On my first plane trip for Transworld Skateboarding Magazine in the summer of 1983, I somehow found my way to Orlando with a group of skaters and went with them to Burdines Fashion Square Shopping Mall. The thing that set Burdines apart from countless shopping malls in the U.S. was that it was lined on two sides by skateable contour-tiled walls with several doorways interspersed here and there.
As most of you know, skateboarding is an unlawful activity in most
municipalities, and much of it is practiced under the cover of darkness. It is very much like a commando raid, flying low under the radar of security and law enforcement types and getting in, getting the photos, and getting out. Time is of the essence and getting caught can ruin a good time and even get expensive, with trespassing tickets or even jail time.
Our Orlandian host and skate guide Tim Scroggs knew the lay of the land and lead our California crew to Burdines for some midnight fun. He warned us that we would have only a few minutes to skate and shoot between rounds by the "No-Fun" security truck. Neil Blender, Billy Ruff, and a few others took turns pushing like mad across the parking lot and getting as high as they could carve noisily across the rippled tiles and over the doorways. As soon as we saw the headlights of the security truck coming around the corner, we knew our short fling was over and that it was time to get the hell out and count ourselves fortunate to be among the skaters to have skated that legendary spot.
I was hoping that we would be able to return in the future, but as so many skate spots end up, Burdines was rendered unskateable by the powers that be. The shot of Billy riding over Neil was published in the mag, but the others never ran.
A few printed images of Neil Blender and Billy Ruff from that day are featured in my online store jgrantbrittainphotos.com
v Billy Ruff carves over the doorway while Neil Blender checks his messages (just kidding, it's 1983.)
v Billy Ruff rides over the protruding door hinges as the Midnight bell tolls.
v Neil Blender extends his tall form via a Bertlemann slide.
]]>I have several prints of him available in my shop
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Jumping ahead to 1985, Kevin and I were staying at Bruno Peeters' house in Antwerp, Belgium. There was a small city skatepark down the street with a few basic skate obstacles. We shot a few token photos of Kevin ollieing on a quarterpipe there, just so I could run an Antwerp skate photo in Transworld Skateboarding Magazine. When I got back to the TWS offices and put an extensive Europe article together, that "token" skate photo of Staab was singled out by the art director, David Carson, and a high-contrast, graphic xeroxed version was used for the sub ad, a sticker, a shirt, a banner to hang at skate contests, and the end dot at the end of articles.
Let's jump ahead to the present. I gave my designer friend, Josh Higgins, the black-and-white photo of Kevin's ollie shot from 37 years ago and asked him to design a pop-art-like collab silkscreened poster for Staab and me to sign and number. Josh came through with a beautiful, vibrant image featuring colors that Kevin actually wears and a punk rock skull graphic down in the corner.
I am offering this as a limited release 18" x 24" silkscreened poster in an edition of 70 prints for $75 each, each signed by Kevin and me.
They are available in my shop.
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"Push" book signing this Sat, Sept 17th at 2PM at Barnes and Noble Encinitas
]]>Come on over to Barnes and Noble Bookstore in Encinitas this Saturday, Sept 17th at 2PM. They will have 40 copies of my book "Push - 80s Skateboarding Photography" available for purchase and signing and I will be talking and doing a Q&A. Hope to see you there!
]]>How I met the skater who changed skateboarding, Mark Gonzales.
]]>How I met the skater who changed skateboarding, Mark Gonzales.
Photos: Top two Venice Beach 1984 and Bottom two are San Diego 1984.
I am often asked when I first shot photographs of Mark Gonzales and if, at that time, I recognized that he was special and that he would change the course of skateboarding.
Well, the answer to the first question is that I met Mark at a freestyle contest in Venice Beach in July of 1984; at least that’s when I think I first met him. That day is definitely the first time I laid my camera lens on him. He was ollieing off the Venice Beach restroom roof along with a group of other skaters, and he actually snapped two decks, one of which was borrowed.
After Mark was done destroying boards, he asked if I wanted to shoot a nearby quarterpipe, and, of course, my answer was an emphatic yes. He then led me up an alley to the backyard of a house with a cool little quarterpipe setup and proceeded to rip it up on another borrowed board.
