Sama Video Recap by Rider Arian Chamasmany
It felt like one of those days where you ditched school just because it was a beautiful day outside. Except in this instance, it was the large amount of work I had piling up that I ditched, and the “day” was more like a week. Old habits die hard I assume, but what right minded individual wouldn’t have done the same in my position? No one, that’s who. I mean, who could turn down a week long skateboarding adventure into a region that use to be known as “The Lost Coast”? Sounds exciting right? Well, it was. So absolutely breathe-taking’ly beautiful exciting, that despite the fact that the town we stayed in only had a population of 300 or so people, and the veggie omelet at the local cafe had just about an entire can of cooking spray applied to it, I would readily go back in a heartbeat. What the small town of Orick California lacked in hoity-toity health food cooking cuisine pizazz, they made up for with crisp clean air, and a lush forest complete with towering redwoods, a thriving elk population, and the Pacific Ocean at their back door. Our adventure’s primary goal was to film a Loaded promo video for the release of their new board, the Dervish Sama. So by Wednesday, our crew had comfortably settled into the mantra of waking up early, hittin’ the hills, and getting our production on.
But before we get into the delicious details, there are a few monumental things you must know about the forest, apart from it’s overall appeal. The first, is the scale of things. Suddenly you begin to feel small, like… insect small. Everything begins to fall into perspective, and instantly you realize how absolutely inwardly focused our lives are. All your worldly worries and fears melt away as you realize that you could die in this forest, and it wouldn’t make a single ounce of difference to these trees. In fact, in some silent way, I wonder if those trees were hoping my city slicker ass would fall and break my neck, just so they could get at all the nutrients my body is made up of. Just to synthesize my carbon rich frame into air, and to keep on with the cycle of life. It’s a real ‘bug on a windshield’ sorta feeling. Both unsettling, and surprisingly calming, all at the same time. The next thing you notice, is the sound, or lack there of it. Just the quiet wooshing of air through pine needles, and a singular chirping bird somewhere off in the trees. No cars, no helicopters, no sirens, no sounds. Just trees and air. It’s really something else, especially for someone accustomed to city living. And finally, you notice the color. The infinitely different shades of green and brown. Earth tones overload. You leave the woods being able to spot a red pickup truck like it was a road flare in a dark room. Your eyes adjust to the spectrum of green, and colors become something to be savored. Yes people, the forest is a special place. It’s like mother earth’s big buddhist temple, where you go to be humble, and live respectfully amongst giants. None of the rules of our modern day society hold any weight in this place. There are no breakups, no bands, no bullshit, just life and death, and the ebb and flow of the cycle of ends and beginnings happening constantly, all around you.
So as one can rightly assume, how fitting to venture off to this mystically epic location for a week, with five of the most wickedly awesome characters, to produce one of the most wickedly awesome videos. Right off the bat, the playback on the footage gave us goosebumps. This only leant itself to inspiring us to want to push ourselves to greater lengths to really create something special during our week spent in a tree hugger heaven. The stoke was at volume eleven for pretty much the extent of the trip. Each riders style complementing the next. Providing a range of longboarding abilities, from fancy flatland, to formidable freeriding. Everyone had their niche, their wonderful place. An extreme effort was made to get every line on camera. Lists were made, and by Friday evening every one of those tricks had been crossed off. For now, there is only so much I can say. There are things that happen on a trip that remain apart of that experience. I could write about the idiosyncrasies of the adventure until the sun goes down, but some things you just had to be there to experience. The dialogue, the jokes, the in the moment details about our adventure that will remain with those who were there for a long time to come. Maybe part of the reason why I’ll remember it is due to the people, maybe it was the location, potentially both? Potentially neither? Whatever the case, I just know that the end product should communicate just how wonderful and awe inspiring that journey to the forest exactly was. A seriously proper thanks to Loaded Board, Adam Colton, Adam Stokowski, Trevor Baird, and Max Watson for making that an experience of which the likes I’ll never forget. Thank you.
Adam Colton Film and Edit thoughts….
ADAM C. Film Thoughts
This video has a poetic element about it which is enhanced by the song. The video encompasses a nice balance of scenery and skating because as we all know skating gets us submerged in beautiful places at times. I had a blast putting in subtle sound effects to really bring out some elements of the environment (wind, waves, birds, elk). I feel like if you are in the right relaxed, calm mindset you can get fully submerged in this video with the skating and scenery; it will just suck you in. Stoked on Emancipator and the rights to the song “Safe in the Steep Cliff”; it works amazingly well with the footage.
Every single piece of filming equipment was used on this shoot, though we particularly focused on using our long lens (28-300 mm) to bring the action close. We focused at times on close ups of the board really following the board and footwork movement. Other times we just focused on showing the movement of the body, which is a really cool concept; not every shot has to show a board to convey freedom and movement. We will be exploring this approach more in the future. Adam S. did an amazing job rolling focus with the Cinevate Follow Focus, which we pretty much used for every long lens shot. The Atlas 30 slider really came in handy on the c stands and allowed us to get back in nature and do some fun shots. We rented an 8-15 mm Canon lens for the video to get up and close with the follow shots; if the rider looks close in the shot, well he was centimeters away, hahaha. This was our first time really using the Small HD monitor and it made tight follow shots, reviewing and focusing much easier. Still much to learn about using the full potential of the monitor.
Hope you all enjoy the experience; we had a blast making the video and wanted to keep it chill and fun and really show how the Dervish Sama shines with it lively playfulness.
Thanks to
