Sweetgrass Productions | Film. Mountains. Culture. Soul.

Page 1 of 2 12 »

Christmas came a little early this year... We are

Christmas came a little early this year...

We are excited to see Made in the Mitten taking home a @vimeo staff pick- the true gold standard of filmmaking in our modern 21st century world. Congrats to the team for taking this one home!

Director: @zeppelinzeerip
Editor: @mikaljamesbrown
Director of Photography: @jsukes
Music: @futuremysticband
Graphic Design: @max.hofert.design

Archival Footage Provided By:
Bob, Bill, and Tom Pushaw
Julie Poppen
@e.m.media
Zachary Trost
@grainmedia
Nick Johnson

Supported by @burton and @newhollandbrew .

Additional thanks: Muskegon Community College, Pando Winter Sports Park, @nauticalbynature , Jess Smith, @adam_dickerson , @levirye , Dominic Bergquist, Bob Novak, Bill and Tom Pushaw, Ron Pesch, @bcocard

Fun times diving into old super 8 footage to edit

Fun times diving into old super 8 footage to edit this piece on how snowboarding arose from the ‘mitten’ of Michigan. There’s an unquestionable spirt found in these frames and beyond their edges that distilled into a portrait of exploration and joy in the uncovering of a new type of movement that would change snowsports forever.
.
Thanks to @zeppelinzeerip for bringing me onto the project, and to @burton and @newhollandbrew for supporting it. Also check out @futuremysticband for more of the dreamy psych vibes that give so much of the emotion to the film.
.
Dedicated to Sherman Poppen - the man who first strapped a pair of skies together on the shores of Lake Michigan, and to Jake Burton Carpenter - who took the ‘Snurfer’ and progressed it into the board that was destined to change the way we slide on snow.
.

Director: @zeppelinzeerip
Editor: @mikaljamesbrown
Director of Photography: @jsukes
Music: @futuremysticband
Graphic Design: @max.hofert.design

Archival Footage Provided By:
Bob, Bill, and Tom Pushaw
Julie Poppen
@e.m.media
Zachary Trost
@grainmedia
Nick Johnson

Supported by @burton and @newhollandbrew .

Additional thanks: Muskegon Community College, Pando Winter Sports Park, @nauticalbynature , Jess Smith, @adam_dickerson , @levirye , Dominic Bergquist, Bob Novak, Bill and Tom Pushaw, Ron Pesch, @bcocard

You know it’s gonna be a pitter patter kinda day

You know it’s gonna be a pitter patter kinda day when Mariah and Gaga are the EZ-Rock bookends to your mountain commute. @blackcrows_skis @patagonia_snow

Mountain time with Martin is a heady reminder that

Mountain time with Martin is a heady reminder that platforms like this are, mostly, caustic pits of loneliness and despair. On the skin track we talk about community, how many friends one actually needs, Fred Beckey, Gang Starr, and time well spent. He doesn't sleep with his phone next to his head. While others chase the mortgage mobius strip, forever ratcheting and leveraging, he joneses for time, and life without debt. He's had the same ski pack since I met him.

He'd also never talk of his tracks unprompted, or even prompted. His rap sheet is deep, but you'd never know it; the second descent of Alaska's University Peak (the cover of 50 Classic Descents), the first descent of the North Face of Clemenceau, a 22-day completion of the Great Divide Traverse from Jasper to Lake Louise, Alberta, and a St. Elias expedition, to name a few.

As we sat at the table last week, the only two in the vaulted space of the Asulkan Hut, the drone of propane lanterns cut the rush of a deep winter Selkirk storm bearing down outside. Aided by some 16-year Lagavulin, Martin talked about a 2014 Himalayan expedition, chasing down a dream conjured by a distant 7000m peak in a @kristoffer.erickson photo, Mt Saipal. Charting into an unknown valley with hopes of a bridge to cross whitewater, flip-flopped porters carrying unbelievable loads, and several weeks of establishing high camps and shuttling loads, only to find a rotten, unrideable snowpack on their line of descent. While they waited in basecamp for the porters to return, serac fall triggered an apocalyptic avalanche on the face, pushing debris 100m up and over a moraine in the valley. From the safety of Kathmandu a week later, they watched a typhoon push wind and snow into the mountains, caving tents and homes, and ultimately killing people in the double digits. The frailty of life and the consequences of his pursuits, I suspect, had rarely been sharper.