After that impromptu private session, I went back down to the beach and shot the rest of the freestyle contest.
Back in the 1980s, it seemed as though there was a contest every month, and the summer of 1984 was packed. The very next month after Venice Beach, there was a street contest in the parking lot next to the Holiday Inn at the San Diego Embarcadero. Back in those days, a street contest consisted of a couple of jump ramps; a horseshoe-shaped, double-sided steel curb; some parking blocks; a picnic table; and an old tire on top of a wooden platform. The usual assortment of pro and amateur skaters showed up at this contest with their friends and other industry types in tow.
Among the participants, I noticed Mark Gonzales on his board, darting in and out of the throng of skaters and throwing himself off the variety of obstacles on the rough pavement. The Gonz was sporting a different hairstyle than the previous month in Venice Beach, and he was doing street handplants on the parking blocks and bonelesses all around the course, turning heads and blowing minds.
The answer to the second question about whether I knew he would change skateboarding’s course? I knew Mark was special, and I knew he was changing skateboarding in that moment. But remember, back in that period, we only lived for the moment and really never imagined what skateboarding would be in the future. Now, looking back, I’m not surprised about his remarkable influence over skateboarding.
Here are a few photos from those memorable first and second photo sessions with Gonz back in July and August of 1984.
Prints available jgrantbrittainphotos.com
]]>How the Nikon FM2 Changed My Skate Photography
]]>How the Nikon FM2 Changed My Skate Photography
I know that this will be a bit nerdy for some of you who aren’t savvy to the technical aspects of photography, but here goes.
When I shot my first skate photo at the Del Mar Skate Ranch in February of 1979, my first skate photo ever, I knew nothing of the workings of the camera I borrowed. I asked my roommate, whose camera it was, what to do. He loaded the roll of Kodachrome 64 film for me and told me to shoot at a fast shutter speed, 1/500th of a second, match the exposure needle to the little circle in the viewfinder, and most importantly to have the sun behind me. Those were my instructions, and I pretty much stuck to them for years. I did learn to tweak those rules over time, but shooting a skater with the sun behind them during the day meant I was pretty much relegated to producing silhouettes and a lot of bad photos.
After a few years of working on the tan on the back of my neck, a technical miracle from the Nikon Corporation came along, and in late 1985 I picked up the Nikon FM2 camera body. This camera was a game changer with a faster flash sync of 1/250th of a second, which allowed me to shoot fill flash during the day, even shooting directly into the sun and lighting up the shadows with minimal motion blur. This technical leap changed my photography big time; there were no limits when it came to lighting, and in the next few years I shot some of my favorite, well-lit, images.
Here are a few examples of daytime skate photos using the Nikon FM2 and a flash:
Nikon FM2 with 16mm Nikkor fisheye lens.
Tony Hawk, Crossbone Lien, Del Mar Skate Ranch, 1987
Steve Caballero, Fish Banks, Sunnyvale, CA, 1987
Chris Miller, Seylynne Skatepark, N. Vancouver, BC, 1986
Rodney Mullen, Ollie Grab, San Francisco, CA, 1988
Mark Gonzales, Gemco Bank, Oceanside, CA, 1985
]]>In late 1986, I would drive east on Via de la Valle in Del Mar, California, and pass beneath the overpass of the I-5 freeway on my way to get coffee at The Pannikin. As a photographer, I was always on the lookout for a good photo or background, and I had long admired the shaft of light which shone through the gap in the bridge above, a gap which was between the north and southbound lanes and bisected the ferroconcrete wall below with contrasting shadow and light.
I am often asked, “Do you see in black and white?” The answer is “Hell yes, a lot.” There are certain scenes that scream black and white, and this simple geometric shape cast by the sun onto the massive backdrop was projecting strongly onto my photo brain. I started to previsualize a photograph of a skateboarder passing in front of the textured wall, and I began to calculate what time of day to shoot it. Over the next few days, I would see the angle of light change daily as the earth revolved. I finally figured that early afternoon would be the best time to capture the shadow’s diagonal shape in my Nikon’s viewfinder.
