because it was eating me up trying to find things to talk about the regarding the trip since the whole trip can almost NOT be talked about...anyway, here's a few more photos!

Lobster proved the sign right. When I dip, you dip, we dip.

Clint locked his keys in the trunk this night.

No loitering.

There's a lot more photos from the trip, and stories to tell but sometimes things are better left unsaid. Knowing that Clint and I had to return to California was a little saddening. That meant coming back to reality so to speak. The world always seems a little more fun when you're not in your daily settings. Mini vacations like this are good for the mind and heart. We drove back that night. Got home super late. Woke up early early and then I went straight to my boss Ted Newsome's Warpaint music video shoot. I shot the behind the scenes / making of piece for that project and it's 95% done at this point. The label has yet to release the video I did for the band, but I have a feeling it will come out after Ted's video comes out. What Ted has shown me so far looks insane! Keep your eyes peeled!

In other news, I did an edit for my boys at Signal Snowboards. I'm by no means a fan of the band Linkin Park. No offense to them...just not into that kinda stuff. BUT, the singer of that band and Signal teamed up to raise awareness and money to help out Japan in this very tough time.

I did not shoot ANY of this...just merely did the editing for it. That is all. SUPPORT BANGARANG OR DIE! Can't stress this enough. Also, get ready for something new out of the twiztid mind of Micah Hollinger...PROJECT TURTLE!

T3i

2011-04-28T17:02:00.001-07:00

I bought a Canon T3i a today ago. I walked right on down to Samy's, purchased this bad boy, walked back, and shot my first photo with it. This photo was processed in camera with some new feature this camera has.

Unidentifiable bro.

Hot damn!

2011-04-26T00:51:00.000-07:00

The wrist was broken all along. I'd like to take this time to thank the dumb fuck doctor up north for her totally wrong diagnosis. The month I spent with my wrist misaligned was PAINFULLY fun.

Got it reset and casted today.

I can't wait to skait.

One Day Without Shoes

2011-04-21T11:53:00.000-07:00

The fines folks over at BANGARANG brought us all this really cool gem of a skate piece and you need to check it out NOW or suffer the consequences:

This video was made (and inspired) for Tom's "One Day Without Shoes" which encourages people to go just one, single day, without shoes to see what a lot of people around the world do on a daily basis. The day was April 5th by the way. Yeah I'm late...so what. I saw the video the day Micah posted it, but for some reason forgot to post it up on here. Well better late than never.

As most of us know, Tom's gives a pair of shoes to people who can't afford them for every pair of shoes bought. I have a pair and it feels good to know that because of that pair someone else got to put some protection on their feet. I've finally pulling selects for a top secret project that Micah and myself filmed on mine and Clint's last outing to Arizona. Stay tuned for detailz?

BUY SOME TOMS, AND SOME BANGARANG!

A Sunday in the IE.

2011-04-15T16:29:00.000-07:00

The Inland Empire is an area that is chalk full of good times. I know that that area is frowned upon for some reason...it may be the excessive heat? It may be the BRO factor? It may be the desert wastelandesque setting? I don't know what it is...but I like it out there. I for sure wouldn't choose to live out there. But it's a cool place to go out to for skateboarding reasons! I have a lot of friends out there, and I always seem to be with Sean Peterson when I venture out there. Anywhere you go with SP you are guaranteed to have a great time. I'm not trying to jock him too hard but he's a character and a half! SP...I love you dog!

As you can guess, SP was part of this IE mission. The crew this day was Sean Peterson, Eduardo Craig, Brad Burt, Daniel Knapp, and Paul Flores. We were all over the place that day and left nothing behind us but laughs and little things that pop when you throw them at the ground. Paul had a field day with an ice cream man and bought everything he had that exploded or created smoke. At one point we ended up at a crazy spot with an equally crazy background...snowcapped mountains.

We'll start off the photo documentation with none other than the king of the IE himself...Sean Peterson.

When no tricks ended up going down we ended up nabbing up an extra basketball from a family that was at the school. Eduardo Craigt with the lay away (Paul Flores with the much needed assist)!!!

Mr. Handsome himself, Brad Burt, laughing at how hard he was getting schooled on the b-ball court.

Paul was all over the place the whole day...obviously.

Brad shot this photo of yours truly at the same spot...he shoots film :0

The day continued on after we left that spot. We paraded around the area and just messed around and had fun. Eduardo got some clips, Brad got some photos, and SP also got some stuff. After the skating was over we hung out in a parking lot for a while and just put out the vibes. You all know about putting out the vibes!

Somehow Paul got access to the roof of this Subway. Eduardo HAIL MARY'D it the football that for some reason has been in my car for 2 years (I hate football).

DEAD ON!

We all admired the wintery looking mountains all day :)

Paul straight lined his icy beverage for maximum thirst quenching power. Why fight the urges?

We held down the parking lot like no others could have.

There's something about the end of a "meet up and skate" sesh that is always a little bit of a bummer. At least if it was a good day! When the cars with the separate people part ways is when the session is really over. I love being able to just hang out with your friends once you finish skating and just chat it up. When you're out skating you're usually just going straight to business but the times where you're just in a parking lot or at a spot just wrapping is when you get to bond more and really see how things are going in peoples lives. Well, since we live in California and everything is so "spread out" like everyone says the time spent driving to spots you also have that time to connect as well...but whatever alright I'm trying to get sentimental about how I like to spend time with friends before, during, and after skating! All you out there should know what I'm talking about. Come on!

Since the day these photos were taken was a little while ago now that I am revisiting I can't help but laugh at the two photos of Paul on the Subway roof. I was laughing so hard when I saw those again for the first time because I kept thinking (while we were there) if the workers inside were aware someone was on the roof, hahaha! Could they hear his foot steps, could they see Eduardo throwing the ball towards them, or were they just in their own culinary world? We will never know. All I do know, is that seeing Eduardo throwing the ball to some little figure on a roof with his arms up in the air makes me laugh so damn hard. So what if I find humor in the most minuscule things in life that most people don't think twice about. It's the little things that count...

Phone Pixz

2011-04-05T02:38:00.000-07:00

Earlier tonight Moose sent me a photo of him looking all gnarly with one of the iPhone effects. It made me laugh so I figured why not blog it? He's in AZ with Ryan Reyes right now (I so wish I could be there!) and so he sent me a photo of Ryan as well and then I got to thinking "why not just do a blog post with phone pics!?" So I'm doing just that...silly pics from phones! It's got "win" written all over it. I went through my phone and also through picture text's I've received from friends and will now share these intimate phone pics and picture text messages with the world.

This pic of Moose really gets me!

This picture of Ryan Reyes actually looks believable? There may be a person out there that looks just like this!

I went to a party with some friends while I was up North last month...Robbie was straight TKO'd in the privacy of someones bedroom floor.

Abel was a bit more ruthless about where he passed out at the party!

Beto looking hyphy at Abel's place next to the most irie jacket ever?! Get up, stand up.

Hometown homies <3

Brad Burt and myself went and saw Royksopp play last week...it was a night full of drunken debauchery to say the least!

My rowdiness definitely bummed people out at the show that night :/

Mitch MacMurray dropping some knowledge via iChat?

This one comes via Dylan Witkin. We saw this authority figure and chatted with him for a bit. LEGIT!

Another one from Dylan of Clint Walker one night at my place...if ONLY you knew what was just going on right before Dylan took this!

Another Dylan Witkin gem here. This ones from the Tampa Airport and I don't think I even need to tell you what's so damn funny about this one...

All the homies out there...keep the picture text messages coming. I need to comb through the inbox of my phone more often!

Bear Bear Dayz

2011-03-28T01:04:00.000-07:00

Like I had previously said...I have a lot of photos shot that hadn't been gone through. Do any of you shoot stuff, then without having a chance to organize and edit those photos, shoot more stuff and then just get over it because you have more stuff to go through than when you started? I hate getting behind on transferring photos onto my computer because by the time I'm bringing in more than one day's worth of stuff I feel like it's gonna be a mish to go through eeeeverything. Which it usually is...and then I just let things pile up even more, and more, and more! This is definitely the case at the moment.

About a month ago Bradley Burt, David Loy, and myself took a trip out to Big Bear super late at night. Adam's mom has a cabin up in Lake Arrowhead so he gave us the key and we high tailed it out there. We ended up getting to the cabin at around 1:30AM and were ready to go in, have a few brews, and post up to watch a movie or something. Little did we know that no one had been up to the cabin in a while and we were welcomed home by a butt load of snow everywhere. By everywhere I mean there was no way of getting into the uphill drive way...period. Yeah! Not exactly what we wanted to see at 1:30AM. There was no option but to grab some shovels from the basement and shovel it all out. We had to do it, and we did it! Let the photo sharing begin...

This is the first time I think I've seen David throw down on some manual labor.

This is not the first time I've seen Brad acting the fool.

The mountains were so blue on this silver bullet can that they were purpz.

All work and no beer makes so and so a something...

We battled for an hour and a half...and we won. Barely.

I guess in a way, you can kind of say that we got the full experience. We shoveled a drive way by hand like people do in lots of parts of the country. Well we didn't exactly do the whole drive way. Just enough to fit my car into it without sticking out into the street. I had never had to do that before and I got mad respect for people that gotta deal with this kind of thing on the regular. I never really thought about having to dig your car in our out of the snow as being such a crazy thing to do. Props to all you snowie peeps out there. It didn't stop there though. Once we got in we realized that the people there last did not shut off the water properly! That means no showers for us or nothing. Just no running water, period. Very lame. The three of us were just so stoked to get in doors though that it didn't bug us that much.

We made sandwiches when we got in. Brad and I didn't look this dumb eating them though.

The fire place was going off...and so was DLoy!

We stayed up late and watched some snowboard flicks. We SHOULD have gone to sleep as soon as we got in doors, but of course that was never going to happen. When the homies are out of town together you're always guaranteed to stay up late. Even if you gotta be up early in the morning the next day!

The above photo is probably my favorite from the trip because if any of you have ever gone on trips with David (or just stayed at the same place as him) you know what it's like to deal with him in the morning. Getting him out of bed is nearly impossible! It doesn't matter if it's early or not. Or if he got no sleep, or a solid 15 hours of sleep. The guy just will not get out of bed! I admire his will to fight getting out of bed though. Sort of. Not really. You can plead him, beg him, and down right yell at him to get the fuck out of bed...but it does no good in the end. This truly captures the nature of a morning with DLoy. I can't imagine what it was like to get him up and ready to go to normal school! I'll need to ask Dennis and Synthia about this next time I see them because I'm sure it'll be a conversation chalk full of laughs.

Ready to head out!

We bailed to the mountain a lot later than we had planned because we stayed up late unfortunately. But we got a full day in! Sean Peterson was also up there that day so we met up with him and did our thang. Of course on the first run of the day my lift ticket somehow gets ripped off my pants. It was a lame situation but after talking to the peeps I was able to get a replacement one (even though they have a no replacement lift ticket policy...who can say no to this little face?) and the day was great! Got to ride some good snow, did some back country (which I suck at!) and then on the last run fell really, really fucking hard! It was exactly the kinda day you'd expect. Great until the last run, and then BAM! I got broke off really hard actually. I still had a great time though. Good times had by all. We even ran into Greg Lutzka in the parking lot. We kicked it with him for a bit and then headed back down the mountain. The whole day was basically one huge snowball fight. It got really crazy during the back country runs. It was so much fun!!! Things get serious when you get a harsh snowball to the face though...that kinda happened a lot this time around, haha!

No matter where we went David somehow turned it into a snowball fight.

David propositioned Brad to engage into an all out war at the gas station. It was the battle to end all the battles and they went for it full blast.

This one lasted a long time and they were chasing each other all over the place. I could not stop laughing the whole time! I managed to catch Brad hitting David in the face here while also getting hit in the process.

The battle had ended.

But they were still on guard and ready for anything!