The legend and folklore that surround skiing have always held a certain magnetism for me. The mystical descents and temples of mountaineering, the deep days, and the tailgate hedonism of life spent in constant pursuit of the next face shot.

The return of long shadow season. The white froth

The return of long shadow season. The white froth zombie freak, it appears, is emerging, from hibernation. @blackcrows_skis @patagonia_snow

When the world is on fire sometimes the best move

When the world is on fire sometimes the best move is to throw on a pair of metallic tights, turn the dial to 11 and send it full turbo into the thunderdome. Behold our first ever collaboration with @pit_viper as we bring the new @lookbindings pivot campaign to a prime time tv screen near you. It may be a new LOOK for us, but you can rest assured knowing that in true OG Sweetgrass style, this was a 100% human powered ski production; every turn, every spread eagle, every tongue thrust was earned with pure, glorious sweat equity.
.
Thanks to our legendary all star cast @rachaelburks @ahmetsbrother @spencerharkins for absolutely killing it, and stay tuned for upcoming LOOKS into the lives of each unique character on, and off the slopes. 📹&✂️by @mikaljamesbrown

When Google Earth has sex with optimism, some frea

When Google Earth has sex with optimism, some freaky shit happens. Deemed a "retirement party" for a dude who's outdoor rap sheet is a phone book, the journey began with a plane scout last summer, and concluded with said dude, cresting 60, barfing on top of the ridge. The dream was simple-- follow an uninterrupted ridge from the Bugaboos west all the way to the Four Squatters. 50km and 17,000ft of vertical off trail scrambling, glaciation, bergschrunds, shit rock, mud, shale, sidehilling, sand, and finally, a 2500m vertical descent through alder, deadfall, bears. Casual Sunday.

30 hours later with an unplanned 3 hour shiver fest bivy at treeline, we arrived at our car at Duncan Lake, not sure whether beer, or coke, or water was best to wash us clean of the misery. Certainly, most definitely, 100%, not destined to become a classic route, but a memory a few days after the fact, and likely a good memory by the end of the week. Pics by Nelson Rocha and Nick @randy.richmond @patagonia

Alberto Pugno, a fisherman in the Italian Alps, is

Alberto Pugno, a fisherman in the Italian Alps, is the last known practitioner of an ancient style of flyfishing remarkable for its pure simplicity.
Watch the film through the link in bio. ——- Films, like yearbooks, serve as markers of time. We spend large portions of our lives, sequestered in dark edit caves, wrestling with their every detail, and getting to know the characters better than they know themselves.
IL PESCATORE COMPLETO will forever bring me back to the summer of '19, where I was lifted off my feet by the romance of Chopin, the pastoral beauty of Alagna, and the masterful simplicity of Arturo Pugno.
It was a rare occasion when I got to the end of the process and thought "well that doesn't totally suck." Huge thanks to Yvon Chouinard, all at @patagonia, and @alxlwthr for trusting us to shape the story into what you see today, an ode to Italianness, fish whispering, and simplicity. Bacioni 😘

Here at SGP we aren’t your typical team sports f

Here at SGP we aren’t your typical team sports fans, but when we got a call from @foxsports to shoot a lead in spot for a little game called THE SUPERBOWL it was hard to say no. Tune in at 6pm EST to see ‘Before They Were Here’ (we’ll believe it when we see it!). Cinematography by @mikaljamesbrown and @mikeparenteau with camera wrangling by @the_poacher and @snackyz shoot wrangling by @vincent_paolella

It’s a hairs-on-the-back-of-the-neck kind of mom

It’s a hairs-on-the-back-of-the-neck kind of moment, joining a small, but growing, number of land protections in Canada that recognize and prioritize the rights of the First Nations. The Ktunaxa, the federal government, and @wildinsight just announced the official officialness of the Qat’muk protected area to permanently keep Jumbo Wild forever. I couldn’t have dreamed of this outcome for the Ktunaxa, Wildsight, and the citizens of the east and west Kootenays when we began our work on the film some years ago. Huge congratulations for the many, many people who believed in fighting against the odds, for several decades, to protect their backyard and ancestral home. 📷: @grove_garrett @patagonia

Follow Us