the predatory bird

Tag: Skateboarding

  • Tetherball: The Sport Behind the Sportsmen

    The release of A Place in the Sun proved that Russell Houghten can paint a compelling and pristine picture of skateboarding in Los Angeles. But, when something is all shiny there’s some part of each one of us that wants to reach out and start scratching it up a little. Questions can do that and critics might ask; Has Houghten become a slave to color depth? Is his equipment slowing him down? As stunning as his work is, has Russell Houghten’s drive to become the greatest action sports documentarian of our time imposed some limiting factors on his agility as a filmmaker? The answers are subjective. What we now know for a fact is that there was another camera eye on location during the making of New Balance Numeric’s first video. That eye was watching, thinking and planning before swooping in all like,
    “Yo, Tyler. It would be tight if we filmed a line here real quick while Russell’s all wrapped up with that time-lapse.”
    The result is part behind-the-scenes documentary, part alternative-angle compilation and part investigation into a new and troubling urban sport that’s sweeping the empty school yards of LA.
    This video contains many layers: Alternative angles; rare and exclusive new footage; still photography pasted in with a stock camera-shutter sound-effect; jump-cuts, titling, split-audio edits, cross fades, fade-ins and fade-outs; BGPs from Mike O Meally, Atiba Jefferson, Russell Houghten and possibly even Suge Knight strolling past Talib Kweli’s temporary parking lot. It is basically the Inception of skateboard videos. It is the dream within the dream and the thing I love more than anything else is that what happens behind the scenes of a Hollywood skate production is, simply, more skating.

    Annonymous asked: “How do you get these robust taught-chested sportsmen to perform these breathtaking moves?”
    Answer: “By refining my hang ten technique at any available opportunity and toning my camera arm on the Tetherball court. Judging from the shakycam of some of these clips it needs more work.”

  • Item Test: A Predatory Birder at Large

    Wisconsin raised, San Diego resident, Jeff Halleran, is one of the earliest proponents of The Predatory Bird. His personal blog is a veritable treasure trove of the Lesser-Spotted California Thrashers that he observes and documents around the San Diego area.
    Amongst other fine specimens you will find such rare and awesome gems as reasonably new Dave Coyne clips; rampaging Blood Wizard, Drew Dezort; the legendary Ed Devera and OG Zero rider Aaron Harrison, killing it consistently.
    In this quick video, Jeff puts his original Predatory Bird Lifestyle Item through some rigorous field tests. We’re happy to report that The Lifestyle Item does not disappoint.

  • Paper Trail

    The live-action performance in the intro to Joe Pease animation experiment ‘Paper Trail’ is truly exquisite.
    In this post Joe answers 3 quick questions about animation and the animators he considers to be some of the greats.

    Joe Pease on set

    What’s the first animation you remember watching that got you sparked on the medium?
    I would say Disney movies would’ve been the first. The Jungle Book and Sword in the Stone. In Aus we also had these short claymations between programmes called Pingu, have you seen that?
    Yes! I used to love Pingu, it was consistently pretty hilarious.
    So good! I don’t think Americans know about it.

    What do you think is the appeal of animation rather than live action?
    I like the look of certain styles of animation. I’m really into line drawn animation. Also, the fact you don’t need to rely on other people to work on it. There are not really any boundaries to what you can do either, which is cool.

    Which animators do you find inspiring?
    Frank and Ollie, the original Disney animators are incredible.

    This guy Bruce Bickford who did Frank Zappa music videos.

    Ray Harryhausen for how epic his stuff was before anyone.

    I’ve also been super into motion graphics recently. Here’s one by a production company in the UK called Animade

    What about Matt Stone and Trey Parker?

    Of course! How could I forget?
    Joe Pease up close

  • A Pictorial Journey Behind the Scenes of New Balance Numeric’s A Place in the Sun

    With the release of A Place in the Sun New Balance Numeric also announced that they’ll be adding Toy Machine’s buff & tight Jordan Taylor and Sk8Mafia powerhouse Tyler Surrey to the team. This turn of events does a great service to skateboarding as these are two of the truest rulers in existence and they deserve all the encouragement we can collectively raise. You can see more from them in the full-on, alternate-angles/behind-the-scenes video extravaganza that I’ll hopefully have finished by next week.
    In the meantime, below is a 7 part review of the recent past that includes the trailer for aforementioned video extravaganza and a photo essay covering a small portion of the making of A Place in the Sun.