The trip was a success. Thank you Adam for letting us stay at the cabin! Hopefully next time you are with us. Tonight is my last night up in Watsonville visiting the family and friends. I will be leaving in pain unfortunately. I fell really, really hard today while skating at the Scotts Valley park with childhood friends Ryuta Shimotomai and Jason Miller. It was one of those falls where everyone goes "ooooooowwwwwhhhh" and goes silent. Yeah...it sucked really bad and I think I may have broken my wrist. It hurts to move it and I can't put any weight on it or lift things with it. Sweet. Thanks a lot you stupid, dumb fuck, little girl on the snakeboard. Not only did you get in our ways a million times but you psyched me out and made me second guess committing to a trick. Fuck you and everything you've ever loved :o

Warpaint

2011-03-24T14:30:00.000-07:00

At the beginning of the year I got a call from a buddy of mine asking me to help out with a project. Seeing as how it was a friend of mine and I always do what I can for him, or whoever he knows that needs help, I told him I'd help him before I even had all the details. When I finally asked for all the details near the end of the call he told me the project was a music video for the band Warpaint. I had been listening to the band very heavily ever since the release of their first full length album earlier in 2010...so of course I was rather stoked to be able to work on something with them.

Phone calls were traded between Theresa (one of the members of the band), and myself that day and we got started right away trying to figure things out. The band was about to head over the proverbial pond to tour some exotic areas that most will never get to see...this left little time for us to really work! We did what we could with the time that we had, and then I worked while Theresa and the rest of her homegirls got jiggy with it down under (among other places). Of course we made the most progress on the project while the band was not out on tour, but they had another trip lined up pretty much right after they got back.

To make a long story short. It took us upwards of 2 1/2 months to finish the music video for Shadows. In a way, I am glad that things were allowed to have a surplus of time because as we spent more and more time with it it allowed the project to get more and more dynamic. If we had rushed the process it would have come out looking, and feeling completely different. Because it was such a post production heavy video it laid many roads with endless forks ahead of us. This was the first time I had done something like this on this type of scale so it was quite a learning experience!

The video got handed off to the record label fairly recently. Which is great! That means that all your little eyes can feast upon the brainchild that Theresa and I gave birth to. I also encourage anyone who hasn't heard the band to check them out. I don't mean to jock them too hard or anything, but their album "The Fool" is by far my favorite album of 2010. If you like good music you will enjoy "The Fool"...straight up. Buy the album and listen to it loudly. They are out on tour right now and if they come to a city near you buy a ticket and go watch them do their thang. I promise you will not be disappointed.

This is a photo I shot of Theresa, and her ghost, the night we shot a majority of the video.

The masked dancer in all her glory.

Rocky Horror Projector Show.

The link posted above is the music video for "Undertow," which was the first video off their album. If you like what you hear you're definitely going to like the rest of "The Fool." That is all for now. I am currently up in Watsonville visiting my family and friends amidst a barrage of gale force winds and water droplets that seem to have some sort of magnetic attraction to the lenses of my glasses. Not much skating to be done in settings like these! But it's always nice to get the hell out of LA...feel me!? I've been up to a lot since the last time I posted. And I have a bunch of photos I'd like to post as well! But that will have to wait until another time...since this rain won't be stopping today I'm guessing that means another time = tomorrow.

Kelly Hart

2011-03-18T01:49:00.000-07:00

The man, Kyle Camarillo, literally JUST finished this commercial he did for Kelly Hart for LRG. He finished it like less than 10 minutes before he tossed the link my way. Basically hot off the press is what I'm getting at. Check it out and take notes. If you wanna make great looking video stuff you can learn a lot from watching this man's work :)

Kelly Hart from LRG on Vimeo.

Keep your eyes peeled for Kyle's photos in magazines also. He's been shooting a lot of photos, they look great, and are getting ran. Give props where props are deserved!

Respect.

2HH Crew Hanging

2011-02-28T22:17:00.000-08:00

I stopped by the 2HeadedHorse office today to and hung out with the posse. For those of you that don't actually talk to me personally or hang out with me then this will be some news: I am unemployed.

After the SLAM show ended (I should say "shut down," because that fits the situation more) the work at the office pretty much came to a halt. That is all that I will say because I really don't want to get into details. I've had to tell the story to all my friends numerous times and I don't feel like having to spill it all out again. All that aside, I went in and visited the crew today to see how things were going. Laban and I went and got lunch for everyone and then came back and hung out. Felt good to hang out with everyone even thought it has only been 2 weeks. I shot a few photos while there because I had my camera in my car.

I feel sorry for the people that don't know this bunch right here.

Cookie monsters.

I told her that I was going to shoot a photo of her smoking...I was lucky enough to catch her in the act! NO MORE SMOKING MIA!!!

David JUST got to my place so I must be going. We are heading to Big Bear with good ole Brad Burt. SEE YOU ALL LATER!

Clint Walker Destroyer Video

2011-02-24T21:24:00.000-08:00

A few months back I got a call from my good friend Diamond Dave Bergthold (the real master mind behind Built To Shred) while I was at the office about shooting a piece for him. We were basically shooting a Built To Shred segment without Jeff. Easy peazyyy. I shot all of season 2 of Built To Shred so of course I was down because these kinds of things are super fun to be a part of. AND for my boy Clint, it was a no brainer. The proper ingredients were all there for a good time, and a cool all day shooting spree.

One Saturday morning I woke up early, drove down to Santa Ana (to the Ambiguous office), and we got the ball rolling. It was basically on from 8AM to about 8PM. The whole crew was there: Kyle Walker, Trevor Vaughan, John Murrow, Brian "BH" Hanson, and Isaac Siems. This is part 1 of 2:

It's been so long since I did this that I totally forgot it was ever even coming out. Dave did a bang up job cutting everything that I shot for this together. I'm sure I overshot like crazy...and I know how overshooting can sometimes be a burden when you step to the cutting table. PROPS DAVE! I guess stay tuned for part 2?

I've got a bunch of new photos for you kiddos...shall we begin?

Brad, Dylan, and Elliott were tripping on some crazy bugs that were posted up on these plants. Dylan just got finished getting a cool trick on this rugged bank to ledge in Venice on Main where this was shot. Brad looks/is creepy.

At the spot before this bank to ledge Brad somehow managed to hit his forehead on the glass that opens to give the openee access to the trunk of my car. He broke skin so he must have nailed it pretty hard. Way to go you idiot.

While we were skating we spotted Tim Meadows walking right past us. We told him that we were fans of his and actually hung out with us for about 5 minutes. He graciously allowed me to snap a pic with him and Dylan...I'm kicking myself in the ass for not asking Brad or Elliott to snap a pic of me with him as well :(

Tim must have gotten envious of our rollerskateboarding because he quickly asked Dylan if he could see his board. We thought he just wanted to scope it out but as soon as he grabbed it he through down, skated up the street, and skated back. The most amazing thing about this is the fact that he didn't push mongo. HUGE POINTS FOR THAT ONE! He said his kids were into skating so he learned to push around as well so he could mess around with them as well. What a dad!

I don't let Jerald Webb smoke in my car. However he lets me candidly snap photos of him smoking out in public.

There is this really cool, and crazy skater made spot right down the street from where I live. The spot is on a bike path leading down to Marina Del Rey so there is plenty of bike / pedestrian traffic. We took it upon ourselves to take over this section of the bike path and proceeded to have a good time. I caught a moment of the "hanging" while filming. I live for times like these.

I've been shooting a lot of photos lately and I hope that the photos are somewhat interesting. I'm not a photographer by any means, but I like shooting my friends in their natural environments. I just want to say thank you to all of you out there who even bother to come to this URL that is my own. There's a lot of things going on in my life right now...some good, some weirdly awkward...but at least I know I got my friends and I got my skating to keep me happy. I will end this with a quote that a pretty lady said to me last Friday night...for some reason it stuck with me a lot and has been floating around in my head.

"A lot can change in 5 minutes..."

Simple. True.

Santa Barbara Skate Park Montage

2011-02-18T11:12:00.000-08:00

My very first "Sesh" video for The Skateboard Mag dropped today (thank you DanoZone). It's feature a buuuunch of the homies. I wish I could have fit more in their, but driving up to Santa Barbara from LA is quite the mission and 2 trips with one carload of people can only get you so far. If only I had one of those clown cars...a boy can dream right?

Anyways, here is the link:

Santa Barbara Park Montage

Thanks to everyone who came up to Santa Barbara and seshed with us. I hope you guys had as much fun as I did making this. Unfortunately, Dan Roberts blew out his ACL right after this while shooting his first ad for Vox. I wish you a speedy recovery and hope you get your surgery soon. We all miss shredding with you man.

Hope everyone has a good weekend!

The Metal Madman

2011-02-04T10:52:00.000-08:00

Humor is a weird thing when you really think about it. Sometimes I will laugh at the stupidest things that in reality shouldn't be funny whatsoever, or that no one even thinks twice about (in a humorous way). Then other times a group of people will be laughing at something that is "supposed" to be funny and I won't even crack a smile. The kind of things that I find the funniest are the subtle things are almost not even supposed to be funny: tone of voice, mannerisms, weird pauses in weird places, awkward glances, and most importantly beer humor.

The reason I say beer humor is because for a long time now I have been following this guy who chugs beers on video. There is nothing special here besides a personality, a camera locked off on one angle, a bottle of beer, and a glass. It may not sound like the best set up for comedic venture...but you know what, I think it is grrrrrrrreat. Minimalism at it's best here ladies and gentledudes. I present to you *drum roll please*...THE METAL MADMAN!

This is the first video I ever saw of the Metal Madman's and I've been hooked ever since. I love them all though. You may not find it funny...actually I hope you DON'T find it funny, and I hope it bums you out because that would stoke me out even more on this. I've been showing my friends this stuff for almost 2 years now, and it never gets old for me. I'm about as picky with humor/comedy as I am with food. This gets me going though and I don't know why. Genius.

After all this time, I've actually contacted the Metal Madman about his videos and he responded. There is talk about myself purchasing him a unique beer and sending it to him to drink in his next video. He is even so gracious enough as to give me a shout out! That will be a day worth celebrating for sure. Mark your calenders when that video comes out because that beer chug will be worthy of a national holiday. It's Friday morning, before noon, the weekend is almost here, and the Metal Madman has just showed you now to pound a brew like a real beer drinker. Crack one open, pour it out, chug the hell out of it, and salute to the almighty Metal Madman in us all.

TrevGnarPhotoz

2011-01-14T14:53:00.000-08:00

This past weekend we got some really good clips and photos to accompany them. We shot this clip and Trevor shot a candid photo of it that ended up coming out really cool :

Trevor Vaughan gave me the photo specifically for the blog. So thank you for that TrevGnar! I was going to crop out the sign but the fact it says 420 on it was reason enough to keep it in there...obviously, brah! The spot had a very narrow, and short runway and was quite a reach. If that wasn't enough to deal with the ground you land on is really rough as well. Good job Dylan and Trevor. Hopefully Trevor will start feeding me more photos for the blog in the future *wink wink*...*nudge nudge*.

Weekend of the January 8th

2011-01-11T23:46:00.000-08:00

Now that my boys from Oklahoma are back my weekends are suddenly starting to be a lot more fun. I was kind of in a bit of a rut for a while and not really getting too excited about skating, but what a change having a few peeps around can do. Not that my friends that I kick it with aren't great or anything. Because they are! They're amazing.

With that said, I kicked it all weekend with Dylan, Clint, Kyle, and Trevor and had a great time! Brian Hanson was with us Saturday but he's too stealth and I wasn't able to document him. That guy is the man. If you've seen Toy Machine's Brainwash video then you are familiar with his HD filming. He rules.

While checking out a spot that ended up not being skateable I caught Kyle's evil twin lurking in the depths.

Puff-Puff-Give.

Tobacco.

Clint has been handling HVX second angles for me lately. Kyle looks scared.

Hanging out at Santa Monica High with his mouth closed for once.

The Crew: Death, Kyle, Myself, Dylan. Right after handling some business in Santa Monica.

We got to film some banging ass clips. Trevor got some great photos. And most importantly we got to have lots of fun. Having to work all day every weekday means that you don't take weekends for granted. So all the rest of you Monday - Friday peeps out there...have some god damn fun on the weekend! And again...watch Dylan's Mag Minute over at The Skateboard Mag!

Dylan's Mag Minute.

2011-01-10T15:41:00.000-08:00

The Mag Minute that I did for Dylan Witkin is finally up over at The Skateboard Mag. I suggest you go give them the traffic.

However, if you are lazy, you can also check it out right here:

We finished this clip up months and months ago, but just kind of sat on it. I'm glad we waited though because we stacked a few more clips recently (the nollie back 180 and switch frontside feeble), and it was able to drop right after his win at the Girl Open House contest! Timing is everything I hear. The dudes a beast...enough said.

