The Bone Zone is THE  preseason spot to shred in Utah. Homies put in some major hours chopping trees, building jibs and hailing rails up a secret spot in the woods.  It’s a great place to get all the kinks and rust of your legs and for me a good spot to warm the old trigger finger back up to shooting snowboarding.  I have yet to check out this years zone but I have to say the season of 2008 was by far the best I set up I had seen.  All to wood features were dialed in perfect and shot really well.  I normally don’t spend a lot of my time shooting  jibbing but this particular year I logged  a couple of days firing away up at the zone coming away with some great stuff.  To this day I think the last shot of the set of Keegan Valaika tail pressing the wood kink is a personal favorite of mine.  Always a good time with crew at the Bone Zone!

Date: February 18th 2009
Rider: Neil Provo
Location: Powder Mountain, Utah

I recall this milky day being one of my more memorable inbounds pow days, specifically how much quality riding I was able to enjoy while shooting. I had meet up with the Rossi crew to shred and shoot a two day online feature at Powder Mountain. Pow Mow is a small gem of a resort located north of Salt Lake, off the beaten path, making it  super low key and the pow stays fresh for days.  This was one of my first times shooting with Neil Provo and right away I was stoked on his riding and natural style. We pretty much lapped out all day shooting one or two features each run ending up with some great images.   I really enjoy shooting in milky and flat light conditions. I think it sets such a nice mood that adds a dramatic feel to the photos.  If that gray bird day couldn’t get any better the next morning was full blue and we ended up having another epic day of riding as well as some great cat runs off Lightning Ridge. Such a fun mission with a great crew!

Neil just joined the growing ranks of the Levitation Project and I can’t wait to have him in front of my lens more this upcoming season!  Stop by Neil’s blog to check out some more great photos and video from him and his brother Ian.  These guys are always doing rad stuff and documenting the hell out of it!

Images © Andrew Miller 2010

This weeks Memory Bank photo set is dug up from our last night on Thompson Pass in April 09.  This was a perfect crisp night to wind down our Alaskan experience gathering with everyone in camp around the large bonfire sharing stories, laughing and finishing off the rest of the Alaskan Brew stock.  Great night to end our three week stay in AK.

Date: May 10th 2008
Rider: Pat Moore
Location: Snowboarder Superpark 12: The Son of Berserker –  Mammoth, California.

The 2008 Superpark 12 at Mammoth was another first for me.  I remember back in middle school the first time I had read about Superpark in Snowboarder mag in particular the photo sequence of Travis Rice doing an insane 100 + foot rodeo.  I remember studying all the photos as well reading the funny stories about Bridges rolling around on a sled shooting poachers with a paintball gun.  Well I had finally gotten my chance to come to Superpark, not to ride as I had imaged when I was younger but to help document everything that went down.  Day one was pretty chaotic but after each day and each bigger feature opened most riders were weeded out while only the best and gnarliest were left standing.  One of the main standouts being Pat Moore. This wasn’t a surprise after his showings from the last couple of Superparks, he sure knows how to leave his mark.  This year was no exception expect I was able to witness it first hand.  He killed it and here’s the proof.

You can find all the insane heli footage from Superpark compiled into a mini edit in the bonus features of That’s it That’s All.

Date: February 2nd 2008
Rider: Gigi Ruf
Location: Quiksilver Natural Selection – Dicks Ditch, Jackson Hole, Wyoming.

Every time I look at this particular shot it always brings me right back to that cold, dark, misty day in Dicks Ditch. This was my first trip to Jackson and it could not have been at a better time. For one Travis Rice had hand picked 17 of the worlds  best freestyle riders to come to Jackson for a all natural new approach to a big mountain freestyle contest.  Everyone was posted up for a seven day window competing on only the best two days. To top it off both selected zones on the mountain had been closed off a week or so prior letting mother nature blanket over three feet of snow on top of another 2 during the week.
If I remember correctly Gigi was probably the 4 or 5 rider to test his luck on day one in the buried course down the popular Dicks Ditch run. The course had around ten packed lips scattered down the gully with each landing having a nice fluffy cushion of about 3 – 4ft of deep pow. As you can see it was pretty white out conditions with those three black specks on the right photo serving for a lip marker.  After his first hit Gigi had a bit of trouble getting a ton of speed through the sea of un-tracked snow opting for a classic method disappearing into a whiteout through the nipple deep landing. These two photos combined were my favorite shots from the trip.