Raw. Photo: Vimeo
Basically, the inspiration to create this latest project was simply the fact that I had a butt-load of footage from the last two years that I hadn’t really used yet. I had been involved with another film project back in 2012 where a few clips were used, but there was a distribution issue and only a handful of people ever saw them anyway. Fortunately, being a former ASP judge, I have formed some great relationships with the surfers on tour so I tend to know when sessions are going down in Cali and that has been a valuable tool to constantly capture new material.
About the no Red Cam, no Drones, no GoPro, and no Water Angle stuff, it is not because I am opposed at all, but more a situation where everyone is kind of doing that right now and the industry is getting a bit saturated with it all. Don’t get me wrong, I am completely supportive of everyone’s unique situations and an individual’s ability to create. I do quite enjoy watching the high dollar corpo creations from guys like Taylor Steele, Kai Neville, Thomas Campbell, etc., but it’s just not my scene. I wasn’t born with well-to-do parents that bought my equipment, I didn’t go to film school, and I refuse to kiss any industry ass to land gigs. To be completely honest and to be a tad spiteful, this entire film was made with a used camera, a borrowed computer, and a pirated copy of Final Cut, just show to you don’t need a bunch of dough to get the job done.
Where I live in the Santa Barbara, there is an interesting dynamic to filming. We have some very talented film makers here, each working exclusively with their own professional athletes. The Coffin brothers have Ryan Perry, Dane Reynolds has Mini Blanchard, Yadin Nicol has Andrew Schoener, and so on. It is a well known fact that I have worked a lot in the past with Bobby Martinez and still do from time to time, but that simply doesn’t pay the bills.
Throw in a world class cinematographer like Michael Kew, plus young bucks like Sean Lesh and Nick Liotta, and the pot just gets deeper. Even though collectively we are all friends in a small community packed full of talent, it is still vital that we all maintain a level of respect for each other’s work. That means that sometimes a predominantly independent guy like myself has to wait until they use their angles of sessions for their own projects before I get to work on mine.
It is simply showing respect and not being a hack like all the wannabes who post sessions within a few hours of happening just to see their name on a surfing website. Fortunately there are so many short web clips these days, people forget most of ’em in a day, if not hours. The great thing, though, is that a fundamentally solid, well done, half-hour surf flick resonates in people’s memories for a lot longer, and despite being a free film with no budget, I hope folks get a kick in the ass out of this one.
As a parting statement, I would like to give props to the band Freedom Hawk. They are featured heavily in the film. They are all surfers and skaters from Virginia Beach, and they f-ing rock, so check ’em out on Instagram at @freedomhawkband or check out their music and vibe at www.freedomhawk.net.
And one last thing: Blake Vincent Keuny is the f-ing man…
To check out more of Dave Schauber’s work, visit his Vimeo page and follow him on Instagram.
