Human / Machines

A super video shoot from the elite burn units snow team is HUMAN / MACHINES. Featuring the all-star cast of Gigi Rüf, Arthur Longo, Ståle Sandbech and Mathieu Crepel it was filmed in the wild backcountry of Riksgränsen in Sweden, Folgefonna in Norway and Snowpark in New Zealand by Johannes Östergård. Click above to watch the full video.

Below you will find some words on Human / Machines by Jason Horton. Plus interviews with filmmaker Johannes Östergård, and burn units Arthur Longo and Ståle Sandbech, talking about the concept, the future of snowboarding and just how they ride.

The Story of Human / Machines by Jason Horton

Man's physical limitations have never been a match for his ingenuity. When, back in around 8000BC, he figured out that placing rollers underneath large stones allowed him to move things he could never possibly carry, he created a prototype of the first machine; the wheel. He's been building machines ever since. Unfortunately, the better we became at building them, the more we distanced ourselves from the natural world.

Is our ingenuity really a good thing? Dolphins are supposed to be as smart as we are, and they didn't build anything; then again, they didn't destroy anything either. Fast forward to today, and we're living in a post-industrial utopia or wasteland, depending on your point of view. Fast forward a few more years and we'll be at war with robots and sending Terminators back in time to protect John Connor. Talk about being too clever for your own good. But I digress.

The idea for this short film came about while we were trying to figure out a location for our next Burn team shoot. Because our team have such a variety of riding styles, we'd talked about building something that had big, progressive jumps in it, but also with smaller, more unusual lines worked into it. This would allow a rider like Gigi to express his creative approach, while giving Ståle free rein to throw 10s and 12s.

As usual, Gigi had other ideas. He suggested holding the shoot in a famous gulley in Rikgransen, which is an amazing natural playground. Back in the day, this was the place where top Scando riders like Marius Sommer would head each springtime to shoot these amazing natural hits in the crazy late Arctic light. Gigi's idea was all about taking the filmshoot back to the roots, with everyone grabbing a shovel, finding their own line, firing up the BBQ and sessioning away into the small hours.

So there we were, with Gigi wanting to pursue his vision of all-natural, additive-free snowboarding, and me, with visions of snow sculptures on steroids. Suddenly, it clicked: we would do both. The film would explore both sides of the same coin. Armed with a 16mm movie camera that's older than any of us, Gigi would head to Riks with Arthur and Pirates filmer Justin Hare to shoot in the gulley. Meanwhile, armed with RED cameras, dollies and a heli budget, filmmaker Johannes Östergård would head to Folgefonna with Ståle and Mat and a few other Pirates crew to build a badass kicker that would send the guys into the stratosphere, all with a nice sunset and lake backdrop. Well, that was the plan, anyway.

Over in Riks, the sun shone, the light was perfect, and the vibe was all about having fun, and getting 'er done. Terrain like this, spread out for miles and all within easy reach by sled, inspires your inner creativity like nothing else. It's like staring at clouds, and slowly letting your imagination create pictures out of the randomness. And, of course, when the person creating those pictures is Gigi, the results are always going to be magical.

But, while Gigi's crew was blessed with days of good snow and warm sunshine, the "machines" were dogged by snow-destroying rain, constant cloud cover and flat light. Perhaps Mother Nature had heard about our organic vs. metallic concept, and was trying to show us which approach she was personally backing? Still, it kind of worked out anyway, at least aesthetically. With the snow covered in a layer of ash courtesy of Icelandic volcanic activity, heavy granite surrounding the jump and grey clouds suspended above, the jump took on a sombre, industrial look that actually suited the tone of the film perfectly.

Action-wise, the patchy light took its toll: for example Ståle, who had been planning some double-corks and backside 12s, 'only' felt comfortable busting out a frontside 1080 because of the conditions. Which just goes to show how these young guns are progressing the sport every time they strap in: a trick that just a few years ago would have been the highlight of a riders season is now a stock trick to be done on demand. By the week's end, we had the sketchy distinction of being the first crew to hire a heli to film a session from the sky...in the rain.

But we almost had enough shots to call the film a wrap - almost. And so it was time to use a machine that represents better than any other man's mastery of the physical world, something that gives us all the freedom to be anywhere we want to be in a matter of hours. A jumbo jet. Pretty soon Ståle was on a flight to Snowpark in New Zealand, where the jumps were almost as perfect as the sunsets. We had placed our trust in the machines, and we had prevailed.

Interview - Johannes Östergård, Director

What techniques were used to film the contrasting parts of the movie?
Johannes Östergård: I knew right from the start I wanted us to shoot the Human part of the film on analog film to get a grainy, warm, earthy look. The Machines part we shot on digital cameras, the super crisp 4k shots from the RED fit the futuristic feeling of the segment.