Beverly Hills High Fire

2010-12-30T11:29:00.001-08:00

Just recently a bunch of us headed out to go skate on a Sunday. The Santa Maria homies, the Oklahoma dogs, and then some local heads that I shred with! No joke, our pack was like 15 deep and it was so damn fun. With a crew that big we didn't last too long. We got some stuff for sure though and Dylan got his banger right as security rolled up! So that was amazing! My boy Shane also got a pretty cool trick, hurray.

The funny thing though is that while we were getting kicked out an apartment building next door to Beverly somehow caught on fire! This is what gave us the extra time needed to get the tricks. Of course the fire was more of priority than us skating so the heat got taken off us real quick. Sometimes you get lucky. Once we finished our plate and wiped our mouths clean of the rail that everyones touched I snapped a photo of Clint and Dylan thanking the fire for the extra time.

I've been shooting a lot of photos as of late. Nothing serious, just putting the DSLR to good use is all. I recently went up to Watsonville to visit the family and shot more photos up there in a few days then I had in the whole rest of the year up to that point!

This is my friend Carlos' girlfriend's dog YUM YUM! Cute dog that Yummers.

Derek Rydquist playing John Cougar Mellencamp songs.

My cousin Ramon's daughters on Christmas Eve at his place.

Christmas Eve with the family at my parent's house!

My dad shot this photo of Derek, myself, and Tiger before I left back to LA.

I took the PCH through Big Sur back to LA this time around...what a view huh?

Swallow the sun.

That is all for now.

Norman Woods Day In The Life

2010-12-29T22:41:00.000-08:00

A while back I meet up with Norm Doggie and had no idea that he was going to be shooting a "Day In The Life" video until we actually met up. Dylan and Norman had already gone to war with this curved rail in Culver not too far from where I live and we had plans of going back and handling some business!

Before going there though we met at Stoner in Santa Monica (my favorite place to meet up now because I can get some skating in before mishing out). My boy Dirty was the one filming the piece with Normz so he let me get a few clips for his little video! Too bad I had the weakest clips, blah! The other dudes killed it way harder. I still had fun though. And Dylan got a clip too...plus one we're keeping under wraps ;)

All Hail Collin Hale.

2010-12-25T23:38:00.000-08:00

The skateboarding world doesn't really know the extent of Collin Hale's finesse and ease. There are so many people out there who are great skateboarders. We all know this; it's a fact. We see them everywhere we go. When I think of great skateboarders or "the best skateboarders" Collin always makes my list.

Amazing skateboarder, a likable character, a knowledgeable person, and a great cook. These are just a few of the ways of describing Collin. When I was working for Hurley I always looked forward to having Collin come out to stay with me. Not only because we got to go skating and filming, but because he was fun to hang around with and spend time with. I haven't seen Collin in a while so when I saw him skating in this years Tampa AM you can bet that I just about screamed to see him on his skateboard in a contest and getting into the highlight reel! Contests are good and bad ways of seeing skateboarders. Super controlled environments filled with hundreds of peering eyes burning holes through the very surface of your skin can push one to the limits of greatness, or break one down to the point of not making a single trick.

I love and hate contests. I hate having to film at contests because it's boring as fuck. Witnessing the events through my own eyes and not through a panel of pixels in a viewfinder is a lot more enjoyable. However, I'll do it if I'm getting paid to do so. Go figure. I also hate them because I don't think that they properly display ones talent as much as you'd think. But who cares about that (money hungry kids and their parents), so let us move on.

When I am not squinty eyed and looking through a viewfinder at a contest I am loving hanging out with friends, mingling, and watching people stress and have fun on the course. The stress is almost more entertaining to watch for me than the triumphs, ha. But I do love to watch my homies have a good time on the course and score high. I feel like Collin always does pretty damn good at contests but has yet to come out on top. Judges you need to stop being dipshits and acknowledge a powerhouse when you see one. All those gross kids out there doing perfectly, uncool tricks suck. When Collin Hale shows up at a contest show a homie some freaking love!

I somehow digressed from talking about how rad Collin is to how I feel about contests. Welcome to the mind of yours truly. A million thoughts being centrally fused into one ambivalent...thing? Back to what I wanted to get across:

COLLIN IS A BEAST

I'm very stoked to have been able to have you be a part of "Skate Movie." Even though some of this footage may have been in "Family Tree," or in other clips I had a great time cutting this all together. Watch that video if you haven't! Dave Abair also havs a banging ass part in the video.

Collin, I love you buddy. I hope to continue watching you skate and also wish you the best of luck in any and all endeavors that you may pursue. I also hope you all had a great Christmas and are safe! Til next time :)

Anti-Social Networking

2010-12-24T00:53:00.000-08:00

About a month and a half ago I deleted my Facebook profile, and I must say that it is rather refreshing and liberating in a way. I had been thinking about doing it for some time now. The decision to actually go through with it though was a little more spur of the moment than I thought. I think that's kind of the way that it had to be done though because thinking about it and stuff kind of just kept me from actually doing it. That old saying "actions speak louder than words" applied to the situation.

I doubt that I am gone forever. I may be back tomorrow. I could have been back yesterday. Or who know, I may just give it another week or two. I don't want to sound too lame or anything here but : shut the fuck up.

I say this because that's what I wanted to yell at people when I'd sometimes see these 10 second incremental updates about stuff that doesn't matter to anyone. The bad thing is that when I'd catch myself doing it (not every hour by any means, but I'd post things that I felt were unnecessary or of no importance) I felt like a complete loser. We do it because everyone else is doing it. Do we yearn to feel important? Do we want people to think that we are far more busy than we really are? Do we do it to try to make people think we are cool? Who knows...I'm sure the answer is out there buried in some psychology book that's outdated and horrendously true in nature.

We all do it. It makes me hate the people I am "friends" with online though. And that's the thing that really bugged me. People I don't really give a fuck about are posting every incident happening in their lives and I end up knowing peoples current life timelines. I don't care about funny thing your cat did. Nor does 99% of people care about what you ate for your late brunch. I hate to break it to you too, but every time you get a new shirt or article of clothing...we really don't need to see it. Geez. This kind of thing is what kept me from wanting to be a part of that cycle of internet lameness. I don't want to be that kind of person without even knowing I'm doing it. That damn website tends to make people strive for attention. As does most social networking sites.

It would appear that these sites are bringing people together, when in fact I feel like they are pushing people apart. Internet chatting is so impersonal! It's fake and I hope people don't forget what it's like to have real conversation with random people out in the streets or in line at a place. Is the next generation going to be socially inept because they won't know how to deal with people in real life settings because most communication is done on the internet?

I like to be in contact with people on a slightly more personal level. A formal e-mail is worlds apart from a Facebook message or comment for some reason. I'm getting to the point where I am calling people a lot more now and it seems like people don't answer their phones. You're more likely to get a response from someone on Facebook or through text now than actually calling nowadays it seems. Or maybe my friends are just lame and don't answer their phones, ha!

I don't feel like ranting anymore. I've had tons of people asking me where I've gone as of late because of my "digital disappearance." You kind of quickly realize who your really good friends are when you take away internet connections between you and the social networking world. For almost 2 months now I feel like I've only talked to 10 friends. They just so happen to be the 10 or so friends I really even care to talk to / want to talk to. It just so happens to be that they are mostly guy friends of course! The skate homies. The real reason most people are on those things is to talk to girl they're otherwise afraid to really try to initiate conversation with in real life. So yeah, all you girls out there who I'd give a free pap smear to...I'm still here, haha. You just gotta dig a little harder to discover my whereabouts.

So all you peeps out there who lurk all damn day, and waste time doing nothing on social networking sites if you want a real change up and breathe of fresh air I got your answer. Delete your binary existance for a while: liberate yourself. Remember what it's like to have privacy again for once.

On a lighter subject. The SLAM! show premiered the 2 weeks ago. Episode 2 just aired yesterday! My good buddy Ethan Loy had a segment in the show. Dylan Witkin and myself came out in his segment as well. So look out for it, and the rest of the episodes. New episodes air at 10:30 on Wednesdays...or something like that. We're still actually heavily working on the show. We have yet to finish out the season, so that's what's kept me busy the last few months. The lack of personal life is kind of getting to me and it also caused me to ruin my first relationship in 3 years...sweet. I almost lasted 3 months! Too bad I suck though, and have self esteem and commitment issues. Flawed. Broken.

I've been shooting a lot of photos lately...check some:

California : Coast

The SLAM! crew having pre-flight drinks : LAX

Laban stalks himself : Mammoth.

Car dance party : I-80

That is all for now. Have a great Christmas everyone <3

The Devil

2010-12-10T10:32:00.000-08:00

My buddy Ben Cabreana came down a few weeks ago with some of the Santa Maria skate crew to shred. You may remember Ben from when he won Slap Magazine's first "One In A Million Contest" :

Anyways, Ben's homie Shane fell asleep at my place while we were hanging out. Earlier, before he had fallen asleep Ben's other friend was looking at some children's book about Jesus that my roommate had on the coffee table. My roommate and I aren't religious by any means so it's kind of silly for us to have the book, but it finally came in handy! Ben's friend found a funny ass picture of Jesus that resembled Shane to a T!!! We laughed about it for a while and asked if we could take a photo of him with the photo in the book next to his face and he wouldn't do it. We could tell he was bummed. He ended up falling asleep because we had been out skating all day and I was able to snap a photo of it. ONE FOR THE BOOKS MY FRIENDS! Hopefully this makes you laugh as hard as it made all of us laugh.

The funny thing is that Shane's nickname (besides Shamus) is "The Devil," so it just makes the fact that he resembles this drawing of Jesus is what makes it all the more funny. And the fact that he's wearing a Judas Priest shirt. Does this mean that Satan and Jesus are maybe the same person? Must we look at the greater picture here? I'm into pondering that further for sure...but for now I'll just laugh it up at this photo ;)

Sextape Video

2010-12-06T15:06:00.000-08:00

I rarely get all that excited about music videos for bands that I don't actually listen to myself. However, this one is just a tad bit too hard to not like. My old roommate Brant recently came over and was ranting and raving about this new Deftones video and how great it was. The Deftones have been around forever and I have never really been all that big on them. Because of this I was kind of wary about watching this video when Brant was telling me I had to watch it. Brant is a super talented, experienced dude and knows how to light the fuck out of stuff (cinematically speaking) so I had a feeling that if he was this excited over the video that I really did need to watch it. I let him pull it up on my laptop and was blown away to say the least. Now your turn to watch:

Deftones | Sextape from ZF FILMS on Vimeo.

(WATCH FULL SCREEN!)

To the untrained, uneducated film school / film making eye one may just think it looks cool. Don't be fooled though. You have yet to hear the crazy part. This whole video has absolutely no color correction, compositing, or post effects whatsoever. It was all done on set with lighting, and color corrected in camera. So the look of the video was all set up during production, and all that was done in post was all strictly hard cuts and nothing else. Just clips being laid out on a timeline with no transitions, no mixing two images together, no tweaking colors...NO NOTHING! You could almost pause the video at any given time and have an amazing still photo. Seeing how it was shot on the Red, you could definitely create a print out of the freeze frames!

If you don't believe me, do a little research of your own and read about the making of this video. It was just two dudes, a ton of lights, military grade ziplock bags, prisms, and some other cool toys. It's very inspiring when something like this comes along. Hopefully some you film guys and girls out there reading this will also be inspired in one way or another. Even if it's just to check out this band a little more. I ended up loving the song in the end and now feel like after all these years these guys are worth checking out.

