Travel Features

Phonetographed – Eero Ettala’s Season Through the Lens Of His Phone

Travelling for a season without the all-consuming pressure to deliver a regular video part meant, as well as throwing down the hammers you’d expect, Eero Ettala was able to chill and enjoy his friends’ riding – and more often than not he’d whip out his phone and snap off a few stills. Turns out they’re pretty, pretty good.

Most of these shots you’ll see below he took using his Black Eye lenses – a phone lens brand he started with homies a few years back. So, with out further ado, enjoy his phonetographs…

After an intense season of filming Ender and putting out my final video part, I decided to stress less about everything and go more with the flow. In the past I’ve always needed to have a solid plan for filming a part. I even had this little written list on my computer of spots I wanted to hit and tricks I wanted to land that season. And now since I wasn’t filming another video part, it was awesome to be able to go on trips with different crews and not being the one in charge all the time. Following other riders to their spots was refreshing to me and to my riding, but of course sometimes it was also easier to just sit back and enjoy the show. Most of the time I was too hyper to just sit and watch, so I started shooting the action with my phone and these are 20 of my favourite photos from the 2015-2016 season. – Eero

November 2015

This picture was taken from our first riding trip of the season to Ruka in northern Finland. At that time of the year the days are short and when it’s supposed to be bright out it’s usually just grey and flat light, so the morning this picture was taken we went to look for something to jib in the village. Antti Jussila ended up jumping off the roof into the snow covered ladder in the heart of Ruka village.

When you see the sun on the horizon you need to make the most out of it, since it will be gone a few minutes later. Sun and powder is a rare combo in Finland, but we were able to witness both at once, and that is when Toni Kerkelä let rip a little frontside slash for the fans.

Another typical morning in Ruka. Grey weather and no reason to ride the resort, so Toni Kerkelä decided to turn into a hippie and jump over the fence in our parking lot.

December 2015

For our second early season trip to Ruka blessed us with more sunny days than the one before. Here, Antti Jussila worships the sun on his way down the mountain.

January 2016

Nitro decided to make a trip to Finland to film for their new movie called BOOM. I had Dom Dom [Dominic Wagner] and [Marc] Swoboda staying at my place and our goal was to get radical in the streets of Helsinki. And Swoboda for sure was getting radical with this fifty up the ledge into a handplant and landing back on the ledge to a boardslide.

February 2016

When the snow melted in Helsinki it was time to drive up north and follow the snow. We ended up in Kuopio and stayed there for another five days of shredding the streets. The last spot of the trip reminded me that I was getting too fat and it was time to lose some weight or otherwise I’d snap all my boards in half.

Shortly after my trip with Nitro, Antti Jussila called me to join them for another filming trip to Joensuu, Finland. Antti had already scoped out this cool yellow rainbow rail and on the warm up tries I was able to snap this photo of him doing a legit frontside noseblunt!

While Janne Lipsanen was getting tech on a kink rail, me and Antti scoped around the area to shoot something fun for Instagram. And that’s how Antti Jussila ended up jumping one-footed down to a frozen set of stairs in Joensuu.

The last spot of the trip was at the cross country skiing stadium. Antti Jussila was onto some one-foot madness, but for getting comfortable with the spot he poked out few mean Stales before the real banger.

March 2016

I had already been to this spot a couple times myself and this time I promised to help a brother out and be the winch man for Antti. After he got his trick for the video, I asked the filmer to winch him in instead so I could shoot this photo of Antti wallriding and pretty much landing on my face.

Mid-March I was asked to join the Oakley boys for a nice weekend trip to Mammoth, California. The weather was as nice as you could imagine and on the first night we had a cool sunset session on the big old Oakley wallride in the main park. Sven Thorgren blasting a tail grab to fakie.

The second day of the trip we had organised an Oakley mini pipe challenge. Riding the mini pipe was the most fun I had the whole season, and here Sven Thorgren plants his way to the other side of the tire on the bottom of the pipe.

Talma is my local resort back home in Finland and that is where I get to shred with all my homies. The resort is fairly small, but perfect for getting your tricks dialled. 100 laps a day as I’ve said before. The “smooth operator” Markku Koski jumping over the legendary hip of Talma glacier.

At this session I got to work like a real photographer. Ville Lahtinen was nice enough to let me use his Nikon setup to shoot a couple frames. Antti Jussila sending it down the roof on to a boardslide in his old home town of Oulu, Finland.

April 2016

Spring was in full effect and Nitro called a crew of riders for a park shoot in France. My knee was hurting pretty bad at the beginning of the trip, so I decided to follow the other riders and shoot whatever they were doing. Torgeir Bergrem backside tailslides the missile for my viewing pleasure.

May 2016

The last filming trip of the year for Nitro’s BOOM took us to Pyramiden, which is an abandoned Russian mining town in Svalbard. We had the access to hit anything we found in town and this crazy rail, that Sam Taxwood did a 50-50 frontside 360 out on, ended up being the ender shot for the whole movie.

The architecture in Pyramiden was pretty ideal for snowboarding, as you can see in this photo. Sam Taxwood nose presses a creeper ledge right outside an abandoned swimming hall.

Torgeir Bergrem has knees of steel. This roof drop wasn’t tempting to hit by any means, because it had the flattest landing imaginable. Being a Norwegian viking, Torgeir took it like a man and rode away clean. I love the steeze of this ollie.

Sam Taxwood plants his hand high up the wall next to some sketchy oil tanks in Pyramiden on our last filming day of the year for Nitro’s BOOM.

Happy to be on a boat back from Pyramiden to Longyearbyen after a successful trip with the Nitro crew, and realising that for once I had an injury free season with loads of great days on my board with various people. Thanks everyone!