For Gigi and Arthur we mostly shot handheld, more finding shots in the moment and going with the flow. I would like to say it's a more observing documentary style of shooting. Ståle's and Mathieu's part was shot with much bigger toys - cinesliders, cranes and helicopter. The shots look incredible, but this type of filmmaking takes more planning and is sometimes less spontaneous

What is your personal take on the ever-increasing equipment and techniques available to filmmakers?
JÖ: I think it's great that cameras are getting cheaper and all sorts of Hollywood style tools are becoming available to everyone. Who wouldn't like that? But instead of just talking about pixels, frame rates and depth of field, I would like to talk more about ideas.

Good ideas. A short film shot on your dad's old VHS camera can be just as fantastic as the expensive big production film. So I guess what I'm trying to say is, I hope we see people push their own creative ideas as much as the camera manufacturer is pushing their engineering team.

What other shred films inspire you, from both ends of the technical spectrum?
JÖs: When I started watching shred films I really liked The Garden, Subject Haakonsen and the TB series (Johan Olofsson's insane line in TB5!). A few years on I loved watching The Resistance, got me super pumped on riding. Then of course the Robot Food films - filming and editing style really changed a lot then. At this point I started getting more into filmmaking, and got a bit more critical and bored with watching snowboarding.

Luckily then came Blank Paper's 91 Words for Snow and In Short. I still think they are very inspirational, Benedek and the guys experimented with different styles of story telling and got me stoked on riding.

Human Interview - Arthur Longo

What is it you like about Riks?
Arthur Longo: The terrain here is really great, you can do so much: build hips, hit lips, and there are a lot of rocks you can hit this time of year also. Best of all, it's super easy to access with the sled, and you can really explore. You just have to open your eyes and scope a little. It's endless. Did you know about it before you came here? I knew about it without knowing about it, if you know what I mean. I'd seen shots of the train tunnel, and of course the contest with Ingemar's famous air, but I didn't know it was all Riks.

How does a typical day go up here?
AL: Well, first thing you learn in Riks is you never know what the weather is going to do - sunny, rainy, windy, you never know. So that makes for a lot of last-minute decisions about what you'll do on any given day. Each morning we would meet and try to agree on where to go and what to hit...and agreeing can be the hardest part of the day.

What is your approach to shaping jumps?
AL: Well, some folks love building big jumps, they can't wait to start shovelling. But me...not so much. But it's something you have to do, so for me it's more about adapting to the terrain, so you don't have to spend so much time digging.

Do you have a good eye for finding spots to build on?
AL: It's something quite personal, I think. Sometimes you're the only one who sees something, and so once again it can become hard to agree with others on what to focus on, as everyone has their own ideas. As the years go by, I'm getting better at figuring out how well a setup is going to work.

How about Gigi? What's his eye like?
AL: Gigi is good, for sure. Sometimes he'll say "I'm going to try that" and to me it looks hard, or sketchy, or small or whatever. But it works because he's already seen it in his mind's eye. Especially when something looks too small, he always makes it look so stylish in ways you hadn't thought would be possible.

What is it you like most about natural terrain?
AL: You're able to do whatever you see. It's not someone else who decided what you're going to ride and having to adapt. It's pretty much about what you see, riding it how you want. It's more personal. You're free.

Machines Interview - Ståle Sandbech

Are you a fan of how parks have evolved, and all the new training techniques?
Ståle Sandbech: Back in the days you had to build your own jumps, hike back up, try your own tricks. Maybe you couldn't even ride on the hill because snowboards weren't allowed. Today you're seeing 22ft pipes, with airbags, everything is perfectly shaped - it's insane. You can jump around like a maniac. I kinda want to try to learn tricks just on the jump rather than on the airbag, to show that you've got balls. But now that we've got to triple cork 1440s, the game has changed.

Is all this technology a good thing?
SS: The world is filled with machines. We've got HD, we're all carrying these GoPros...when you think about how much everything has changed in the past 10 years, it's so crazy. It's cool sometimes to just block out the technology. I often don't even bring my phone. I don't know, it's a hard question!

Can you program yourself to learn new tricks?
I can make my body learn new tricks, but there's more to it than that. I have to try a trick that's close to the one I'm trying, then start trying out the feeling of the new one. You have to get through a series of doors. In a way I'm a machine programming my body to do something. Maybe that's how it will be in the future. In twenty years from now maybe there'll be a trick I want to do so I go to the App Store and download it, you never know.

More from the burn units snow team in the coming months (a whole lot more this winter!) on facbeook.com/burn and twitter.com/@burn.