Sorry for the lack of updates as well. I've been going crazy working on the SLAM! show at work. I plan on updating a lot more though :)

When You Are Older

2010-09-12T00:13:00.000-07:00

I will start off by saying that anyone reading this needs to listen to more Glassjaw... you may have never heard them, you may have heard of them just never really got to know any of their songs, hell they may be your top band on your Last.fm...even so you STILL need to listen to more Glassjaw. I have a feeling most musically inept skateboarders don't know a thing about this band...I've been listening to this band for almost 10 years now and I feel like I need to introduce the band to some of the skate community (since I'm sure that's the only kind of people that read this, and I love you all)...even if I know that most skateboarders won't be into it...it's still worth a shot! If you need an introduction here you go, let this song be your "gateway drug" into the back catalog of this bands music (this is actually the song I'm listening to at the moment) :

"Ape Dos Mil"

What I did want to talk about was something to do with parents. I'm up North in Watsonville visiting for the weekend right now,(it was my Mom's birthday Thursday so I came up for that) and the other day my Dad and I were talking and somehow we got to the topic of jail. I memory serves me correct, the whole jail thing came to be talked about because of a sketchy situation that my cousin's husband got into down in Mexico. He didn't go to jail, nor was he doing anything wrong but it was just a baaaaad thing that happened. Because of this story jail came to be talked about.

My Dad was telling me stories about him (and his friends) going to jail, never for anything serious. Just small weekend stints. The stories of how he got in there were funny though! At one point he said something that I found very hilarious, yet something didn't sit right about the whole situation. He said "Eh, it was an experience...my friends and I were living together and sometimes we'd go out on Friday night, have fun, and end up in jail for the weekend...go in on Friday night, come out Sunday around 3 in the afternoon. No biggie!" My Mom remember's these weekends and didn't think they were quite as funny as he and I thought. I could see her holding back smiles and laughter though. She definitely broke character and laughed a few times though!

The reason I am even writing is because he was making it out to not be a big deal to go to jail for the weekend! "No biggie!" His exact words. How the fuck is this no biggie? I will say right now that if I ever ended up in jail for a few days, no matter what the offense may have been, I highly doubt that the words "No biggie," would come up in any discussion of the matter. Nor would I hear the end of it. Be it when I was younger, or this very weekend, haha! If my Dad would have told me all this when I was younger though, who knows if I'd have one of these stories by now. I know for a fact though, that he wouldn't have dared tell me this at a younger age. I know I would have been far less smart about a lot of things I can look back on and have done things differently had I had the "No biggie" mentality. There have got to be other people out there that have have this kind of thing happen. I know there are, what am I talking about!? Might not be the same topic, but simply some stuff being said (that for one reason or another) that otherwise would never have been said in your teen years.

All parents were just like us. They were born. They grew up. They grew up and probably got into a lot of trouble, caused a ruckus, and did stupid things (or one would only hope). They were not born at the age of 30 or 40+ like you may believe in the single digit, to mid beginning double digit chapters of your life. That is unless you're one of those unlucky losers who have lame, loser parents that give birth to equally lame kids. Your kind needs to lined up along horribly painted mural of the most mundane things in life and shot in the head with watermelon launchers...nothing fatal...just a little something to stir up the brain and loosen you up mentally. The visuals are making my mouth water as I type. Excuse me while I wipe the salivation from my chin.

Now that I've come back, I take back what I said. I came across many of these douche bags (male and female) in high school, college, in just about every bar I go to, skate park, skate spots and in other areas of life that need to stop blood circulation in their bodies. Do a lot of us a favor and shove multiple guns down your throats in front of your stupid "friends" and pull the pretty trigger. See which bullets feel, and taste the best. Hopefully none of them. ;)

Back to a lighter note :) My parents are fucking awesome. As we children grow up and our parents tell us more and more about themselves and the things they got into as kids you come to realize that they all did stupid shit like us. My whole family is pretty freaking funny when it comes to stories when I think of it. And I'm sure that there are many more stories to be heard and enjoyed. When you hear that weekend trips to jail is a mellow thing, you better believe you need to do some archeological excavations of the brain to unearth some funny stories. I urge you all to talk your parents / relatives and ask them about crazy stories when you get the chance!!! Things were different back in the day. To think that a world without the internet and video games only means that kids at the time were out and about messing around in a world less fake and electronic than our world now...instead of watching funny videos online inside of 4 walls they were outside getting into some real life stupid shit!

Conversate.

Big on TV

2010-09-05T13:59:00.000-07:00

One day before going out and skating, a bunch of us were sitting in my livingroom watching TV. Meetch, happened to spot the scores of the televised hotdog eating contest and noticed something a little peculiar...

...needless to say, Dr. Adam Bertolet was in the room with his hands preoccupied doing some botanical research on the coffee table and could not explain himself and why he was being referred to as such on the television. Being the botanist that he is, he continued his research (through all the laughter and heckling) and then shared his results with everyone in the room.

ALL HAIL DR. ANUS EATER BERTOLET!

The Ryan Reyes Interview (and interview clip)

2010-08-19T01:08:00.000-07:00

Ryan Reyes. Kind of has a ring to it, aye? I'm the kind of person that thinks that a name says a lot about you...those of you with cool sounding names should thank your parents for setting you up for coolness from birth. I've known Ryan for 5 years now I think, and I still remember the first time I met him like it was yesterday. We did this interview the weekend before his birthday, so he is now 21 years old at this moment. I remember tripping when he was turning 18. Now he's hit his last numerical milestone in his life that holds major significance. Well, actually I'm lying. There is one left. Senior citizenship...that's the milestone where you pay less at certain restaurants, and other random things...not nearly as cool as being able to go into bars and also purchase (and drink) liquids that apparently no one under the age of 21 has ever gotten to taste. Hmm...

Back to the subject at hand...Ryan Reyes...did I say it kind of has a ring to it? BECAUSE IT DOES! Ryan has tons of personality, energy, motivation, and rides around on a skateboard in a manner that is pleasing to the eye. He comes from a loving, and supportive family and has some good people behind him. His Grandpa is the kind of Grandpa you see in movies, and it is insane how much he loves him and what he does (props to Pops!!!). I feel honored to be able to call him a close friend, and am glad that he is on his way up the ranks in the world of rollerskateboarding. If his sponsors read this...DO SOMETHING! You know who you are. You know what you need to do. You're the man Ryan...even if you dislike silverware.

This is how the interview was conducted :)

RR: yo fewl
RV: We're going to start this interview out like most and just get some basic facts out in the open. How old are you, where are you from, how long have you been skating, and what companies give you the left over things that they can't sell?

RR: well i was i was concived on november 24th 1988.and was born roughly 9 months later on july 27th 1989. ive been skating for around 10 years.and i get scraps form black label, ipath, bones, destructo, innes, and i am now representing YEAH! boardshop.

Kool-Aid stains?

RV: YEAH! boardshop? Never heard of it, what's that all about?

RR: Its the dopest of shops! Its located in bartlett illinois. My friend steve davenport owns it.

RV: Radicool! Mad pr0pz. How did you first get into skating and do you remember your first board? If you say it was a Black Label board just to try to save face or I'm going to pour clam chowder down your shirt.

RR: haha chillax! my first board was a reynolds b-house. so save the chowdeeeah

RV: Remember which graphic?

RR: it was the "reaper 3". i remember really wanted the reaper 1 or 2 cause they had those in tony hawk pro skater. but when i got to the shop all they had was 3. so i was forced to settle

The waters fine...come on in!

RV: Never settle. Unless you go back in time and become an indian. You have a slightly unconventional style and that is what I think makes me like going out with you to skate and film. The fact that you find the weird stuff, or skate a spot differently than everyone else! What skateboarders were you into as a kid? Like are there certain guys or teams whose styles influenced you and the way you wanted to skate?

RR: haha thanks. my first favorite pro was andrew reynolds. cause i was told you had to choose from the tony hawk pro skater line up. but later i found out there were others. One of the workers at the vans skatepark i skated at all the time always told me that i should go buy pj ladds wonderful horrible life. so i talked my pops(grandpa) in to giving me enough money for the video and i went to the skateshop to buy it but when i got there i saw that black out had just came out and i thought it looked super sick. so i was faced with a decision. it took a while to choose but i went with black out. i wonder what i would skate like if i had chose pj ladds wonderful horrible life!

Ryan Lurkquist (I laughed so hard at this) !

RV: I can only imagine...Well I think it's really cool that you're now getting stuff from Black Label and not Coliseum Skate Shop (not that Coliseum isn't cool, I loved PJ Ladd's video growing up!!!). How many peeps can say that they get product from the company that put out the first skate video you ever bought!?

RR: haha i dunno. im super lucky to be getting stuff from label. its always been my favorite every time i get a box i cant believe it.

RV: I remember finding out that you were into bands like The Blood Brothers, Black Dahlia Murder, Genghis Tron, and The Locust and instantly being that much more stoked on you! There's nothing I like more than finding skateboarders who don't listen to the same stupid bullshit that every other mindless, musically un-opinionated skate dude likes. I am so tired of getting into skaters cars and hearing nothing but songs you've heard in skate videos all day. What have you been listening to these days that you may not find in most skateboarders iPod?

RR: latley i have been listening to alot of Nobunny. i keep listening to them and they never get old! i also love listening to music i can dance to so its usually alot if mash ups and techno! i still listen to faster stuff like the locust, phobia, and AxRxM from time to time.

I believe this party had the soundtrack to the movie AIR BUD on repeat all night...

RV: Phobia...haven't heard their name in a while. Arizona peeps are kind of crazy for some reason…I don't know what it is, but they're crazy in a good way (and kill it). I'm fucking crazy myself, so I just like the vibe of peeps out there. I must say you fit in pretty well out there, even before you moved there I could see you living out there. What made you want to move out to Arizona, who do you skate with, and how does it differ from life in Orange County? I miss not hanging with you on the regs by the way.

RR: well i ended up in arizona because i was working at camp woodward. there was always awesome people coming and working that were from arizona. and one time ted shmitz and preston harper just invited me to drive out with them. at the time i didnt do anything so i just went on a whim. when i got there it turned out to be the greatest place on earth! the people are amazing and are all about having fun allways! tim ward, john rob, mel rodriguez, and matt price have let me stay at their house's and they ask for nothing in return. i could never find people in the oc with that kind of heart. i never want to leave az.

Ryan And I hanging on the American Misfits Season 3 Arizona stop.

RV: Aside from the heat AZ seems like a really cool place, plenty of people to keep you busy and stuff for sure! I'm stoked for you to be out there and getting stuff done. Originally, when I came up with the idea for Skate Movie I didn't ask you to be in it, and I really don't know why! It should have been a no-brainer! For some reason I didn't think you'd be down, even though we were basically skating everyday. So, I just want to thank you for stepping up to the plate when Moose had to take an honorable discharge (haha, I said discharge). I feel like your part created quite the buzz. What are you working on now? What's in the horizon for RyRey?

RR: ive just been filming as much at possible. right now my footage is scatterd out to abunch of projects.

RV: Not putting all your ballz in one basket is a good thing. I look forward to seeing what you've been up to rollerskate wise as of late. As you know, I hate Twitter. So referring you to RyRey made me laugh a little inside. I know for a while there you were pretty serious about your Farmville thing or whatever, what is your new online addition now that your farm has gone out of business and is getting a strip mall built on it.

RR: haha i got the biggest farm you could get that was my goal! but anyways im usually playing flash games or skate nerding.

RV: I hate skate nerding...but you already know that.

RR: hehe i know sawy

The cool table?

RV: Are there any girlies in your life right now? You're going to be turning in a week here. I can't wait to go out to a bar with you and get plastered and offend hot babez0rz at some point. Are you ready to become a legal pile? How does it feel to know your best days are behind you and that the only new tricks you'll be learning are quicker, more efficient ways to consume alcohol!?

RR: the secrets of my love life are classified richie! but turning 21 doesnt really excite me that much. its cool that i dont have to get people to buy me spit anymore but i dont think i wil ever be at the bars haha. id rather drink a 40 with my closest buddies at a friends than waste all my money with a bunch of strangers. sorry richie

RV: I don't go to the bars very much as well...but every once in a while they're fun. We'll have to have an outting at some point Mr. Ryan "Ketchup and water makes a good Tomato Soup" Reyes. It might be fun?

RR: ill try it. for you

RV: We're going to play a little game of either/or. Ready? You have to answer these with the quickness, and in the least amount of words possible.

RR: o tay

RV: Would you rather lick a bums asshole (one clean, good swipe), or wear B.U.M. Equipment for the rest of your life?

RR: lick

RV: Would you rather get mauled by a big dog, or wear Big Dog Clothing for the rest of your life?

RR: big dawgs are dope. but i would get mauled

RV: Big Dog Clothing is pretty hesh...It's a shame though, I could see you rocking their threads pretty hard.

RR: id be pimp dog

RV: Would you rather try to noseblunt El Toro or jump off a 3 1/2 story high building?

