Where would we be without our filmers? We may very well be working day job, functioning properly in society and imagining what could have been. Thankfully though, that hasn't happened. A great filmer is the glue that holds a video together. A filmer translates vision into reality. A great filmer also has a great hard drive, overflowing with the most beautiful, heart-wrenching moments snowboarding has ever seen. This week, Bryden Bowley digs through his archive to curate his five favorite clips. It's his Shot List. Bryden wanted a disclaimer here that these are in no particular order, and he’s filmed so many great clips of so many great people. He loves you all.
Bryden Bowley
Originally From: Warren, PA
Currently Residing: New York City
Ryan Collins—Drop-In:
That’s definitely a special clip to me. That winter I had been filming for The Uninvited. I was filming Naima and she and I were this awesome duo. My friend Markus Rustad, from Norway, was spending a lot of time in Utah and staying with me. So, this is right around the time Ryan and I started becoming friends—I’m not sure if he’s going to say something different. Maybe we started becoming friends even earlier. Naima wasn’t there that day but we were in Ogden, I was living up there. My friends, Cody Lee, and Tristen Sadler, had told me about this junkyard underneath Snow Basin. And there was a hill with beat-up cars and shit that you could film on and jib. So, me and Markus and Ryan, and I think my friend Aaron was there that day. It was like mid-March and it was a pretty low snow year but there was still a bunch of snow at this junkyard. We linked up there that day and filmed a bunch of weird car stuff. All that footage is in this video I made called Semi-Truck. Wait, what is it? Is it a bulldozer? An excavator? Let’s call it an excavator. It was at the parking lot above it. Ryan was in this drop-in phase, as he always is. He’s like, “I’m going to climb that and drop in on it.” Markus and I were like, “That sounds sick. Let’s do it.” He did it and it was really cool. I had never seen anyone do anything like that. I was just starting to feel comfortable with my filming. I think it caught a lot more eyes when it played in Dust Box than I thought it would. I don’t know, it’s just one of my favorite clips. It was earlier on in our friendship and now he’s like my best friend, for sure. It’s just a really memorable clip to me. We hadn’t filmed anything together for like four years after that until this past winter for Dust Box. But yeah, just a cool clip. I love that clip.
Kennedi Deck—Line:
That was my first ever trip where I was going to just film. It was an exciting time for me. I was on a Vans trip. Tanner and Harry were like, “Here are our cameras. Here’s how to use them. Just do something with them.” And I was just getting to know a bunch of these cool new people who I hadn’t met before. It was my first time meeting Jake. I think I had met Kennedi prior. But it was just fun. It was on Harry’s camera and Kennedi had this line spot. That camera, the Arri, is so freaking heavy but it has this little handle at the top where you can hold it almost like holding an extreme. The spot just kind of lined up for a follow cam and I just wanted to try it. Kennedi just looked really steezy in the clip. I think it’s special to me because I didn’t know what the clip would look like until the video came out and I was so excited to see that. It’s a 16-millimeter camera. The lens I was using was a really wide lens, so I was kind of just like, fingers crossed that things are in frame and it looks dope. There’s this one moment when Kennedi comes off the first rail where it just looks really dope. We get really close and personal. It’s just an exciting clip. Even more exciting to see it in the Vans video and to have never seen it until the video came out—or I guess at the premiere in Salt Lake was the first time I saw it. That was cool.
Emma Crosby—50-50
This Emma clip is in Reykjavik, Iceland. That clip was crazy. It was late at night. The sun went down at literally one o’clock when we were there. We were there in early January. I just said it was late at night but honestly, I can’t even remember what time of day it was. It could have been five pm for all I know. Emma and I vibe really hard. I just remember that clip and feeling like we were really synced up. I just remember feeling like she was really focused and I was super focused too because it’s a really tight space and I had to be in front of her for it to work. We both had these crazy pump bumps that we had to do and that was challenging on its own. I was really focused on what the wall would make your eyes do when the clip plays in the video. I think I was just really engaged in the puzzle of how to make every single thing work well and also line it up for Emma where I time it perfectly for her while she pops to the rail because she pops pretty high and then comes down and lands fifty. It was just fun. I was focused and I could tell she was focused too. And then Kennedi, Jake, and Marc O’Malley were watching above from this bridge and just rooting us on and they were next to this convenience store where they were going and getting candy. It was kind of a vibe. I had only been on one trip with Kennedi and Emma at that point, this was our second. I don’t know, it was just feeling really fun and I was just focused.
