This morning I met up with pro-photographer Stephen Wilde  to shoot some photos for a story that Mountain Bike Magazine is doing about me. Their journalist David Howard has gone in to some depth about my career and lifestyle, so today we went to work on capturing that. A bit of trials, a bit of mountain biking, some yoga poses, and, oh wait, shoot, I forgot to get him to shoot me drinking tea!

I have never shot with Stephen before, so I browsed his website, and could immediate tell that he’s got an eclectic taste and style, and the images struck me as very film like. Sure enough, he used 3 or 4 different film camera’s today, in a variety of formats, and like a ‘ol film pro, didn’t use the flash once. Here are a couple images from his website.

I have been a hobby photographer for a good part of my life. Watching my Grandpa patiently take nature photos, then seeing my dad run around the mountain taking photos of me cross country racing, photography has been bred in to me. I remember my Dad teaching me about shutter speed and aperture; and then going out to experiment on plants, bugs and trees. It was such an enjoyable learning curve, and so exciting to see the results after development.

It has been a long time since I was on a film photoshoot, as opposed to digital. It’s almost weird not to be able to preview the image right after the shot has been taken. I think there is a rare confident patience that is inherent in a film photographers style, it’s almost romantic.

I have been a snobbish digital SLR user for the last few years, and was adamant that people could not tell the difference between a good digital image and a film image when put side by side. My ego was wrapped up in that argument because I had spent so much money on a nice digital camera set up. Over the last year or so I have been able to observe that digital ego, and of course, that allowed it to subside and me to see things from a different perspective. Caryn has always been drawn to film photos more than digital, part of it may be noticeable, and part may be just in the patient artistic touch that comes through in a film image.

Thanks for the shoot today Stephen!

One of the joys of living in the Vancouver area is that the snow is conveniently located up in the mountains. That hasn’t been the case for the last week or so, it dumped about a foot and half at my house, and that seriously put a cramp in my pre-season trials riding! I don’t really consider building a huge snow fort training. Now I know I am totally spoiled living in Vancouver where most of the winter I can ride outside no problem, and I know a good chunk of the people who read this may be in the middle of a severe winter lock down, I feel you, I really do! I guess I’m just psyched to get riding! It’s a nice time of year for me to ride, my show count is low, so the time and energy I do spend on my bike is mostly fun practice. I am busy booking shows right now, and pretty soon it’ll be full on demo time, and my energy level for extra practice will go down.

Talking about Vancouver weather, and talking about demos, I have some shows coming up in Vancouver for the Outdoor Adventure Sports show. Anyone living in the area that is interested in going can print out the 2 for 1 coupon I have attached below, love to see you there!

One of the most common questions I get about Crux is whether the soundtrack is available. Well it is now through iTunes, just search for ‘Crux Soundtrack’. Corduroy Kid worked some magic on this soundtrack! Here is the announcement directly from the musician himself:

“Okay so I’ve been lending music ahemm licensing music to these outdoor filmmaker thrill seeker types for the last 4 or 5 years right. Well last May, my friends, filmmaker Alex Levigne, and allstar world trials/yoga zen like rider Ryan Leech asked me if I wanted to compose a soundtrack for their film. This film would follow 3 riders from Victoria BC thru to Nova Scotia, and on to Austria on Ryan Leeches summer tour 2007. I had a couple of ideas kicking in my brain bucket regarding tempos after having worked on a couple of Ryan’s previous films. I gave these guys two pitches ‘Sonic Pleasure’ and ‘Mood Ruff’ this in return gave them the inspiration to ride to the new music on their ipods and start filming…kind of a reverse process for soundtracks…but very cool. After the first two songs, these guys mainly wanted Corduroy kid flow with lyrical gravy…which was really really hard for me…. after all, how do you write lyrics about riding a bike etc…without writing lyrics about riding a bike. In the end I think some cool lyrical relationships were formed and it’s a damn good record on its own…so with that said go check it out on iTunes, it’s only $6.00!!

Love to all of ya, Shawn”

On that ‘note’, I’ll sign off for now! Ryan

After a year of chatting with pro photographer Haruki Noguchi (Harookz), we finally managed to get out for a shoot. We decided to go back to my chain line from Crux at night because Harookz had some great ideas for lighting.

I arrived at the shoot hoping to get far enough along the chain to get the photo, not really expecting to make it all the way up on to the jersey barrier at the other end; but after about 30 minutes of attempts, I managed to clean the line again, ahhhhh! I wrote a little caption to go along with the photo for the magazines, here are those words: My fascination with riding the most questionable objects has been so enjoyable. Curiosity is an element, the romance of being ‘the first’ is an element, but primarily the euphoria felt when cleaning the envisioned line unbeatable. The most difficult aspect of this line, and most others for that matter, is my mind. It has a habit of focusing on elements of the challenge and blowing them out of proportion. For instance, the fact that the first jersey barrier wasn’t in line with the chain drove me crazy; and thinking that I’d end up on my face if my front tire didn’t roll on to the chain just right spooked me to an unnecessary level. Working through those issues is enjoyable to me, and getting to that state where I can just let my body do what it needs to do is a fantastic experience.