RR: noseblunt fer sure

RV: Would you rather be known as Ryan "My Pog Collection is Valued at 3K" Reyes or Ryan "Two ply!? Who do you think we are? The Rockerfellers?!" Reyes?

RR: pogs! i have some dope ass slammers

RV: Would you rather "hang out" *wink wink* with Miley Cyrus or Taylor Swift?

RR: tay tay

RV: Would you rather drink a whole brand new bottle of ketchup or have The Metal Mad Man wind up as hard as he could and give you a shinner with an AirCraft board?

RR: id let the mad man have a wack at my shinz

Locked and loaded! (Photo: Matt Price)

RV: You are a trooper. Metal Mad Man is the man...he'd give you a good, hearty whack with his trusty 12 year old AirCraft board! After pounding a hearty brew that is of course. We made it to the end! Now thank you who you want to thank (maybe even who you don't want to thank) and finish one last beer with me so we can go to sleep and rest up for filming a little video tomorrow for this interview thingy.

RR: yay! im going to thank alot of people so here we go. ohio dave, dave ashley, john lucero, jimmy astleford, jared lucas, lisa witaker, tim ward, matt price, steve davenport, jackson casey, stephen ostrowski, chris millie, justin modica, cody bear, ari shiffrin, wes baker, brandon jacobson, the loy fam, tyler harl, randy riv, ryan lay, damien, pops ,gma, dylan messer, ted shmitz, preston harper, epod, pete jasenski, mel, joe hammeke, johnny gomez, j-peash, ryan sublette, evan oki, michael pagani, mike mo, vince capaldi, tucson tim, and you richie. i hope i didnt leave anyone out im a lil dunk. sleepy time <3

RV: Thank you Ryan "Did you know they sell AC/DC apparel at Walmart" Reyes...You da man, big dog!

RR: not kewl

That wraps up the interview! Thanks for reading. Hopefully you got to know a learn a little bit about Ryan that you may have otherwise not known. This video clip below was filmed the day after we did the interview and was done specifically for this so that there was something to accompany the text in the interview itself! We basically just went and skated 2 parks right by my place for fun and got a few clips as well. It was almost my first time testing out my new Canon T2i camera...weeeeoww. Enjoy watching Ryan do his thing :)

Jake Johnson On Destructo Clip

2010-08-16T11:11:00.000-07:00

This is one of those dudes who's skating I am very, very into these days. I don't come across many people now a days that get me super stoked. The kind of stoke that I experienced as a kid growing up watching 411's and old Transworld videos in a crowded livingroom with all my friends. Weird, after years and years of seeing tricks, styles, and fads come and go you get somewhat bored with new stuff that is thrown at you on a day to day basis via the interwebz. It's almost easier to just go back to the archives and dig out a video that DID bring that cheerful, happiness of what skateboarding should bring to you. Old faithfuls. In my case, I bring out VHS tapes and watch videos like Zero's Misled Youth, Maple's Black Cat, the 1st and 2nd Tiltmode Videos, or videos like Modus Operandi and The Reason (what happened Transworld?).

My first time watching Jake Johnson's part in Mindfield brought that old feeling of excitement back to me. It was something refreshing. The music, the tricks, the spots...everything! The last time I can fully remember having that same feeling was when Nick Trapasso had his first Toy Machine video part. I'm sure that there are other people out there who are just fine with what they see in videos now a days...but for people who've been following this stuff for 10 years plus I feel it's a little bit harder to stomach some of the new stuff. Be it tricks, music choices, spots, or just the way someone rides away from tricks. Something just isn't the same. I want to thank guys like Jake Johnson, Nick Trapasso, Peter Ramondetta, Marc Johnson, and Pat Burke for keeping skateboarding interesting, fun to watch, and proud be a part of. In a crowd full of strangers who all do the same thing, it's not hard to point out which guys have a little something special hidden in plain view for all to see. That certain aura and glow that surpasses the infectious, monotonous visual aids that muddies up the world of skateboard video parts. You guys make me love this inanimate object with 4 wheels on it more than most people love their husband or wife that they wish would die and leave them a few thousand bucks to waste away on designer drugs and virgin hookers.

Jake Johnson ! Ride Destructo from D3STRUCTO on Vimeo.

By the way, Ryan Reyes' interview is almost done. I just need to do some finishing touches on his video clip that will accompany the text based interview itself. That will hopefully be up within the next few days so be on the look out for it. Also, be on the look out for Dylan Witkin's Mag Minute. I finished it up last night and it will be getting submitted today. I'm sure that there are other people in line, but it will be out soon enough. I can't wait for you all to see what Dylan and I have been up to since Skate Movie dropped. This shit will be turning heads for sure. Keep in mind that Dylan doesn't have any sponsors...lets hope that changes soon!

10:13 AM

2010-07-09T10:17:00.000-07:00

I was texting my good friend Mitch about our favorite skateboarders this morning, and today's "Best Text" comes in from him at 10:13 AM...I know it's a little early to claim it the best already, but what can I say, it made me laugh a little:

"How could I forget the one and only Rodrigo TX! Amazing new part, and Windsor is gonna murder the industry soon I feel it."

Prophetic last words? I guess we'll just have to wait and see...

Coming soon...

2010-07-08T00:45:00.000-07:00

I'll be interviewing Ryan Reyes. Yep :) I'm going to be posting the interview on here hopefully within the next few days. A dude whose brain needs to be poked around at!

Been hanging, playing guitar, and reading too much to as of late to post. Sorry. I know nobody even reads this shit besides like 2 of my homie's so I'm sure nothing is being missed. I've shot a few photos that i want to post, and been skating everyday that I'm off work as usual. Staying busy! Check back soon though because I'm excited about this interview with Ryan!

Riley's on Theeve

2010-06-21T12:34:00.000-07:00

Riley has been killing it as of late. One of my Facebook "friends" posted this and I felt like I should post it myself. I am so glad that he is getting the recognition that he deserves and is coming into his own. Riley is a really fun person to be around, and has a great sense of humor. I wish I still got to see him as much as I used to! Enough of the sentimental stuff though. Just watch this clip :)

Moist.

2010-06-20T23:34:00.000-07:00

Have any of you ever noticed how the word "moist," makes girls feel rather uncomfortable? I only know of two girls who don't mind the word, while all the rest want to punch you in the face for even beginning to form the word, let alone following through with it and actually saying it. I happen to like the word, nor do I ever hold back when feeling the urge to say it in front of girls. You don't even have to say the word "vagina" after saying it, and they STILL get mad. Who's really the pervert in this situation? The person saying the word and not using it in the context of a vagina in anyway? Or the girl getting upset because they probably did think of it in that sense?

So to all you girls out there, get over it! There is no other way to describe good cake besides "moist." There is no better way to describe the heat and humidity in the Dirty South other than "moist." And there certainly is no better way to describe your no-no special place when you're happy besides the every so pretty sounding word "moist." Get over it!

I haven't had a chance to blog in a while because everyday after work (and after getting in short seshes at the Culver City Park when I can after work) I tend to come home and just mess around with my guitar or read. After sitting in front of a god damn computer all day at work, sometimes the last thing I want to do is sit in front of a computer again when I get home.

I have been sick for the last like 2 weeks and that has also helped in hindering my ability to want to do anything after work. Getting sick is kinda crazy when you think about it. There is just a straight all out microbial war going down inside of your body and because of this it makes you insanely tired and unable to function properly. I personally don't trust the pharmaceutical industry, and because of that my sickness has probably lingered around longer than it should have. Skating it out is what usually seems to work though ;) too bad I'm not skating as much as I would like to be!

MOIST!

Yesterday I went to this music festival in Santa Monica and got to see Minus The Bear play. If you freaks haven't heard (or heard of) Minus The Bear then you are seriously blowing it. A bunch of other bands played at this free festival that Pac Sun put on, but Minus The Bear was the only one that I really want to see and they played sooooo good! They kind of butchered the song "Pachuca Sunrise" unfortunately, but it was still insane to see them for free, outdoors, and on the beach! Here is a song from their new album Omni called "Into The Mirror" that you should all hear and enjoy:

Today I went skating down in the Costa Mesa area with DLoy, Ethan, and Dominick. Dom actually informed me that he checks my blog everyday and that is exactly what made me want to make sure that I post today. Now that David drives it is nice to be able to drive down to OC and be able to leave my car somewhere and hop in his car for the rest of the day. David and I have been talking about this day for years, and I am stoked that it is finally here. Now I get to cause a ruckus while he drives and not the other way around. PS E-Pod dos in fact "rulez."

We went to a pretty cool gap today. It was bigger than I thought it was going to be but I felt like I needed to ollie it and I did! I hardly ever skate gaps anymore, but it felt good to ollie a decent sized gap :)

Dominick got a sick trick over the gap! I don't want to say what spot we were at or what trick he got, but rest assured it was rad. His homie Jackson is making a video I guess and he is going to have a part in it, can't wait to see what foootage lil homie is sitting on! The trick that I filmed with him today will be in that video part, yipee!

Since David is currently hurt right now he was there as moral support. Besides that he was also there goofing around as usual. Of course he found a fire extinguisher in the abandoned building...and of course he had to mess with it!

Dom and I ran out of the warehouse with the quickness! I didn't notice how much was being expelled from the extinguisher because I was looking through the lens of the camera and when I took it away from my face the entire place was filled with white powder. So sketchy!

Dom and I ran out with the quickness! David didn't. He stepped out of there with the speed of Michael Myers, and the cool guyness of Dyson Ramones himself. Ovs.

Here is a pic of Dom that I took before we left the spot. I told im I was going to turn it into a fake Shake Junt ad, but I guess I was bluffing.

Picture wise that is about all I got. I didn't go skate at all last weekend and since I went to the music fest thing yesterday I only skated today this weekend! It is so weird when I don't skate all day every weekend. I don't like not skating all weekend. I was still rather sick last weekend so being on the chill tip was what I needed, but enough of that! Sick or not, skating is a must on weekends!

I'll end the post today with a "Best Text." This time it comes via Ryan Reyes while on I-Path's East Coast tour:

"Naked gall playing piano"

Then I said "pix0ritDiDnThappen," and Ryan replied:

"Haha hes got pants on now"

I seriously was laughing SO hard. It's kind of an inside joke so I doubt anyone will get it besides us two. Which is fine by me!

June 3rd, 2010

2010-06-03T20:19:00.000-07:00

What's up everyone?

I haven't posted for a bit, I was pretty busy the last few days and also came down with a little bit of sickness. Last weekend I went up north to Adam's house and spent the night up there with Trent McClung, Dylan Witkin, and Eduardo Craig. The reason that we went up there was to film a park montage for The Skateboard Mag website! We had a great time at the Santa Barbara park and hopefully it shows through in the montage once it is cut. I would have started cutting it already if this sickness hadn't hit me so dang hard. But as soon as I start feeling somewhat better I am going to start cutting away.

I've also been stacking clips with a certain somebody as of late. The footage is going to be compiled together into a Mag Minute, also for The Skateboard Mag. I'm not only excited to be cutting my first Mag Minute, but I am excited to get the homie in the limelight and let all you peeps recognize his gnar skillz. Figuring out the song for this piece is going to be such a bitch though...why must finding a song always be sooo, so hard.

Dan Robert's "Skate Movie" part went up 2 days ago, watch it! He skates to a super good song, and has some sick footy. Pay close attention to the massive hit that he blows out at the end of his intro, it just keeps going, and going, and going...so sick! Hahahahahahahaha!

Back From Germany

2010-05-25T22:35:00.000-07:00

Germany was crazy. Aside from Ted and myself both being WAY over the job about 2 days into the 6 we were supposed to be there, it was cool. Oh, and besides the part where we didn't get a single leisure day to experience the city of Hamburg, it was cool. Oh wait, aaand besides the fact that the agency didn't pick up the tab on anything and made us spend our money pretty much the whole trip so that it ended up costing us our own money, it was cool. I could go on like this forever with things that were "really cool" about the trip, but I'm starting to shake while typing so I will put that to a halt. I don't think my neighbors like the sound of blood coming to a boil and steaming out of my ears anyways. The whistle is a bit deafening.