Dylan Okurowski—Creeper Hop To Down:
I grew up in Pennsylvania. I had gone to Pittsburg on family trips since I was a little kid. I was actually born in Pittsburg. So, I guess I have a special place for Pittsburg in my heart. It's almost like I want to shout out a Pittsburg spot, but I brought up this creeper one because I was driving in Pittsburg last month and I passed this spot and it’s gone. It’s totally gone. I was thinking that deserves some acknowledgment. Also, all of Dylan’s clips are totally messed in that video. Dylan found that spot on Google, fully found that thing. That clip was filmed on our first trip to Pittsburg for How Dark Blue Feels. It was right before Christmas, like December 21st or something and we drove straight from Salt Lake City. Miles was actually nuts for that one. He was out at Mt. Baker with BMO and drove from Baker to Salt Lake City, straight, got to his house, packed his stuff up. Keegan, Denver, Dylan, and I hopped in his truck like an hour later after he got back from Baker. And we drove straight to Pittsburg. That was such a special time for me because I had no idea what was about to happen that winter. I was just excited. I don’t know, maybe Dylan found that spot on Google on the drive. He has such a good eye for spots. I wonder if I’ll get called out for this, but I don’t know if I’ve seen someone do something like that. Like a creeper like that? Down flat and then popping to something else. That’s pretty crazy. Also, another thing about it, he was so smart with it. If you go back and watch that clip and pause it, the down-flat creeper was originally too small for him to really get on it. And it was broken so he took a brick and pushed it in between the rail and the wall to make it wider so he could get on it. That was gnarly to me. It was so sick. I had only filmed a couple clips of Dylan thus far and I was like, “holy shit, this dude is gnarly. This is crazy.” But also, I was hyped on the way I filmed it too. I was excited about the fisheye and getting underneath like that. It’s a memorable clip for me. I remember that day well.
Denver Orr—Switch Back Two:
When you asked this question that is the first clip I thought of so, I’m kind of wondering if that is my favorite clip I’ve ever filmed. That was in Tallinn, Estonia. That winter was just so fun. I rock so heavy with Denver. We were having such a good time [with] Keegan and Miles as well, Phipps was with us for a bit. I just think Denver was having such a good winter. I think we just went to that rail. Well, we had seen it before. I think it’s in the Givin movies. Forest and I think Alex Stathis hit it. I know Stax hit it. We had been hearing of it, I might have asked Harry or Meyer where it was. There was so much snow there. Denver was like, “I think I want to switch back two-seventy.” He’s really good at switch-back twos. He just…I don’t know. He’s really good at them. I’m rambling now, like, why is this clip important to me? It might be because he did it so quickly, and he did it twice in a row. The one that plays in the video is the second one he did. But the first one that he did I want to say it was maybe his sixth or seventh try. He did it really quick. The first one he did, he does a switchback two and goes to the end of the rail. But it's such a long rail. He lands in the switch back two and I think he might have been a bit surprised like a holy shit I’m doing it, kind of a thing, so it’s not as clean as the one that’s in the video. But that’s what I mean. He was kind of just on this tip that winter where he was feeling himself, saying I got this shit. He said, “I got it again,” and I was like, “Yeah, you definitely do. Get up there.” And the one that’s in the video is the second make and the one he did right after the first one. I was just so proud of Denver when he did that. And the 16 that plays after that, you can’t really tell but he was in tears. He was so happy and proud of himself. We were just vibing. I’ll have winters like that, but I’ll never have a winter that was that one. It was just so fun.
Honorable mentions:
Jake Kuzyk: 50-50 back three to 50-50—Dorothy
Markus Rustad: Backflip roof bash—SEMI-TRUCK
Robby Meehan: Back 50-50 big kink—Fall In Place