At this time, I was the photo editor and senior photographer at Transworld Skateboarding Magazine (1983-2003), and Tod Swank, who was a great skater and skate photographer, was my darkroom tech. I enlisted Tod as my photo stunt dummy, and we met up at The Pannikin. We walked over to the shoot location and sussed out the light situation—it looked pretty good. Once I took up position on the opposite side of the four-lane road, I directed him by shouting commands and waving my arms wildly. There was quite a bit of traffic, and we had to wait for a break in the cars going by. Tod pushed back and forth on his board, doing a variety of maneuvers, some pretty comical, including one in a Superman stance (see attached photo). I ran two rolls of Kodak Tri-X 36-exposure film through my camera and felt like we had something usable. We’d captured what I’d envisioned.
Let me point out that this was not shot specifically for the cover—that idea came after we developed the film in the darkroom—I just wanted to have a photo for the mag. Tod developed the film and gave it to me with a contact sheet, and I placed it on my light table and squinted through my magnifying loupe. One image stood out—the frame with Tod simply pushing along the sidewalk. It was so basic—it was the foundation of skateboarding, it was the first thing we all learn to do after stepping on a board, it was the essence of this activity we, who do it, love. We all have this in common: we push.
I showed the chosen frame to David Carson, who was the art director (later to go on to become a design guru), and he was stoked on it. He suggested it for the cover of TWS, and I thought this was a great idea. David also thought that the cover should be designed without any Day-Glo cover blurbs, which were common on New Wave-style 80s covers, and that would muck up the clean design and crowd the pushing skater out of the frame. This would be the perfect cover to go with Garry Scott Davis’s article “Soul Power,” which was scheduled for the June 1987 issue. This photo seemed to us as the Everyman/Everywoman skate photo: everyone could relate to it, and it said soul power bigtime! That’s what we thought, but what you think isn’t always what others will think. We presented the design at an editorial production meeting, and the rest of the staff hated it. It broke all of the magazine distribution and skateboarding world rules—it had no Day-Glo cover blurbs, it was shot in black and white, and it showed a non-pro skater. It wasn’t a guy-in-the-sky peak action shot of a skater on a logoed-out skate deck. I was a bit surprised by the response of the other staff members, and the meeting was getting more and more heated. After the meeting ended I retreated to Carson’s office and tried to come down from it. I pretty much thought our Push cover was a dead design idea after that argument, and I was pissed!
I stayed away for a couple of days to cool off. Eventually, I went back to the office, and the June 1987 issue came out miraculously, with the Carson-designed Tod Swank cover, photo by me. The photo caption on the contents page read, “It doesn’t matter who, where or what. It’s just a skateboarder… skateboarding. Photo: Brittain”. That was what it was all about! It didn’t matter that it didn’t have Swank’s name, that was the point, it was any skater! (For the record, Tod didn’t mind not having his name on the photo.)
You would think that the commotion would all end there, all hunky-dory, right? Not quite. Just as many of our Skate readers hated it as liked it. Friends told me later that they hated or didn’t get it and wondered what the hell we were thinking. I tried to explain it to those people, the every-skater photo thing, the feeling of freedom through the simple act of pushing down the street, you know… that thing we all do, but it was a hard sell.
The mag took some heat for a long while, but I started to notice skateboard mag covers changing over time. I think the Push cover opened up some thoughts on what could go on a skate mag cover and made it clearer that you didn’t have to stick to newsstand consultants’ rules. After all, we’re skaters; we don’t need no stinkin’ rules! People warmed up to that Push cover after twenty or so years. I even heard the old haters say that it was one of their favorite covers and even one of their favorite skate photos. It’s that old saying, “Time will tell”—well it did in this case.
Now, In 2019, I regale young skaters with the story of the Push Cover almost not being a cover and the reasons, and they are amazed, because as a cover it would be so tame by today’s standards. I am proud of that.
If you want to see where we shot it, it’s under the I-5 freeway and Via de la Valle Ave in Del Mar.