The one cool thing about Germany was that the girls seemed to really like me over there. But now I'm back to the land of plentiful shame and girls who don't like me. It was probably just because I looked so different from what they are used to over there. It seemed like a lot of people in Germany smoked though. Nevertheless, the girls there never made leaving lipstick on a cigarette in an ashtray seem so sexy (PS I hate cigarette smoking with a passion). 7 out of 10 girls over there were beyond beautiful...the average girls there were like 69x hotter than the super hot girls here AND they were cool and easy to talk to. Suck on that American bitches. Fuck you. You aren't worth a damn thing. Nor do you don't make dysfunction fashionable :)

The trip back was kinda neat. I sat next to a Portuguese guy who skated on the 1 hour flight from Hamburg to Frankfurt which was rad! Then at the Frankfurt airport someone recognized me from TV! I thought that was pretty weird. I guess his kids watch FuelTV a bunch and this dad saw me on American Misfits Season 3. I was in the process of getting drunk off one huge beer and the dude says to me "Hey, I don't want to sound stupid but are you on any TV shows?" I couldn't help but laugh and totally thought the had me confused with someone else but he said he recognized me from FuelTV. I was in mid conversation with some random, pretty girl who had eyes that I felt like high diving right into and take up a temporary residence in, and had an accent that made me want to melt into a puddle on the ground while this was happening by the way. I wonder if this dude coming up and saying he recognized me from TV made this girl think I was way cooler than I actually am and made her have visions of seeing her hands full of my hair that seems to be stemming from somewhere between her legs as her back arches slightly further and further back...because if so...that would be cool *induce Beavis and Butthead laughter here*

But instead of going into that kinda naughty subject, or the overwhelming inefficiencies of infants how about we can talk about skateboarding? Because after a 12 hour flight I got picked up by my boy Elliott and we went and skated Culver City park for about 2 hours. I didn't think that this skin bag of bones and nerve endings could actually skate, but it was all that I could think about during the flight. That and the horrible nightmares that had been plaguing me for the last 2 weeks. It's a little hard to go after nightmares though, so skateboarding seemed like the reasonable thing to do. I stopped receiving a sign that says I'm here anymore...am I getting through at all? I swear these nightmares are going to get the best of me someday. But then again, how can you lose what you've never had anyways. Oh sanity, what a cruel game you play sometimes :)

The day after returning from the trip I went up to Dan's house and tried to skate but the wind ruined that fairly quickly. We went to one spot on Saturday and that was the extent of my street skateboarding this weekend. I got a trick though, I heelflipped this 3 stair sidewalk gap in Ventura and I was super glad to do it because the gap is actually bigger than I had remembered it. You already have to bone out at the damn thing because the flat(sidewalk) is so long and you also have to clear the part where the cement meets the asphalt. One of my sticks I landed right on that crack and took a hard slam right to my elbow. It still hurts to this day but whatever, I got the trick despite the wind taking all the speed as I pushed and pushed my little heart out at that damn gap.

I don't even really know where any of this is going and my finger tips hurt from playing guitar for hours and hours for the last 2 nights so I want to stop this at once. I will end this with a picture of Dan. At his house I was talking shit about how much I hate his "Gatorade bong" so here is his quote and pic regarding my shit talking:

Dan - "I got a drink out of this...and it's a bong. You can buy a $100 bong and what does it do besides get weed smoked out of it? Mine was 3 dollars, I got a good drink out of it and it gets me just as high as someone's $100 dollar bong..."

Fin.

Leaving for Germany

2010-05-13T13:59:00.000-07:00

I'm about to get picked up to head to Germany with Ted to do a job out there for a week. We've been working like crazy here in LA doing stuff for this job. Hence the lack of posting. Skated with Rob Maatman, Fred Van Schie and a few other really cool dudes at the Quicksilver TF on Monday night and had a blast. David's part is up also, check it out:

He worked his arse off for that part...show him some love.

Today's best text comes via Moose...he sent me this picture message that bummed me out pretty hard:

Adam Bertolet is the champion of the world.

2010-05-06T22:46:00.000-07:00

He really is. If you have ever heard me, or anyone of my friends saying someone is the champion of the world it's usually mean't to be an insult (especially when I say it to David). But in this case, he really is. The story of calling someone "the champion of the world" is a tangent I really don't feel like going down at the moment. Someday I will though.

There are not a lot of people that I personally consider "a really good friend," and I don't know if that's particularly a good thing, but it doesn't matter when you have friends like Adam around. There aren't many that I willingly call on the regular to want to hang out, skating, chill, party with...but Adam is on the list. I remember the first time that I met Adam I was at Santa Barbara park skating with Moose and a few friends when I saw some dude cruising around doing really cool tricks without putting much effort into them. I'm sure that whenever most people go to skate a park their "good radar" is flipped on and scanning for shredders. My "good radar" was peaking in the red zone when I saw this fucker riding around. Adam nollie heelflipped the mini 99 cent dock at the park super clean and I had to give him props and then started talking to him. We skated about, talked and then eventually exchanged numbers to go skate street at some point. Big Daddy Perks (aka Aaron Perko) and I were skating and hanging out at lot at that time (while I lived in Ventura) and the next time BDP came over to go night skating he brought Adam...and it's been on ever since! I didn't even know that they knew each other and then here this dude was standing in my livingroom ready to go skate. Perks told me he was rolling down from SB with a few friends, but I would have never thought Adam would have been one of them. This was like a month after our initial meeting at SB park so I was super stoked to finally see this dude again and see what he had for the streets. I remember it all like it was yesterday.

I quickly introduced Adam to Dan Roberts and they hit it off super good, and just like that Adam is part of the crew. My circle of friends became his circle of friends. I've known the guy for 3 years now, and as soon as I saw just how good Adam was as a skateboarder, and how cool of a person he was I quickly wanted him to be a part of Skate Movie (before the video even had a name or theme!). Adam is one of those guys that everyone likes. Plain and simple. It's not easy to be that guy, I'll tell you that right now. But I have never ever heard anyone say anything bad about Adam, he is honestly on the Theotis Beasley level. I know Thee-Thee. I know how nice he is, and how every likes him...Adam's seriously on that tip. Ask anyone who knows him.

And this may seem kind of strange, but when I think about Adam the movie Fight Club comes to mind. Not because he likes to fight though. Adam is a valet driver at a nice, upscale hotel in downtown Santa Barbara. Like most skateboarders, he gets pretty scraped up and bloodied from the streets. Hey, it's natural for US right. Well it's not so natural for most people in the world. I always wonder what it must be like for Adam to be at work with stigmata's on his hands from skating and having to deal with people and grab keys from random, stupid rich fucks. People must see how bruised, and battered he is and wonder just what their valet guy gets into in his spare time. I bet they would never imagine that the guy goes out and skates huge gaps, handrails, front blunts Hubba Hideout and kickflips out of smith grinds.

And that is where the whole Fight Club thing comes to mind because of the fact that Adam works as a freakin' valet driver and all the people that he interacts with have NOOOO idea how gnarly of a guy they are dealing with. They don't know shit. He is a beast. So undercover, and nonchalant about it. But don't put it his mellow demeanor past him because his skill always catches people off guard. No one see's it coming and when they do they realize they've got a real, hard ass skateboarder on their hands. Josiah Gatyln was caught off guard, I'll say that much. Ben Cabreana also works at a hotel and is a crazy, skateboarding maniac (who happens to play drums just like Adam...can you say twins?).

People like this is one of the things that I love about skateboarding the most. That there are people all over this world skating their hearts out just for the fun of it, with no sponsors (or those with flow but that are relatively unknown), skating because they love it and can't live without it. These people live among us. They park our cars at hotels, cook our food, make our coffee, ring us up at stores, and are out there working their jobs just waiting for work to end so they can go skate. I can't remember how many times I've been out in public and see someone and just instantly think "this guy skateboards." Maybe you've seen him at a spot or park but aren't sure, maybe his Emerica's look a little too beat up (on the left and right foot), or maybe you just sense it. Like it is an energy of some sort that gets transmitted between two people who may not know each other, but share a common love for something. You may not always ask the person if they skate, or ever even find out, but you know inside when you encounter a real skateboarder. A person who knows what it is like to have a genuine love for skateboarding and all that encompasses it. A person who doesn't just buy the clothes, the shoes, and acts like they relate and know what skating is about. You come across these moron's a lot more these days. I hate them, I'll say it. I don't care. The dudes that say "skate or die" or drop the name of a trick like they know what's up when you come across them. FUCK YOU. Go drink an energy drink, have your bro (lamest word ever), grab the nearest blunt object, and have him smash your stupid face in until all thats left is a pile of mush and bone/tooth fragments. Reduced to a paste that requires high tech scientific tools to figure out which douche bag you once were and what family blood line of idiots you belonged to. Alright...I don't hate all the fake, ass wanna be skaters that much...buuuut ;)

I could go on about how I am glad to have a friend like Adam in my life, but I won't because he knows that he's my friend till death already. If you ever see the guy out and about introduce yourself, talk to him, and find out for yourself why people just can't help but like the dude. Ask him his views on girls with 80's butt...that would be a great ice breaker, or just buy the man a Coor's light because he loves those cold activated Rocky Mountains. And with that I give you Adam Bertolet's part in Skate Movie:

PS today's "Best Text" comes via Adam himself when I told him I was doing a write up on him and it goes
a little something like this:

"I hope you mention how I'm a prestigious diamond collector, and also discuss my extensive and
numerous accomplishments in the field of marijuana studies...j/k"

His accomplishments in that field of study are intimidating to say the least.

A Nightmare on Elm Street Remake

2010-05-04T14:20:00.000-07:00

My dad was always a huge movie fanatic and I have fond memories of watching a lot of movies with him while I was growing up. Movies like Space Balls, Bill and Ted's movies, The Fly, old western movies, the Star Wars trilogy, and of course Nightmare on Elm Street movies.

My mom didn't have a problem with me watching the movies so much, but I think what she had a problem with was the nightmares I would have as a result of them. I remember being super young (maybe 7 or 8) and watching the 5th Nightmare on Elm Street movie and that night having one of the craziest nightmares I had ever had. It scared me so bad that I told myself I was not going to be watching these movies anymore. That didn't last long! Despite the nightmares, I could not keep myself from watching movies of this nature. To this day I've loved Freddy, and all that he stands for. I've always wondered what it would be like to be him! Feared by all, deranged, able to do whatever the fuck he wants, and down to just butcher the fuck out of people. I personally wouldn't do any of this obviously, but who wouldn't want to dawn the razor blade fingers and slash up some people that you down right despise. You may think I'm crazy myself for thinking this, but I really don't care...just telling the truth. I'm sure I'm not the only one who has ever thought this. There are other villain's out there that hold it down, but none like Freddy.

The movie is not as good as the original, but I sure as hell enjoyed every single minute of it. I'm always a fan of remakes because sometimes you just want to see how things can be done with the new technology that we have. I didn't particularly like the scene in the remake where Freddy comes out of the wall over Nancy's bed. The CGI was a little much. The original version of that scene just gives that scene a way creepier feeling. But enough of the comparisons. JUST GO WATCH THE MOVIE! I went with my friends Aryeh and Danny and we both came out very pleased. Aryeh was super freaked out most of the time and jumped like a mad man during every scene that surprises you...I was envious of his fear. I think I've watched too many horror movies and my tolerance is up super high. I was surprised and caught off guard for sure at times though, don't get me wrong! Come on, who doesn't like a good scare?

On a side note, what a coincidence that Clint Walker's movie title for Skate Movie turned out to be not only a movie that I personally love, but also a movie that had is opening night the same night as the Skate Movie premiere. It's like a dream come true. Clint's part has been getting a lot of play as of today. Ambiguous rolled out his part earlier today and it's already gotten blasted off to the right people. I was planning on putting up the parts on my youtube page one at a time, but I may just put the whole video up on Google video or something that way you can watch it in its entirety if you don't have the actual DVD. I'll figure that stuff out soon enough.

I'm not really stoked that some random dude that I don't know already put it up, but fuck it...it's inevitable right? I'll probably upload it to my own youtube page later tonight since it's already out so whatebbzzz! I'm leaving for Germany for a side job next Wednesday, I think the Ambiguous dudes may even be selling the DVD online so yeah, if you want a copy ASAP I will be dropping off a stack of DVD's with those dudes hopefully Saturday, if not sooner because I want them to get that shit before I leave for this trip.

