Three days with Christian Hosoi and his crew

 Few people, even in the skate world, remember, but 80's vert legend Christian Hosoi teamed up with Vision for a short time in 1990 with a company called Tuff Skts.  Unreel Productions, Vision's video company, had just shut down.  I was the only guy kept on full time, because I was the lowest paid and could work most of the equipment.  So I was pretty stoked to get the gig of hanging out with Christian Hosoi and his crew for three days shooting video.  I ended up editing a 7 minute promo video, which Vision said looked "too gangster."  So I cut it down to 4 minutes.  I lost my copy, but a 1 1/2 minute version that appeared on Sk8-TV is around, with lame ass music.

 In those days it was Christian with the big, high, stylish airs, and Tony Hawk with the tech tricks.  Christian with a tailgrab frontside on his ramp, in W.C. Fields old house, on top of a hill, in Echo Park. 

 Day number two we went to an abandoned pool in Van Nuys next to a crack house.  I was scared walking in there with a $50,000 video camera.  It was a great session, and I got some great footage, and Block shot photos. 

 Day three of shooting, a big, rectangle pool high on a hill off the 14 freeway, north of L.A.  Christian did so many freakin' tricks in this pool, but its hard to beat this hand behind the back grind for style.

 We met this kid, John Swope, at the Van Nuys pool.  He was doing the most amazing Smith grinds I've EVER seen in a backyard pool.  Even's Christian's Smiths were this good in that pool.  Was Hosoi jealous?  Hell no, he invited John, who he nicknamed "Johnny Grind," to our shoot the next day.  John wound up in the video and I think got a short sponsorship. 

Joey Tran with a backside Smith on Christian's ramp. 

We all stopped for dinner on the last night of shooting.  After eating, Christian gave his young guys prime skating advice for contests.  It was something like this, "Eat a big plate of pasta the night before, get up, take a big shit, smoke a joint, and skate all day."  Ah...... the things that don't make it into skate videos.

Cernicky of Death: still from Barge at Will video

 This guy with the weird smile is skater Mark Cernicky in 1989 at the Yorba Linda ramp.  This was the only section in Vision's 1989 video, Barge at Will, that I shot all the footage for.  I was totally stoked how that section came out, and Mark was, too.

Here's Mark a few years ago, he started racing motorcycles, and has a great gig now, it seems.

Crail slide on a mini

Remember when you had friends in the 80's that said, "Dude! I just got a tattoo gun!"

Stalefish on vert.

Pivot fakie

Toed out (on purpose) frontside air.  These shoots were a couple of fun days with the big ol' 35 pound betacam.

Professional Sidekick

 My name is Steve Emig, and in 1991 I got tagged with the nickname, The White Bear, by my then roommate BMXer/entrepreneur, Chris Moeller.  That's become my penname over the years.  I've spent much of my life as kind of a professional sidekick.  The photo above is a still from the 1989 Vision Skateboards video, Barge At Will.  I'm still not sure who Will was, but we were supposed ot barge at him.

 The skater on the left, above, is Ken Park, airing over the spine and channel on Tony Hawk's Fallbrook mini ramp.  I'm the guy sitting on the rail to the right.  I was hoping to actually meet Tony that day, working as an assistant for Don Hoffman.  But Tony was off doing a demo.  I did have lunch with Don and Frank Hawk, Tony's dad, which was pretty epic day in the skateboarding world then.

 Here's skater Joe Johnson, same video, same spine.  This is from the Super 8 footage I shot that day, while Don Hoffman was shooting amazing 35mm footage that the skaters didn't like because it didn't show their whole body.  Can't please skaters.

 Same video, with Kele Rosecrans snapping an ollie over a little banked hip at a school.  That's me in the background, with the 35 pound, $50,000 betacam over my head.  Video cameras were beasts back then.

Ken Park again, boardslide over the same spine.  That's me standing against the pole on the far left, shooting Super 8 footage, I think.  I've done a lot of things in my 50 years on this planet.  It's time to stop being a sidekick and do my own thing.  Welcome to my blog of my stuff.