]]>These 18x24" Chris Miller Limited Edition Silkscreened Posters are available in my shop for $100 each. The 100 are printed on 140lb rag paper and they are signed and numberd by me in pencil. Order now to arrive by the Holidays. Thanks!
]]>These 18x24" Chris Miller Limited Edition Silkscreened Posters are available in my shop for $100 each. The 100 are printed on 140lb rag paper and they are signed and numberd by me in pencil. Order now to arrive by the Holidays. Thanks!
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"PUSH" available at Gingko Press
]]>My Book, "PUSH" is now available for preorder at Gingko Press
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I have spent the Pandemic searching through my photo archive for what I think of as my most important skate photos from the 1980s. "PUSH" is published by Gingko Press and should be available at Gingko Press and skateshops and bookstores later in November. Keep an eye on my social media for further notice.
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Back in the analog film days and before the computer age, many photos went astray after the time the image was shot, the spread laid out, and the separation made and sent to the printer.
What piqued my interest as I looked into the box was that there were a couple of my color photos in that issue that I never got back.
I started to thumb through the layouts page by page and noticed a bit of color taped to the back of one of the art boards. I lifted a piece of paper to reveal a 2”x2” slide that I had not seen since late 1984. The color slide showed Tony Hawk at the 1984 NSA Summer Finals held at the Del Mar Skate Ranch. At that contest, Tony Hawk took first place in the halfpipe event, with backside airs to tail-smack on the fence post on the hip, as well as huge frontside airs.
This color slide had never come back into my hands, and it had always felt like a personal loss to me. Tony had asked me a couple of years ago if I had it, and I’d had to tell him no. This day I was surprised to see the long lost photo—it was totally unexpected—I was elated!
Enjoy the original slide, art board, and magazine layout. The new print version of the photo is now available in my shop.
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Right before the world changed in March, I shot photos of Tony Hawk for his new sponsor, Vans Shoes. (I talked about that in my previous blog post.) Tony and I reenacted some photos at Sanoland, a legendary skate ditch that we had originally shot at in 1983.
Vans Shoes also started a program called "Foot The Bill," to help shops by putting Tony and Carlsbad Pipelines on a Classic Vans slip-on. They feature my ollie photo of Tony, and net proceeds from shoe sales go to the shop.
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One of my best friends, Josh Higgins, is an unreal designer, and I asked him to design a limited edition silkscreened poster featuring Hawk. I am a big fan of Blue Note Records and their classic jazz album designs, and this poster has that feel to it. I listed the signed and numbered prints in my shop, and all fifty went fast and were shipped all over the world.
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I attended two Black Lives Matter skateboard peaceful protests in San Diego and Encinitas and managed to keep my distance, using my Canon 70-200mm zoom lens. I was so stoked on the thousand-plus skaters from my hometown coming together and protesting peacefully against racism and police brutality. I hope that the energy builds and everyone votes in November.
I really wanted to contribute to BLM, so I collaborated with skater Tod Swank and we signed ten 18x24" Swank Push prints. We posted them on Instagram and Facebook, and they sold out in less than an hour—all the proceeds went to BLM.
MasterClass, the online lecture/workshop classes, featured Tony Hawk, and I provided them with a lot of photos from his past. I watched the class—it was very well done and uplifting. I recommend their classes, which feature experts in a variety of creative fields.
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I also managed to shoot a few portraits of friends during different sessions in front of my favorite background down the street, while wearing masks and social distancing—again using my Canon 70-200mm zoom lens. From L to R: designer Tom Jones, photographer Mike Blabac, my friend Patrick Emerick, and skater John Reeves.
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The latest thing I have been working on is a collaborative video with my buddy Mac Premo about my work—to be seen online during the San Diego Design Week in September. The Design Week is hosted by the Mingei International Museum and features San Diego artists and designers showing their work, portfolios, and workspaces in a safe virtual environment. Mac had been interviewing and filming me for a video project before the pandemic hit. We had been in the darkroom printing photos one day and paid a visit to the spot where the Del Mar Skate Ranch once stood—then to the underpass where I shot the Tod Swank Push photo. In Mac's creative style he has been able to pull together a great film. Stay tuned and check out sddesignweek.org.