Harookz and some of his gear; checking out the shot together.

Hope you’re all well! Ryan.

Bringing Trials to the trailsRyan Leech has a unique way of riding. He claims to be a trials rider, has made videos on how to ride trials, yet his style of trial riding has a unique appeal. Most trial riding I see does not appeal to me, riders bouncing around on their weird looking bikes, generally looking discombobulated. But Ryan captivates my interest, he always has. There’s an element of his style that lends itself to flow, to a certain purity of aescethetic. His riding is visually pleasing and astounding in nature.As a mountain bike filmmaker, there are certain qualities I’m constantly in search of. These are great locations, spectacular light, and unique riders. The first two are self explanatory, but what constitutes a unique rider? I’m looking for riders that have personality, can express themselves and first and foremost have a riding style and matching ability that separates them from other riders. This might be a little too simplistic, there is something more that only really translates when you see the footage. Some riders simply look good on film, while others don’t. It has to do with style, flow, presence and some other indescribeable qualities.I’m approaching the 10 year mark of mountain bike filmmaking. I’ve seen the sport blossom, witnessed the first 5 freeriders getting their first sponsored bikes and filmed them trashing them with their cowboy like antics back in 1997. Now there are so many sponsored riders that I know just a handful of them. But what hasn’t changed is that to make a great mountain bike film you need to pay attention to what is unique. Like making a fine dining experience, you need the great raw ingredients if you expect to make a culinary delight. Same with a mountain bike film.During the filming of Kranked 5, I really wanted Ryan to bring his trials riding out of the urban environment and into the forest. We ventured into the forest and attempted to translate Ryan’s riding onto the trails. I was stoked, it was all there, it would look fabulous, it was new, fresh and spectacular. But my mind was too far in front of reality. Ryan couldn’t hook it up. He gave it a hell of a shake though. It was apparent that he needed some time to get used to the new environment, get a bike more suitable to the terrain and I think most importantly get his mind working on the translation from urban to mountain.Three years later I showed Ryan a location I had found. A mystical, mid-elevation old growth forest ravine with a beautiful creek running through it. THe place is beautiful and inspiring. Within minutes we had found a natural flow for a trail, utilizing the natural elements that were present. Ryan’s imagination took off like Dodge Viper at a Las Vegas intersection. He started describing the indescribable. “Build this, make it this far apart, I’ll gap that, side hop this,, make some 10 foot posts, here some skinnies - 2 inches wide.” Soon he had it all sketched out. He was psyched, hell I was too. It seemed Ryan was ready to bring trials into the trails.The trail crew began building. Ryan came up and refined the build, making sure everything was perfect. I’ve noticed recently that the riders successfully pushing the boundaries all have two things in common, they are great riders and they are amazing tacticians. They know exactly what they and their bike is going to do. How big the gap needs to be, where the transitions must be placed, what will work and what will not work. Gone are the days of winging it and hoping for the best. The trail was built to fit in with the natural beauty of the forest. It is a piece of art. I’d like to think of it as a homage to the forest and how we humans can interact in a non-destructive way with this pristine ecosystem.But this trail is crazy. It does not appear to be rideable. Ryan designed it, explained what he was going to do on each section, so we built it. But now, I look at it and wonder. Is it rideable? Is Ryan able to pull this off? I have moments of angst. The trail took a lot of work to create, it would be such a drag to have it flop, to have been overzealous in our ambitions. But Ryan is a master tactician of trials riding. I have to trust it will happen.Ryan waits for a new special bike. For the first time I have filmed with him he is going to ride a full suspension bike. It’s necessary to be able to make some of the more ambitous moves. The geometry is all different from his usual bike, a bike he knows intimately. Now it’s new geometry, and rear suspension to add a twist in how the bike handles. Ryan will have to adapt his skill set to the new bike.With anything worthwhile it seems you have to go the distance, put extra effort in to realize the vision. Although we are still not finished filming the trail I ‘m feeling confident that this segment has that special uniqueness to it. An innovative, visually pleasing rider, a spectacular forest location and that indescribable element that puts the sparkle on the screen. Ryan has that special uniqueness about him that has allowed him to once again create something spectacular. In this case he has pioneered bringing trials into the trails and let me tell you, it’s damn cool.To check out what this is all about see PROGRESSION - Kranked 6. Ryan rocks it.