parimaj media

Check out this blog that linked to the Too Nice teaser. It’s called Addicted to the Hype. Lots of cool shoes/fashion thingers get posted on there. Take a look.

Online edit compilation of LINE Minnesota MC Tony Seyffer.
Shot at: Breck, Keystone, A Basin, Ruby Hill, Spirit Mountain, Summit Boardshop.
Audio: Is It Me / 4:21… The Day After / Method Man

I had a lot of fun shredding on roadtrips with Tony this year. Hopefully his life isn’t devoured by tax forms so we can ski some more next season.

My first FBML page. Click through it, a tiny bit of diversity and visual excitement in the sea of uniform profiles.

LINE was very nice and posted this video for me, take a look!

In case you missed it (sorry, im slacking on the posting!) Here is the teaser and NS Article. Also, if you haven’t noticed, there is a dedicated TOO NICE section on the site now, look up and check it out!

Here’s an interview I did with the Vail Resorts blog buzz.snow

You can read the edited version here, but I think for the sake of brevity, a bit of context was lost and I sound like an asshole. Here is the original version I submitted where everyone gets the props the deserve.

Give me a little background on your crew- how did you get started in film? Who are the skiers? Who films/edits/produces?

I started filming probably about seven years ago when I was still in high school. My buddy had a little digital camera and we made a snowskate and snowboard edit with a couple friends. There was one shot of me knuckling a jump on some rec skis in there too. We were complete gapers and loving every minute of it. From there, it was just getting clips all the time, winter or summer, whatever sport and dreaming big.

The skiers are simply just us and our friends. I’ve never thought about taking filming skiing seriously enough to like, seek out bigger and bigger names to shoot with you know? It’s not about workin’ hard to get banger shots and to show off, its just simply, documentation. This is what we did, let me show you it because it was a blast. I spend as much time in front of the camera as behind it, its a crew thing, we just take laps and hot potato the camera back and forth. I think I like skiing too much to take filming to the next level.

I kinda filled in a sort of, director role for Too Nice. We had a different four man production crew last year, and the other three guys besides me moved out west, so, as the ‘veteran’ I’m trying to guide the progress of the movie. I sought out the help of three new filmers to make it another real collaboration. We all take shots, get shots, and edit the shots. It’s very much a team effort.

I see that MN is the clear inspiration/influence for Nice. How did that collaboration start, and what was the success of that film?

The idea about a statewide collaboration movie in Minnesota has been kickin’ around for a quite a while, I want to say around 2005. A now good friend of mine, Steve Janisch pitched the idea that all the crews in the state should get together and put together a banger edit to show everyone what Minnesota was all about. It was dubbed ‘The Minnesota Movie’ and after talking back and forth forever, the idea fizzled and died. You can read the thread right here on Newschoolers actually, there’s like 20 pages or something ridiculous like that, http://www.newschoolers.com/web/forums/readthread/thread_id/196804/.

Two years ago, I came in as a freshman at UMD and met David Baillargeon and Jake Strassman (he’s the guy who was in that director role last year, Jake really made Nice happen), a Senior and a Junior at the time. We were all filmers in the same city riding the same hill, and we all started editing movies at the end of the season, so we decided to throw a couple movie premieres with all our flicks. Its always a good time to get the whole community together and watch each other ski on the big screen. A few months and a fair bit of head scratching later, we figured we might as well combine our efforts and finally make the Minnesota Movie happen. We wanted it to be Minnesota from the inside out, the skiers, the locations, the music, everything. I should mention, Travis Halverson was the fourth member of Nice’s crew, he’s been making sweet local movies with David for a long time, but that’s another story.

Nice did something special for our scene. We made like a hundred DVDs, some stickers, and a few dozen shirts, and that’s a ton of cash to invest into local movie swag, or so we thought. We did three premieres of it, two in Minnesota and one in Milwaukee at the Midwest Ski Film Festival. After the last premiere, we were basically cleaned out. I couldn’t believe how much stoke and demand Nice had generated, it was unlike any local movie we’d had around before. Nice got us national attention. Hell, we even shipped DVDs to England and Germany too. We had more people asking for DVDs than we had made. I still have kids asking me for stickers all the time. I mean, we definitely didn’t throw down the biggest tricks on the gnarliest features by a long shot. We didn’t slide as many handrails as we probably should have, but what we did do, was create this kind of unity that brought the state together. I’m really proud of what we accomplished.

Does the sequel, Too Nice, carry the same MN flava’? Or did you spend time filming elsewhere?

We’re technically not calling Too Nice a sequel. Without Jake, Dave, and Travis, I don’t think it can properly be called one. It’s mostly new people, so it’s just a tribute to Nice and all it did to bring us all together. It does follow the same formula though, Minnesota skiers, locations, and music all the way through.