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Finally, I uncovered this photo of Matt Hensley from 1989 and it’s available in my shop now.
One more thing, my son moved out, due to the pandemic, and I now have a killer office!
So, that's what I've been doing since March. Everyone stay safe, stay healthy, stay creative, and Go Skateboarding!
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During this Covid-19 sheltering in place time, I keep stumbling upon long forgotten classic skate photos. This one of Christian Hosoi caught my eye while slapping proof sheets and negatives down on my light table and skimming through the rows and rows. I have perused through tens of thousands of images and becomes quite dizzying. Every so often an image jumps out at me and I can't believe I didn't notice it before? Some skaters just exude Style and this floating backside ollie of Hosoi is no exception. I plucked this frame out of a sequence of Christian that I shot at the Del Mar Skate Ranch back in 1985 with my trusty Nikon F2 with motodrive. Grace under pressure.
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I have been going through a lot of photos lately, actually thousands from the 1980s. When I shot Tod Swank in January of 1987 beneath Interstate 5 and on Via de la Valle in Del Mar, I exposed two rolls of Tri-X and have been looking at the proof sheets off and on since they were developed back then. Just the other day was when I first realized that I had not only taken the iconic Push photo that afternoon, but I had also shot Tod in the morning and in different clothes, hat and shoes. I am not sure how I could've forgotten all of this? Take notice of the shadows cast in opposite directions, the Push in the afternoon and the the nose wheelie in the morning. This evidence has not refreshed my memory, it's rather confusing that I have no memory of it at all.
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Chris Miller, Dead Frog Pool, San Diego 1992. Photo: Grant Brittain
]]>The Search
I have been busy for two years going through my archive of skate photos to choose what to put in my 1980s book, coming out in 2020. You might think that my archive is sequestered away in a hermetically sealed vault in my basement; well, you thought wrong—I live in California and we don’t have basements. My photos from forty or so years of shooting, or at least from the years I was shooting film before the digital age, are stored in metal file cabinets and plastic tubs in my garage, and the organization is a bit haphazard—in fact, it’s a downright mess. I have spent hours and hours sitting in the space where cars should reside, poring over tens of thousands of black and white 35mm film negatives and color transparencies, until I have felt like I might go mad!
Well, during those exhaustive searches, I unearthed many unseen and unpublished photographic gems from the recesses of the dark containers.
There are skaters from what I call the Golden Age of Skateboarding, the 1980s, when skateboarding was evolving, finding itself, and maturing into what it would become in the future; I call these skaters the Legends. I have been searching those bins for those Legends: Hawk, Gonzales, Blender, Mullen, Miller, Caballero, and Hosoi, just to name a few. I get excited every time I dive in and come up with an image I haven’t gazed at for thirty-plus years, and if it has the name Natas Kaupas written on it, I get extra excited. These two images of Natas are a couple of the lost gems I was able to extract from the pile of Whatevers. For some reason, these two jewels never ran in Transworld.
I am making high-quality, archival prints of these Natas photos available in my shop. You can read more about them there and even purchase one or two, if you’re jonesing for a little piece of skate photo history.
By the way, The Search goes on, so stay tuned.
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I have been working on my book feverishly for the last two years and I keep unearthing Photo Gems from my Garage Archive. This powerful photo of Natas Kaupas came to my light table and I did a quick dupe of it with my Macro lens. I ran it on Instagram and some of my followers went crazy, they had never seen it before. If anyone is seriously interested in purchasing a print, let me know and I will get it scanned. Shot in 87 in San Diego. Photo: Grant Brittain
]]>I have been working on my book feverishly for the last two years and I keep unearthing Photo Gems from my Garage Archive. This powerful photo of Natas Kaupas came to my light table and I did a quick dupe of it with my Macro lens. I ran it on Instagram and some of my followers went crazy, they had never seen it before. If anyone is seriously interested in purchasing a print, let me know and I will get it scanned. Shot in 87 in San Diego. Photo: Grant Brittain
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