    1) New Talent on New Balance

    2) Breakfast of Champions
    Hollywood! The home of cinema, celebrity and breakfast burritos a la Surrey, Taylor, Brown and Rattray!
    Dudes about to eat breakfast burritos

    The first thing we did after breakfast was stop by the clinic so Tyler could back tail this small ledge. As you can see there’s a sweet leaf sign with an arrow pointing at him.

    Surrey back tails outside the clinic

    Pretty soon Russell was standing on top of his truck uncertain as to whether he feels mildly anxious about this project or if he’s just getting hungry again. (more…)

  • A Forest in a Land filled with Trees
    The Last of the Jigsaw Decks
    and
    And Ambitious Photo Essay with a Loose Data Aggregation Theme: Part One

    When you spend time staring at all the small fiddly bits of a project – the individual trees – you can often lose sight of the bigger picture you’re building – the spooky woods, the deep forests and the vast, dense, jungles.

    Looking up at the brances of an old tree

    This is an old problem resulting from our only possessing two eyes and them being rooted in sockets located strictly on the front of our skulls. Luckily we have invented tools that allow us to see the forest as a whole; or at least get a decent impression of it.

    View over treetops at Culbin in Nairnshire

    So, what am I going on about? (more…)

  • Skate Teleportation: Only Built for Cuban Linx

    Sometimes, when my cat jumps into a cardboard box I’ll quickly shut the lid and carefully carry the whole special package to another part of the house. I’ll set it down, open it up and he’ll pop his head up and look around at his new surroundings.
    “You went in the teleportation module!” I’ll announce, grinning at my furry friend.
    The cat will stare me down with his piercing feline eyes.
    “You reckless bastard” his little cat expression says. “You did not take adequate clean room precautions!” he reprimands. “There could have been a fly in here and our DNA could have got all jumbled up together! What the hell were you thinking?”
    He’s right. It is dangerous.
    This is why the latest Following video is the best so far. Virtuoso sidewalk surfer and solid friend of the bird Kyle Leeper already knew about the perils of teleportation yet he forged ahead all the same.
    Here’s how it came to be: I transported my life to Portland to wallow in the misery of a northwestern winter. My departure from Southern California of course left a gaping hole but instead of getting depressed about what was gone Kyle got sparked on all that remained; smart Kyle. Joe Pease and him blasted around the streets of San Diego fearlessly hyperlinking between spots with little regard for the inherent hazards. If the results of their efforts don’t make you want to skate then we can be of no further help to you. Good day.

    Stereo Skateboards pro, Kyle Leeper, lives in Carlsbad, California, with his wife, his son, his fish, 2 dogs and another baby on the way. Below we discuss 7 profound topics including sponsorship deals, human reproduction, this video project and generally being stoked.
    Kyle Leeper at Moonlight BEach with Gull in Flight

    1. When’s the 2nd child due?
      Due right around the same time date as my first son was born, late August.
      Damn! So you guys must get horny right around the same time of year.
      Yup, right around December I’m ready to go!
      Well, it gets cold.
      Yeah, these harsh Carlsbad winters get pretty gnarly.

    (more…)

  • Following Tom

    At some point during the summer of 2012 Div called me up.
    “John!” He said.
    “Yeah?”
    “Will you film me and Tom [Remillard] fur AntiHero?”
    “I can try.” I told him.
    We met down at Washington Street to get a couple of clips and see where that led us but Div couldn’t make it. He’d thrown his back out troweling concrete for too many days straight. Ideally we’d have filmed a shitload of random skate clips and sent them to Deluxe where they’d have stirred them into something unmistakeably AntiHero but I get these ideas where I’m psyched on old Powell videos and…
    Well, this is the first thing Tom and I did while we were waiting for Div to heal up. It was originally the techno bonus of a short called HITAROCK. Obviously it’s not all one line but if you’ve ever seen Tom skating WSVT you may be like me in thinking that this dream line is not that farfetched. We feel it does a decent job of showcasing the ferocious concrete contours of one of the best renegade park projects in the world.

  • Following Jake

    Jake is from Eugene, Oregon.
    He lives in Portland, Oregon.
    He is the inventor of D3PO.
    He’s down to rip in the streets whenever possible.
    Jake worked on the Following video project with the shakier of 2 existing Predatory Bird camera operators (me).
    Jake and this camera operator spent quite some time searching the streets for just the right bin. Many were rejected before we eventually found the one by the tramlines.


    Jake would like to thank Krooked for flowing him the boards skated throughout.

    What’s so good about The Smiths compared to Morrissey? (more…)