We filmed quite a bit more than what was seen in Nice last year, other places in the midwest and out west. That stuff is tucked away in the bonus features and Too Nice will be the same. I spent quite a bit of time traveling elsewhere this year, four weeks in Colorado and three or four to Mt. Hood Oregon. A lot of the stuff we did out west would probably look great in the movie, but it’s not fitting with the theme, so off to the bonus section or the internet it goes.

What has been the response to ski films coming out of the Midwest? Admittedly, it’s not a mecca of skiing. How are you overcoming that perception?

For the most part, I would say it’s positive. There’s people that hate, you know like ‘those tricks weren’t that hard’ or ‘less park, more urban’ but like, that’s not really what we’re going for. For me, this movie is all about the spirit and friendship of Minnesota skiers. It’s a movie for the everyday skier you know? Like, let Level 1 come in and slay our handrails, that’s cool. We’re not making a Level 1 or Poor Boyz movie in any way. Everyone around here gets stoked on local flicks, and they have been for years, because it’s them and their friends ripping around like they do everyday.

I don’t think about overcoming perceptions really. Minnesota will never be a destination for awesome terrain, that’s a given. People will say what they want to say. Minnesota has produced some nasty, nasty skiers over the years, that’s a fact. Too Nice isn’t going to say, ‘oh hey those guys are making do with what they have,’ either, even though we tend to do a fair bit of that. It’s just about us having a damn good time. I think, in a time when most skiers are taking things too seriously, we’re just kinda chilling and doing whatever. A 70/30 urban to park ratio would be banger, but I’m lazy and so are most of my friends.

Who are your sponsors? How do you make the films happen?

Too Nice is sponsored by our mothers, student loans, and my credit card company. There’s no question, making a movie is expensive. You can blow through a lot of gas traveling to ski other parks and scouting and setting up an urban with the whole shebang, drop in, genny, lights. In an effort to cut down on stress and annoying phone calls from aforementioned sponsors, we try and do it simple and cheap.

Us as skiers, there’s several of us out there in the flick that get some flow support you know, but some free skis or gloves doesn’t make a movie happen. Like I said, it’s a DIY thing. We take it out of pocket and film ourselves doin’ what we do. Also, we are really good at being gypsies. The last time I went to Jack in the Box, I left with about 732 packets of taco sauce. I put them in the basket I walked out of Safeway with.

Some people I do have to thank for supporting us for real though, are the fine people at Continental Ski and Bike for forking over the cash to bring in the pro movies to headline our premieres. I’m glad they continue to do so because it’s nice to involve local shops in the local scene. Plus, I like my minimum payments where they are.

When does Too Nice release? Any plans to take it on tour?

Too Nice will be out this fall. Hopefully we’ll do a repeat of last years mini premiere tour. I’m hoping to take the flick to some of the farther out scenes in the state. You can’t bring the state together if you are leaving people out! Also, we’re gonna kick it out online for free after the new year.

Any plans to make another film?

I think I’ll be making movies and edits for as long as I’m skiing. I don’t have plans to continue the Minnesota Movie theme though. I’m traveling more and more these days, and it will be harder and harder to document Minnesota skiing and do it justice when I spend less and less time there. Who knows though, there’s always a new generation to pick it up. Plus, everyone knows sequels suck and a third movie, call it ‘Still Nice,’ would probably be about as good as Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles 3.

If you asked what the most fun ski trip I had ever been on was, I would tell you right away it was my trip to Mt. Hood last July. That would also be filed under: craziest trip, scariest thing that ever happened to me, and would immediately do again. The big snag on last years trip though, was I came home with a $600 credit card bill. At $52 a day in the summer or $800+ for a summer pass, Timberline isn’t a cheap place to ski (It’s $54 a day this summer). I heard about the spring pass that Timberline offers when it came time to plan a sequel to the trip, it’s only $99. The price of a pass is the same as two lift tickets? Well shit, let’s go!

I made the trip with Erik Ringsmuth, Jack Stephenson, and a kid we met on Newschoolers from Illinois, Kyle Gipper. I meet a lot of my friends via Newschoolers, Erik for one, but I still thought it was weird, more stupid that a someone would want to go on a two and a half week road trip with three perfect strangers. Actually, Jack and Erik didn’t know each other at the start of the trip either. It ended up exactly like last year, planned to the last minute with mostly strangers.