Thank you to all of you that made it out to the premiere...I was a nervous wreck the whole damn time. Once more people started showing up I really began to lay low and didn't want to be seen or talked to really (besides my really close friends) because I had such anxiety. Before the major crowds showed up I was stoked, skating the park, had a great time hanging with Donovon and his Dad Anthony Piscapo (among others), but yeah...when things started to get a little more hectic I just kind of wanted to hide! Because of this I didn't get much of a chance to hang and talk to a bunch of the homie's that came out...but know that it meant a lot to see you guys there and have you come to support the crew of dudes. I wish that I could convey the message the way I want to but I fee like it's not really coming out right. The neurological connections in my brain seem to not have the strongest link to the motor skills currently powering these fingers of mine right now. But know that I am very grateful for you all coming and sharing the night with us all. And a special thanks to Clint Walker's parents for coming all the way out from Oklahoma for this! I had a great time talking with them and was just happy to finally get a chance to meet them (and see just who it was that produced the beast that is Clint-On). I told his mom that the dress code for girls was a Marilyn Monroe look, haha! I think she believed me.

Thank you all and sweet nightmares :)

SKATE MOVIE PREMIERE TONIGHT

2010-04-30T12:10:00.000-07:00

EVERYONE IN THE AREA...GO!

Plus a new screen grab to add to the mix...this was from last night and Ryan Reyes and myself were having ourselves quite a laugh with this one:

Marisa Dal Santo

2010-04-28T11:22:00.000-07:00

This girl, literally is, the best girl out there riding a skateboard. There are some other girls that hold it down, not going to lie, but there's something about this girl that really hypes me up. Her bag of tricks is cool, she looks a lot more comfortable on a board than your average girl skateboarder, and she seems to be pretty well rounded! She can skate gaps, rails, and do cool weird stuff as well! Just the fact that she does tricks other than front boards on real handrails should say something. Smith grind tail grabs!? Perhaps she's studied up on some Adrian Mallory footy (another amazing skater, and fun dude).

She is now riding for Innes Clothing, and this is her "welcoming" part. I am actually wearing a pair of Innes jeans today...what a co-inky-dink right? Watch her part:

My little buddy Donovon Piscapo rides for Zero as well, so while at Downtown Showdown a year or 2 back I got to meet and hang out with her because I spent that night hanging with Donny. She seemed like a really cool girl, and knew she ripped...but I had no idea she was as good as I would find out when "Strange World" dropped. Donny had told me she had skills, but a girl kickflip frontside boardsliding real handrails and variel heelflipping legit sets is not what I thought we were all in store for, no offense.

Zero's "Misled Youth" was my defining video for me as a kid growing up. I watched it sooooo damn much, and it will always remind me of why I loved skating so much then and now. And look at this, years and years down the line STILL putting out great videos. The whole Zero style fully influenced my editing style. Jamie Thomas may not know this, but there's a photo of him in the Thrasher with Chris Cole's Rincon front blunt on it with me standing next to him (along side Clint Walker and Daxter Lussier). I still trip thinking about that because of the fact that I grew up on Zero and was so influenced by that company..and now I'm in Thrasher standing next to that freaking guy! The people that grew up with me and knew me when I lived in Watsonville all know me by, and call me Chief...I bet most of you So Cal peeps didn't know that. All my bestfriends growing up, to this day, refer to me by that name and it's all because of you Logan Gritton (LOG!). I'm not indian but hey, whatevs. So technically, there's 2 Chief's in that photo in the mag, haha! By the way, all you people should not just download the video or watch it in parts on youtube...buy it and support the people who are out there breaking themselves off and pushing skateboarding forward. They need our support. I'm sure you can spare 15 bucks or so for the video.

Anyways, Marisa could be opening up the door for a lot more girls to hop on boards and actually want to go out and skate some real street spots and not just parks. As a matter of fact, I hope she does inspire a lot of girls to do this. Dan has told me before that when he was younger Tyler Hansen would see a hot girl while they were out and about and say things like "Hey Dan, imagine that hot girl right there backside lipsliding El Toro...in a bikini!" If Marisa keeps thing up we may actually be able to witness this! Too bad they took out the middle rail though because now these bikini clad bombshells who are going to flock to El Toro to be the first to make Dan and Tyler's dream come true have a little safety net and can bail the ollie and just flop onto the other side and roll down the grass. Goodbye full commit first tries, I guess. Hopefully the itchiness isn't too bad and they can continue to try. Tyler really did say that by the way, and other stuff along those lines. He is a true visionary.

So to all you girls out there, you may not have to skate in a bikini, you may not have to try to skate El Toro...but you may have to start stepping it up and working on your style, building your bag of tricks, and start gaining that board control. With girls like Marisa Dal Santo's and Leticia Bufoni out there doing man tricks, your little kick turns and no pop ollies just aren't going to cut it anymore.

PS Nightmare on Elm Street comes out on Friday! Same day as the "Skate Movie" video premiere...so if you don't see me at the premiere you know where I'll be.

David got his license today!

2010-04-27T23:51:00.000-07:00

This is a photo I shot of David in Utretch while we were on our 2 week trip out in Holland. This trip is actually where the whole concept for Skate Movie came to me...one stormy, drunken, night full of rain and lightning. We were staying at Rob Maatman's house and Rob and I were just hanging in his backyard listening to music, talking, and enjoying the weather while David and Robbin Oost were watching TV, playing video games, or something inside. I hate to sound cliche, but I swear one of those lightning bolts was the trigger to the idea. Like a light bulb turned on right above my head or something...cartoon style! It didn't come to be until after the trip when I was at home on a boring night in front of my computer with Final Cut Pro open and an empty sequence that I thought that just maybe the idea I had that night at Rob's wasn't so crazy after all...that trip was one of the most fun trips I have ever been on in my life. I had such a good time, hanging with friends, skating, kicking it hard every night, and just taking in a new culture and it's customs day in and out. Rob's parents took us out in Deventer (where Rob lives) the night before David and I flew back and they took us to a "Mexican" restaurant...Dutch style! Their twist on Mexican food was interesting to say the least...but they sure did have margaritas down! Rob's parents loaded me up with a good amount of those tasty beverages and got me super drunk. I think I was hitting on our waitress pretty hard. I would have married that blonde bombshell then and there, haha!

Anyways, back to what I wanted to write up here. I was working a side job for Cartoon Network today and I had a good amount of downtime at the first location so David and I were texting while he was at the DMV waiting to take his driving test. Sure enough he passed and got his license! Never thought I'd see the day. I don't even know what it's going to be like anymore now that he has it...actually I do know! After close to 4 years of me driving him all around Southern (and even Northern) California, it is time for him to drive me around for once! And David, I'm telling you right now, I BETTER HAVE PERMANENT SHOTGUN WHENEVER I'M IN THAT CAR! Congratulations buddy.

And on that note, I would just like to say that I don't care what any of you faggots out in internet land have to say about David. Granted, David has done some stupid stuff in the past, but hey who hasn't? I for sure know that I've done some stuuuupid stuff in my high school and college years...hell I did some really stupid stuff just last friday night on my birthday that I'm not proud of after leaving the karaoke bar! WE CAN ALL BE LAME AT TIMES! So don't go acting like you've never done lame things before because you know you have. And if you claim that you haven't, you're a damn liar. He knows he's done some dumb things (and I know it too hah!), but he has grown a lot. I've seen his skating mature over the last few years, and seen him grow as a person as well. And I'm not referring to his height (although I kind of am becuase we used to wear the same sized clothes/shoes when we first started hanging), I'm talking about him growing up in all aspects of the term.

Keep in mind he is still young, he still has some more maturing ahead of him, but I've spent enough time with him and his family to know that he has been raised right. He still drives me crazy at times, but I will always consider him one of my bestfriends no matter what. The two of us have had tons of great times together, endless laughs, and an inside joke list that we'd have to send off to NASA to calculate the numerical count of. A lot of the people that I know and skate with on a regular basis I met through him, so I am stoked for that as well.

So all you anonymous, faceless, shit talking, internet morons out there...keep your faggot ass in your chair talking your shit while David is out skating harder than you, handling business, and having fun on his board. DLoy's got a really sick part in Skate Movie and the tricks should talk for themselves. If reading this changes your views of me so be it. Fuck you, I don't need your acceptance. Let my close friends and I sit and watch you and your friends make fools of yourselves and act stupid with each other (all close friends do it), and I'm sure we would have a grand, old time pointing out all your flaws and making fun of the dumb shit you do/say. I'm old enough now to not care about what people think about me, my horrible taste in music or who I hang out with. Being considered "cool," isn't anything worth stressing at this point in life. I have David's back, and all my other close friend's backs, until the end. Fuck being cool, I'm over it. Apparently, it's a lot easier to be "cool" than it is to be "real," these days...

Birthday Weekend

2010-04-25T23:20:00.000-07:00

Here are some photos that got taken over the the span of the birthday weekend :)

I don't really remember how this ended up happening, but I remember being in the livingroom and everything was cool. I was talking to Adam and then I look back at these two and they're suddenly going at it. Clint is lucky that he got this Lake Forrest Locc before his "vato" transformation:

Next time Clint tries to test nuts, he's going to get the wrath of the numb chucks yo...he be doing indian burns too!

And then you got this guy! Held it down hard at 6 Flags all day. I don't think any visitor at the park got yelled at more than David.

This was us in line for the new Terminator rollercoaster. Wait is that Shawn Hale standing behind me in the photo? No wait that's just Heath Ledger!

This photo above is one of my favorites from the weekend. Jason got a devastating right hook from Clint while we were on one of the rides...bet he didn't see that one coming. Looks like that girl behind Jason didn't see the photo opportunity coming...

I really don't know what the hell was going on in here, but from the looks of it I walked in on Clint reenacting a victorious scene from an epic movie ala Clash of the Titan's or 300.

Last photo to add to the mix is myself shotgunning a draught before heading out to 6 Flags...and if you know me pretty well you know I hate beer (and most alcohol) so this was no easy feat. But I took some down before getting on the road.

All in all, I had a great time this weekend. I had so much fun being with the homies, roaming around 6 Flags like we were all 13 years old. Pissing people off, getting yelled at, making fun of just about every person that crossed our path. Sounds like the stuff we do while we're out skating. Hopefully people were making fun of us while we were there. It's crazy how a place like an amusement park can change one's mentality completely upside down. We were all so excited and eager to get on the next ride, figure out who was riding with who, and of course figure out what section of the ride you wanted to be on. David, Dylan, Dan, (too many D names) and myself all have season passes now so I already can't wait to go back! So bummed Dan didn't get to join us on this escapade :(

A bunch of us met up at Boardwalk 11 Karaoke Bar after 6 Flags and had a wild time over there. I sang a Styx song, Adam sang some song that he ended up barely even singing, however he somehow managed to bum out the karaoke DJ super hard so it was a solid performance on his part. The highlight of the night I think was Toby singing the yodeling song called "Cattle Call," and I think that most people in the bar were NOT feeling that one at all. I heard him sing the song once before and honestly almost died of laughter, so I made him sing it again and again I had another laughing induced near death experience. Toby holds it down so damn hard!

Thank you all for coming and hanging out. It meant a lot. Thank you for all the drinks! I somehow wasn't hung over, but Adam sure as hell was! I literally was drinking tons and tons of water the whole night non-stop and I know that that saved me the pains that Adam suffered (then magically skated out later in the day). Today was such a weird day because I had plans to go film with Sean Peterson today, and then somehow just ended up staying at home and just chilled. Something I almost never do on weekends. I am always out and about. It was a nice change up from always being on the go. Got to just relax, got lunch with Danny, and then watched a super good movie with my other friend Elliott. I don't know if I am planning on spending another Sunday like this again anytime soon, but after the hecticness that was Thursday through Saturday, it was perfect. You should all watch the movie "Bronson," because it was one of the craziest movies you will ever see. The shot compositions, lighting, and acting are sooo amazing. The whole movie is on point, PERIOD! So watch it, and bask in all it's glory. The main actor does one of the better performances I've seen in a LONG time. I'm ready to lay in bed and read, so you should all go pick up a book and do the same ;)

I also have a "Best Text" entry to add to the mix. This one came via Adam Bertolet:

"Coors Light just keeps getting better! Heard a commercial on the radio, they have a window on the box now so you can sea if your beer is cold as the Rockies before u buy it!! So smart"

Adam's love for Coors Light is deeper than the holes in your bowling ball.

