The Role of Filmmakers in the Growth of Street Snowboarding
Street snowboarding is arguably the most creative frontier of snowboarding. 30 years ago, it consisted of driving around for hours until you found a spot. Two guys had to hold the rider’s arms and slingshot him into the feature. Today, it consists of hours of scrolling satellite images on Google Earth until a spot appears. An electric winch is then connected to a tree or a post, which pulls the rider into the feature. But at the heart of this entire process is the person behind the lens of the camera that is filming it.
Whitey McConnaughy, founder of Kingpin Productions, has filmed enough snowboarding to know what it’s supposed to look like. He started Kingpin at age 22 and soon evolved into one of the most influential snowboard filmmakers of the late 1990s and 2000s. If anyone understands what’s being gained or lost today, it’s him.
Early street snowboarding was heavily influenced by skateboarding. “Riders wanted to emulate street skating in the snow,” said Whitey. The process of spot hunting back then was very similar to finding spots for skating. It took a lot of time driving around and seeing what was possible.
There was no such thing as a terrain park at a resort in the 90s. No rails, no boxes, no man-made features, just groomed runs. This forced snowboarders to get creative and think outside of the box. So, they took to the streets to express their creativity. Street riding became more of a necessity than anything else and the street was the only place to find a rail to slide. This led to a renegade, DIY culture surrounding the sport. It mirrored what happened in the 80s when skateparks closed nationwide and skateboarders were forced onto the streets. Again, leading to a creative and outlaw culture. Street snowboarding wasn’t just copying skateboarding, both sports were born from the same pressure and resilience. Riders were looking to challenge themselves in new ways when resorts didn’t offer them enough.
In the early 90s street boarding was called the new-school age of snowboarding. The huge craze was rails; rail clips were everywhere. Somewhere between ’95-’99 rails fell out and all riders focused on were big jumps and cliffs. Then another pivot, and in 2000 handrails became cool again and never fell off from there. Whitey called these “East Coast rail missions.” He brought a few riders out from the West Coast to his hometown of Washington D.C. when it got dumped on with snow. While District employees were shoveling snow off of walkways, Whitey and Kingpin Productions were moving snow to make lines possible. During the filming of ‘Destroyer’ Mikey Leblanc famously slid the handrails of the United States Capitol Building. Kingpin also targeted other “missions” in New York City, Cleveland, Philadelphia, and Cincinnati.
Whitey said that the best filmers are the ones who actually understand the sport. One of the filmer’s main jobs in making a street snowboarding movie is actually scoping spots and bringing them to the riders. A key part of this was not only knowing what to look for, but knowing the rider’s capabilities. “The rider needs to be excited about it,” Whitey said. This was a huge task, and a lot of the burden fell on the filmmakers. It was also much more than just hitting the record button. Back then there weren’t big budgets or huge production teams. The guys filming were also setting up the spots, directing the crew, and editing film by hand, after the fact.
In the early days of street snowboarding two people would each hold one of the rider’s arms and then slingshot him into a spot. This so-so method surely held back a lot of early progression, but that’s how it goes. In the mid 2000s the introduction of bungees came along which completely changed the game. This was a cheap and easy way to get the rider up to speed in time for whatever feature. Then when electric winches started being used, the possibilities of lines and spots became endless. That was the beginning of huge gaps, roof transfers, and big lines. Nowadays a lot of the high production snowboard films consist of backcountry spots which weren’t easily accessible back then. This was made possible by multi hour sled missions which unlocked so many more cool spots and lines.
Along with the evolution of spot enhancing technology there was also the evolution of spot hunting technology. Filming locations used to be found by driving around for hours and writing down addresses. Then came portable GPS devices and a spot’s coordinates could be marked. Justin Meyer, co-founder of VideoGrass, has spent hours on Google Earth. “Lots of street view,” he said. This now allows filmmakers to scope spots that they can’t drive to, i.e., in other states. The whole idea behind Meyer’s method to finding locations is staying far away from basic features. He strives to find unique and less obvious spots that the normal person would otherwise never notice. There aren’t fewer spots, it’s just a lot harder to find something unique.
“We’re so saturated with these short video clips now, and people aren’t focusing on long form as much as they were,” said Whitey, “Long form just doesn’t have the same weight it used to.” Now, a rider can blow up off of a few Instagram clips without needing to film a real part. Solo filming is something that is becoming a lot more common especially with the introduction of 360° cameras which allow riders to get incredible footage by themselves. Now this is totally fine. There is nothing wrong with the lone wolf mindset, but it is hard to beat the energy that a full crew brings.
The most prevalent formula for snowboard video now is short, algorithm-driven content. This sort of content lacks the soul and identity that snowboarding was once built upon. Now this isn’t to say no one is doing it the old school way anymore, it’s just that the narrative has shifted away from the original camaraderie of the sport. “There was never any pressure back then, it was nothing but fun,” said Whitey.
As snowboarding continues to evolve it is important to highlight the people with cameras who showed people without cameras what the sport actually looked like. New technology has pushed street riding to new heights, but it also changed how riders film and share their work. The shift from full crews into solo missions and short clips means more reach but less story, less soul. The challenge now is to at least try and remember where the sport started and just how far it has come.