We all loaded into Erik’s old family van and set off on the incredibly exciting 30 hour drive. Now, I’d been checking the weather for a week straight, 47 times a day, and all I saw was a forecast of rain. I try to be optimistic most of the time, but all indictions pointed to the possibility of the trip being a total fuck. I didn’t fully accept that that was our fate until we pulled into Government Camp, the town (cough) at the base of Mt. Hood, where it was pissing rain. We had stayed at our camp at the Old Airstrip for only long enough to stake a tent and tie up a tarp in a pathetic attempt to keep some potential firewood dry before running for the dry shelter that was the porch of the general store. All would soon be well though, we were about to go skiing the next day.

Just kidding. We walked into the Wy’East Day Lodge to find that the lifts were closed because of poor visibility. One of three days all year that lifts had been closed. What are the chances? We fled to the nearby city of Sandy for the first time. Armed with duct tape, more tarp, rope, and a hatchet, we constructed a gypsy base camp to keep us dry. There were two pillars propping this 20 foot long tarp up and drainage ditches to channel water away from the tent and fire, it was a masterpiece. Well, until rain accumulated on top of it and wrecked it. Daily. Alcohol makes everything better, and we indulged in quite a bit of whiskey that night. Me and Kyle channeled som Bear Grylls and set up snares and traps all around the airstrip using chunks of ramen as bait. They got increasingly elaborate, our best ones were a pit with a leaf covering, and a stick propping up a large rock that would surely kill a small unsuspecting animal. This is when Kyle discovers he loves whiskey.

Our first day of skiing was perfect. It was windy, foggy, cold, and rainy. Our second day of skiing, it snowed and the park was closed. Erik was not happy, he needs rails to survive. He sheltered inside on his iPhone while the rest of us lapped ankle deep freshies with our neighbors from across the airstrip, two guys from Utah name Trever and Mike. We met them the night before, but being the awful human beings we are, we didn’t remember their names until later, and usually referred to them collectively as Utah. The only chair that was open was the regular season park chair, which meant that it serviced three mostly flat runs. They had moved the park from that chair up to the late season location off of the Magic Mile not long before we had all gotten there. All that was left was a line of rollers that before were presumably, awesome jumps. Following Utah around though, we lapped the chair until close, finding small drops and gaps in the trees. An amazing day. I goggle tanned in the 45 minutes of sun we got.

We fled from the snow to Portland that night, to crash with Erik’s aunt and uncle. Five days into our trip, and we were broken and miserable. The rain, snow, and skiing situation had us completely dejected. We stopped in Sandy on the way there so Jack could replace his broken phone, and that’s where I met my first love of the trip. Her name was Verizon Girl, and I’m pretty sure she was hot. I don’t actually remember what she looks like, but after five days of no female contact, we all thought she was hot. We were chatting it up real nice, and on our way out, she said she was going to the Lake near our camp with her friend who was also female, and said how crazy it would be if she saw us there. Well, we’re all retards, and told her we were going to Portland to hide from the rain. Idiots. The Verizon store is where we discover that Kyle loves parkour. See Video.

Our night in Portland was amazing. We had hot food, showers, TV, and a dry place to sleep. Erik’s uncle even bought us beer, a cool local micro, because he spied a 30 rack of Keystone we had procured for Utah in the back of the Van. We wandered the downtown area afterward, and in the span of an hour, Kyle got shot down and called 14 years old by a girl on the street, practiced martial arts with a bum, and got his ass kicked by some nerds LARPing in the street. He was knocked over into a puddle. My friends are retarded.

Clean and ready for more, we left the next morning ready to ski. No such luck. As we re-entered Sandy from Portland, the battery gauge in the van started dropping. Does your car even have a battery gauge? Mine doesn’t, but this ‘95 Ford Aerostar did. We pulled over and let the van die after the headlights, wipers, and speedometer stopped working. The battery and alternator were toast. Cue $300+ spent and and an entire day wasted walking across town. In the waiting room of a repair shop, Kyle discovers he loves coffee. This day is also when our spree of petty theft begins. We left Sandy with a fixed van and dozens of packets of tea, hot chocolate, and saltine crackers. We are so good at roadtrip.

Our luck shaped up somewhat after that, it didn’t seem like anything else could go wrong at the point. We met some new neighbors and tossed a couple beers back around their fire. Actually, Kyle had already met one of them the night we set up snares. We were sleeping in the van to escape the rain, and Kyle, upon seeing a new truck pull into the camp, ran out of the van to meet them before they even got a chance to park. Allegedly, he wasn’t wearing pants, unsuccessfully offered them applesauce, and was very drunk. Eventually, it is revealed that me and Kyle were retards who propped up a rock with a chunk of ramen tied to it. Our neighbors think we are retarded.