Hyper

2010-04-17T13:20:00.000-07:00

"Hyper" is a short film that was written and directed by my close friend Derek Rydquist. Derek is the singer of a band called The Faceless and used to be the singer of (the now defunct?) band The Taste Of Blood. Derek used to skateboard back when we were in high school, so he knows a stylish trick in a video from a lame trick any time of the day.

I remember shooting this like it was yesterday. I remember being at my beach house in Oxnard Shores hanging out in my room while waiting to be picked up by my friend Barrett, and I specifically remember eating a special kind of brownie prior to being picked up...just to make the 5 hour car ride up to Aptos a little more interesting. Isn't it funny how sometimes you think of a certain event (or time in general) and it's almost feels like a little worker bee inside your head goes to your memory vaults, grabs the proper laser disc that corresponds to that time, pops it in, and everything is there for you recount: sights, smells, conversations, textures, hopeful thoughts. That is how I am feeling right now. I remember it all! I am also currently thinking about how I always find myself thinking to myself "I'd give anything to go back to that day/times." I think I find myself saying that far too much. I wonder if I have already started to hate my life and everything I do so that the only things I really want anymore are good times I've already head. Or if the times were just so fun that I want to laugh at the same things again, be surrounded by those people, and experience a slightly less hectic life. Luckily it's the second thing I listed here and not the first option. I'd rather you reading this be the one to hate your life, and not me ;)

I do remember when Derek emailed me his script for this project and being so excited because I could already see the thing becoming visualized in my head. If only we had a budget we could have made this damn thing look INSANE! Buuut, what can you do...Derek was in college, and like most college kids, didn't have tons of money to pour into this sort of thing. Either way, I think we did all that we could have possibly done and also had a great time doing it. "Hyper" very much has the feel of that one scene in the movie "The Rules Of Attraction" where the dude goes to Europe and basically loses his mind. One of the main actresses in that movie (Shannyn Sossamon) is bestfriends with my production manager at 2HH...I lose my mind everytime I see her. Thank you lovely lady for sparing me the cost of a European vacation in order to lose my mind like your cohort in the movie.

Enough of that, back to the short film...WATCH IT! Derek has a way with words. Although the narration may not have been recorded (or edited) the best, what Derek says is gold! Great stuff. There are also many of my friends in the short which is just hilarious (when you know the peeps): Ryan Murray, Daniel Rodriquez, Chelsea Altman, Brittany Norris, Morgan Arnold...hell one of my limbs is even in the film! I've finally made it! I wish I could do stuff like this more...I want to cut short films and narrative stuff so bad, I just don't have an "in" with that kind of stuff. One can hope right!?

Alright, I need to shower and get ready for Clint's Dekline demo at 9Star Skate Shop right down the street...if you're in the area GO! It starts at 3. And listen to Derek's band...cuz they're kewlz :)

Wednesday Funday

2010-04-16T12:01:00.000-07:00

On Wednesday I went down to Costa Mesa to have a meeting regarding the Skate Movie premiere and upon arriving at Hurley I was greeted by Dennis Loy and the doggies (Elvie and Ollie).

Dennis is one of the coolest dads you'll ever meet. He supports his son's and family to the fullest, and is such a down to earth guy. If you ever see him around with Ethan or David meet and greet! Him and the Loy family are like family :) And look at these pooches! Dan Murphy ain't got nothin' on these two! Haha, kidding! I don't know Murphy, but his dog looks rad too.

At the same time that Dennis spotted me pulling into Hurley, I spotted Mike Campos. This homies got Moreno Valley and Riverside on lockdown...good filmer and great skater. He'll manual your face off. Hopefully he's got some new footage that he's sitting on because I want to see some new shit out of this guy. This guy and I need to go back out on skate trips again...fun days!

Soon after arriving Bruno Passos and I had our meeting with 2 of the guys who are in charge of the premiere at Hurley and it went great. We got the logistics figured out, and everything is a go for the 30th. Everything went so well that Bruno even decided to crack open a Coors Light in lieu of handling our business. You can bet that that cold activated can got drank with the quickness (especially with the help of that wide mouth opening)...definitely emptied out into his system before those blue mountains could turn back to white!

Andre Genovesi even showed up and it was great to see him. I hadn't really seen or talked to him in a good while...not since like the filming of the first episode of Built To Shred Season 2. I used to skate and film with Andre a lot and then we kind of had a falling out and it was amazing to sit down and hang out, talk, and settle things. I've been a fan of Andre's since I was a young lad, and always was blown away by his insane pop and precise switch stance skating. The guy is a beast! Bo big, but such finesse. He is having a baby boy too! Congratulations Andre and Samantha. Peep that stash Andre was rocking, a nasty brushfire could start all up on that...lucky for him he doesn't smoke!

I got to spend a fair amount of time with Ethan as well this day. He introduced me to some great people who run a business called Krochet Kids and they're doing some really awesome stuff for people in Uganda. I bought myself and Allen a shirt from them, and the money is going towards some really good causes and helping out great people as well. Check them out and maybe pick up a shirt or a rad beanie (hand knit in Uganda!). Thanks for introducing me E-Pod...High 5!

After some much needed mellow, hang out time around the Hurley office Ethan and I ventured off to Costa Mesa park for a little sesh before the lights went out. Not much went down but I was glad to see some familiar faces. Dominick Walker, Myles Wright, and Jeff Carlyle...guys that I do not get to see enough. I love Myles and Dom...they crack me up non stop, good dudes/good times. As long as they keep they drawlzzzz cleeannnn!

Dominick has something in his hand there...hmmmm...he was pretty bummed I didn't let him watch what was on that shiny little disc :o

SKATE MOVIE PREMIERE FLYER!

2010-04-14T11:48:00.000-07:00

THE TIME HAS COME EVERYONE! Come one, come all. There is rumor that my homies "King Cheese" are going to be playing the premiere as well, and that FUELTV is going to be covering it. So bring all your friends, hang out, skate the park, mingle, make out beneath the bleachers, get caught smoking behind the handball courts, all that stuff...and of course watch Skate Movie.

By the way, "King Cheese " is my friend Ben Cabreana's band that is guaranteed to bum your day out, or bum your high out if you're that kind of person. Him and Blake are wild and like to have a good time while making their musical instruments squeal. Blake even has the best vertical squat I've ever seen while performing...it's a sight to be seen for sure. Ben was the winner of Slap Magazine's "One In A Million Contest" last year, so if you're not familiar with his skateboarding take a gander right down here:

Can't wait to see you all there, bring some hot babes too...they're always nice to look at while they stand around completely out of their element.

Chris Lambert hates fake boobs.

2010-04-09T17:38:00.000-07:00

As I hit the "title" box to type in what I would be calling this post Chris Lambert was talking about boobs...fake boobs to be exact.

That has nothing to do with my post, but my post is about this man, Chris Lambert:

That there is a bottle of tequila, and that there styrofoam cup contains said tequila. Barging the hard-A in broad daylight. Hard. I have sooooo much fun at work with when I'm hanging out with this guy in the office...if you had seen what he was just doing right now to an inflatable goat as I type this up you'd be cracking up. I grew up watching this guys skateboarding, and now I know him on a personal level...I still trip out on it. He's a legend. The stories he tells while hanging out are the best, he'll have anyone laughing till they're in pain. He even did this earlier when he decided to randomly start tickling me and gave me a headache that's lasted more than an hour.

I told him that I had started a blog and wanted to put him on it. Unfortunately, I didn't bring my D40x today so I had to snap a nice high quality pic of him...but that doesn't matter. Chris is the man, and I hope anyone who reads this gets a chance to meet him and get to know him. For my lack of a better photo I'll post some of his skate footage from the Expedition One days:

A new start...

2010-04-08T23:36:00.000-07:00

This is my first time posting and I don't really know how to start...I never really wanted to make one of these but now that "Skate Movie" is over...I figured why not start taking photos again and maybe start up a random blog full of skateboarding, rantings, music related things, video related things...things in general!

The last 4 or 5 months have been the most hectic times ever I feel like. Crazier than graduating from high school, scarier than moving away from home to go to college, more strenuous than graduating from college...and it's all because of "Skate Movie." I set a deadline for myself to get it done and I met the deadline...but meeting that deadline took every bit of energy I have in my short, little body. Since December of 2009, everyday after work I would come home and edit stuff for "Skate Movie" well into the wee hours of the morning. I would sit in front of a computer all day at work finishing up American Misfits Season 3 (the season premiered last Friday and episode 2 comes out tomorrow night on FUELTV), and then I'd come home and sit in front of my computer at home editing "Skate Movie" from about 6:30/7PM until at least 2AM every night, then wake up at 8AM and get ready to do it all over again. This, on top of being out skating and filming with the homies for the video ANY and EVERY chance I got really took its toll on me. This last month my body has been so weak from the lack of rest, and the last week especially. I felt like I was one of the living dead...blank eyes to the world, with one goal in mind. Crazy how you can get so caught up in something isn't it? How something that as intangible as an idea, something you can't even touch, but can only see in your head can take such utter control of your life...I like it.

Even though the post production is done on the video, and the journey of creating it is over it is all that I can think about. I think the fact that I have a finished piece in my hands that I can't show anyone is what is keeping me so excited and thinking. Im so curious as to what everyone in the video is going to think of video as a whole. No one in the video has seen anything other than their parts and maybe parts of the intro...and it's staying that way until the day of the premiere which is still 22 days away. The waiting makes me curious...

There is such a fine line between in the world of skateboarding videos with regards to doing something different. What I attempted with "Skate Movie" was something slightly different...but not too different. I wonder where it will end up on that fine line? Will I cross over into the "that was too weird" area, or will I stray over into that "that was cool!" area...which is where I want to end up obviously. I am beyond happy with the video, though! It is beyond anything I could have possibly imagined. The caliber of skating, the riders involved, the music, the tricks...I am so stoked. But then again, I am naturally biased because I made the damn thing. Time will tell...come to the premiere April 30th, at the Hurley/Converse HQ in Costa Mesa and be the judge. The waiting makes me nervous...

I don't know how this blog is going to do, or how it will even come across. I just know that I enjoy writing. Writing...does anyone do that anymore? I should say I like typing then. I don't do it as much as I would like anymore, but I do enjoy doing it and I almost never let anyone see what I write. So maybe this is finally be my platform to just write and let some of that stuff out.

I already know that because of this blog I am going to start shooting photos more. That way there is something visually (in the still photo realm) stimulating here besides my pointless, meaningless words. I have so much supplemental footage left over from "Skate Movie" and I want to put little pieces together (or maybe even just a raw clip) and let them be seen. Because otherwise they'll just collect digital dust bunnies on my computer and not get seen. On top of that, theres always an endless slew of youtube videos to be found and shared, so yeah...the stuff that I'm going to post is just going to be all over the spectrum. I'm excited to have a place to share links, ideas, articles, videos, photos...everything!

Here is one thing I am for sure going to do, and thats post a thing called "Best Text," where anytime I get a stupid text message (my friends provide me with a lot of these fortunately) that stands out from the rest I'm going to post it on here...with the phone number star'd out of course! (***) ***-3534 for example maybe a method I use to hide the persons number? Aside from that, I am a huge fan of desktop screen grabs...so you best believe I'll be taking screen grabs of tons of funny shit and putting it on here.

As a matter of fact...I'm going to post a screen grab from an iChat conversation I had with David about 2 days ago. Consider this my first "Screen Grabz" addition to the blog...with many more to come. I even have archives I'm sure of this kind of stuff. The photo archives will be raided as well and those will be posted whenever I have some free time to go through and find some cool ones worth sharing. Anyways...this screen grab is funny because David is soooo not down for the person that I said I was going to put in his "thank you list" in the credits of the video. The funnier thing is that you will most likely NEVER know who it was that we were talking about...and I think it's going to stay that way:

That screen grab really cracks me up and I don't know why! Those devil faces are a doozy, eh? Hahah! I'm going to be doing some photoshop work and making this lay out a bit more customized, and making a proper layout next week. So I apologize for the blandness right now. After I make the "Skate Movie Premiere" Flyer I will have more time to make this stupid blog look a little nicer. Later dewdz!