Over a week into our trip, we finally get a sunny day. We dubbed it Magical Monday on the Magical Mile. Pretty soon after that though, Utah decides its time to call the trip off, it just wasn’t going to be worth it for them with the weather how it was. Mike blew most of his remaining cash of a handle of rum and an 18 pack of beer at the general store and we proceeded to go from sober to blackout in under an hour. We invited over some new neighbors, Idaho Dan the Man, Idaho Pete, and Idaho Pete’s girlfriend. We made asses of ourselves. There was puke and piss everywhere. Our neighbors think we are retarded.

A few days after that, I met my second love of the trip. Her name was Hot Chocolate Girl and she was hot. I actually don’t remember what she looks like either. As you can tell, I’m really bad with names, and most of the girls I saw were put in the ‘hot’ category because when you are camping in the woods with three other dudes for two and a half weeks, every girl is hot if she’s under 250 pounds. She was worth three points, I talked to her several times, and got a hug. I should probably explain the game we play on ski trips now. It’s the talking to girls game. Every girl you talk to is worth one point. Hugs are worth two points, you get the idea, the points reset every day. Well, I thought I was doing pretty good. Then I saw the braces. Abort mission. She keeps running into me the next couple days and talking to me. Jesus, how old did she think I was? All my friends have beards. My friends now think I will shortly end up in jail.

The trip was mostly uneventful until our last night, we passed the time by drinking in the van, off-roading and almost flipping the van, poaching wifi in the van, sitting in the rain in the van, stealing shopping baskets from chain retailers, going to Jack in the Box and stealing sauce packets, stealing logs, plates, and plastic forks from the lodge, and playing card games in the van. Our routine was skiing until 2:30, sitting in the lodge until we got kicked out at 5, then failing to make a fire until 10. The on and off rain meant that it took pretty much a full can of lighter fluid to start a fire on any given day. On our last night though, Kyle acquires some gasoline in a five gallon can. He proceeds to be a moron by making gas trails, lighting rocks on fire, and pouring it on our pile of soggy wood in our fire pit we are attempting to burn. Eventually we get some flames going, but Kyle keeps hosing it with the gas can. It happened pretty quick, the flames shot back up the stream into the can. Kyle drops it and we all hide behind trees, staring at our flaming gas can. Kyle is freaking out and we are all yelling at him to douse it with some water bottles. He’s practically crying in fear at this point, and he tries to splash the gas can from ten feet away. There is also a tree in between him and the gas can. At this point, I am resigned to the fact that I will shortly die in a fiery, gassy explosion because of my inept friends. I guess I’m not doing anything either, except for yelling at Kyle to stop sucking at putting out gas fires. Somehow, Kyle finds his balls and puts out the fire. My friends are retarded.

See you in five weeks to do it all again T-Line.

The Edit

Circle 13: My Friends are Retarded

So basically, I don’t think these giant corporations with hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of R&D dollars can build a god damn ski boot correctly. I’m pretty much way more awesome than them, and with a hacksaw, school scissors and some glue, I can make ski boots amazing. In all seriousness though, check out the SPK V-Cut tutorial I did for BroBomb here: http://brobomb.com/2010/05/monday-mod-v-cut-your-boots/

After spending three weeks couch bumming with LINE MC Tony Seyffer in January, I knew I had to go back and do it again over spring break. We started rounding up a crew and soon my car filled and we needed more spots. So, Tony has this girlfriend, Whitney, who has this mom, who has this guy who rents the basement from her. Well this guy has some awesome creeper vans that he isn’t using. One reason for the non-use being that he brought a running chainsaw into a bar. He didn’t kill anyone, but he’s chillin’ in jail. So, we’ve also got this friend, Colten Welch, his mom served jury duty on that. Add 9 rider Austin Torvinen and girl skier #2 Kendelle and you have our van crew. All rocking LINE skis except that 9thward duder. Hella LINE skis.

So we like LINE, a lot, so we decided to write LINE all over this janky van, because we do that (remember the Ullrfest float from episode 7?), with some window chalk. Austin wrote Ninthward on it too, and then wrote Free Candy on the hood. Tony drove straight through the night and had some absurd, unhealthy amount of 5 Hour Energy shots to do it. Oh, there were whiskey plates on them too.

It didn’t take long after arriving in Breckenridge for us to start laughing at how ridiculous our ride was. Every day, we rolled through Main Street traffic, honking at tourists, small children, their parents, everyone. Some people ignored us, some people laughed, some people were downright offended. The best was pulling into and out of free church dinner with it. The van was simply, awesome.

Other random thoughts: spring break crowds at Breck are retarded, Keystone was deserted, Keystone’s medium jumps are wack, In the four weeks total I spent in Summit County this season, I skied 0 real powder.

We didn’t do too much filming since we couldn’t link up with Jake Strassman, who did our LINE Midwest edit on our first trip. The MN Does CO edit was our shots from the week. Here’s the leftover shots from it: