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"\"&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=\\\"\\/files\\/2008\\/11\\/26\\/tita_zimm.jpg\\\"&gt;&lt;img class=\\\"alignnone size-full wp-image-1000083360\\\" title=\\\"tita_zimm\\\" src=\\\"\\/files\\/2008\\/11\\/26\\/tita_zimm.jpg\\\" alt=\\\"\\\" width=\\\"500\\\" height=\\\"328\\\" \\/&gt;&lt;\\/a&gt;&lt;\\/p&gt;\\n&lt;h1&gt;Travis Rice And The Mega Movie&lt;\\/h1&gt;\\n&lt;h3&gt;From the exclusive first look behind the scenes of That\\u2019s It, That\\u2019s All in the TransWorld Sept Issue 2008&lt;\\/h3&gt;\\n&lt;div id='gallery-1' class='gallery galleryid-1000083356 gallery-columns-3 gallery-size-thumbnail'&gt;&lt;figure class='gallery-item'&gt;\\n\\t\\t\\t&lt;div class='gallery-icon landscape'&gt;\\n\\t\\t\\t\\t&lt;a href='http:\\/\\/snowboarding.transworld.net\\/photos\\/travis-rice-mega-movie-thats-it-thats-all\\/attachment\\/snb0908_tr3\\/'&gt;&lt;img width=\\\"179\\\" height=\\\"117\\\" src=\\\"http:\\/\\/snowboarding.transworld.net\\/wp-content\\/blogs.dir\\/442\\/files\\/2008\\/11\\/26\\/snb0908_tr3.jpg\\\" class=\\\"attachment-thumbnail size-thumbnail\\\" alt=\\\"snb0908_tr3\\\" \\/&gt;&lt;\\/a&gt;\\n\\t\\t\\t&lt;\\/div&gt;&lt;\\/figure&gt;&lt;figure class='gallery-item'&gt;\\n\\t\\t\\t&lt;div class='gallery-icon landscape'&gt;\\n\\t\\t\\t\\t&lt;a href='http:\\/\\/snowboarding.transworld.net\\/photos\\/travis-rice-mega-movie-thats-it-thats-all\\/attachment\\/snb0908_tr31\\/'&gt;&lt;img width=\\\"179\\\" height=\\\"117\\\" src=\\\"http:\\/\\/snowboarding.transworld.net\\/wp-content\\/blogs.dir\\/442\\/files\\/2008\\/11\\/26\\/snb0908_tr31.jpg\\\" class=\\\"attachment-thumbnail size-thumbnail\\\" alt=\\\"snb0908_tr31\\\" \\/&gt;&lt;\\/a&gt;\\n\\t\\t\\t&lt;\\/div&gt;&lt;\\/figure&gt;&lt;figure class='gallery-item'&gt;\\n\\t\\t\\t&lt;div class='gallery-icon landscape'&gt;\\n\\t\\t\\t\\t&lt;a href='http:\\/\\/snowboarding.transworld.net\\/photos\\/travis-rice-mega-movie-thats-it-thats-all\\/attachment\\/tita_zimm\\/'&gt;&lt;img width=\\\"178\\\" height=\\\"117\\\" src=\\\"http:\\/\\/snowboarding.transworld.net\\/wp-content\\/blogs.dir\\/442\\/files\\/2008\\/11\\/26\\/tita_zimm.jpg\\\" class=\\\"attachment-thumbnail size-thumbnail\\\" alt=\\\"tita_zimm\\\" \\/&gt;&lt;\\/a&gt;\\n\\t\\t\\t&lt;\\/div&gt;&lt;\\/figure&gt;\\n\\t\\t&lt;\\/div&gt;\\n\\n&lt;h2&gt;Watch the TITA Metal Teaser &lt;span style=\\\"text-decoration: underline;\\\"&gt;&lt;span style=\\\"color: #00ccff;\\\"&gt;&lt;a href=\\\"\\/2008\\/08\\/29\\/thats-it-thats-all-metal-teaser\\/\\\" target=\\\"_blank\\\"&gt;here&lt;\\/a&gt;&lt;\\/span&gt;&lt;\\/span&gt;&lt;\\/h2&gt;\\n&lt;p&gt;Words By Melissa Larsen&lt;\\/p&gt;\\n&lt;p&gt;All Photos Tim Zimmerman&lt;\\/p&gt;\\n&lt;p&gt;\\u201cYou want to hear a story about Travis Rice? I\\u2019ll tell you a story about that kid.\\u201d&lt;br \\/&gt;\\nThe agent at the Jackson Hole airport check-in counter tags my snowboard bag through to Valdez, Alaska and leans over with a Cheshire-Cat grin: \\u201cWhen Travis was about five years old, he would come into the ski-patrol shack with his dad every day. He always wore this patroller jacket that came down past his knees, and he would just tear around the place. It didn\\u2019t matter what you told him. He just ran around and did whatever he wanted.\\u201d&lt;br \\/&gt;\\nI stand at the counter patiently, waiting for the story to continue. It doesn\\u2019t. That\\u2019s it. That\\u2019s the end. A moment of awkward silence passes between us. The man\\u2019s eyes crinkle in amusement as I struggle for comprehension. And then it dawns on me.&lt;br \\/&gt;\\n\\u201cSo, basically, nothing\\u2019s changed,\\u201d I say.&lt;br \\/&gt;\\nHe shrugs his shoulders and, with raised eyebrows, smiles again. \\u201cYou tell me.\\u201d&lt;\\/p&gt;\\n&lt;p&gt;Two days later, I\\u2019m sitting in the back of a helicopter next to Curt Morgan, the other half of Travis\\u2019 new production company, Brainfarm. (Curt and Travis met back when Curt was making movies for Grenade and continued working together on the Community Project.) We\\u2019re in the Chugach mountain range, in an area of the Valdez backcountry known as Science Fiction. It\\u2019s the second sunny day they\\u2019ve seen in three weeks, but the weather is a mixed blessing: The sun arrived the day before with a giant windstorm, and the slopes that haven\\u2019t been wind-hammered have been wind-loaded. Safe, rideable aspects are few and far between. The consensus among the riders\\u2014Mark Landvik, Nicolas M\\u00fcller, Jeremy Jones, and Travis\\u2014is that, while they might have found some lines that look good enough to film, the conditions are such that none of them can really \\u201csend it,\\u201d or ride to their full potential. Frustrations are mounting as the day wears on.&lt;\\/p&gt;\\n&lt;p&gt;The Final Act&lt;br \\/&gt;\\nAlaska is the last stand in the behemoth battle that Travis and Curt have been waging against \\u201cuncontrollable forces\\u201d over the last two years in a quest to create their tour de force: a snowboard-adventure epic entitled That\\u2019s It, That\\u2019s All\\u2014a cinematic vision described by those who\\u2019ve seen pieces of the project along the way as \\u201cthe Planet Earth of snowboarding.\\u201d&lt;br \\/&gt;\\nUnder the guidance of AK riding veteran Jeremy Jones, Curt and Travis have spent the last fourteen months planning this Alaska trip, trying to take into account every conceivable snafu that could arise to thwart them. They\\u2019ve given themselves a month to wait for a window of good weather. They\\u2019ve hired guides from H20\\u2014the Valdez heli operation that holds use-permits for the most amount of terrain in the area\\u2014procured two dedicated helicopters and pre-paid for 96 hours of flight time.&lt;br \\/&gt;\\nMention this number to any professional skier, snowboarder, or lensman with AK filming experience and watch their eyes grow wide as they do a cost calculation in their heads. Even with a substantial cost-per-hour discount, 96 hours is an unheard of amount of time for any film crew to spend flying in a heli. This extravagance is one of the many that has created such a buzz in the snowboard community. When it comes to going over the top in ways that no shred-movie company has ever even thought of before, Travis and Curt are standing in the eye of a hurricane of their own creation with their eyes on the prize, while around them rumors and prophecies of both doom and greatness swirl.&lt;br \\/&gt;\\nOver the radio an H20 guide out flying a few peaks over with another film crew is calling in a zone that they\\u2019re intending to land in and ride. A swift answer comes back from headquarters: that zone is off limits. Travis\\u2019 crew has already scoped it and called dibs. The others will have to go somewhere else. This is what pre-paying for 96 hours of heli time gets you\\u2014first pick of every unridden peak within H20\\u2019s permit range. And it\\u2019s worth every penny. The weather\\u2019s only supposed to hold for a week. That\\u2019s one week to shoot the final all-our-remaining-eggs-are-in-this-one-AK-basket segment that will bring the filming portion of this two-year project to a close. The pressure is on.&lt;br \\/&gt;\\nBack in the camera helicopter, Curt has his handheld radio pressed against his forehead. Travis has just delivered some harshly worded opinions about how he believes the remainder of the day\\u2019s events should unfold that are in direct contradiction to the plan Curt just tried to implement. Curt has his eyes closed and lets out a deep exhale before deferring to Travis\\u2019 plan with a short, sarcastic reply.&lt;br \\/&gt;\\nCurt dismisses the moment as the result of creative tension. Travis will later apologize for the outburst, explaining that they had been waiting for so long for a good filming day, he was impatient to get things moving. And he and Curt are both alpha males, so they inevitably clash over whose way is right from time to time. The tension is always temporary.&lt;\\/p&gt;\\n&lt;p&gt;A New Way Of Seeing Things&lt;br \\/&gt;\\nJeremy Jones has just been dropped off on a nearby peak, so we take off to set up the aerial shot. He is perched on a narrow ledge above a long, razor-thin spine. Between Jeremy and the spine is a fifteen- to twenty-foot drop. Between him and that drop is a blind rollover. From where he sits, he can\\u2019t see a thing besides the valley floor below him.&lt;br \\/&gt;\\nHovering above Jeremy, the consummate professional with nerves of steel (who, by the way, is riding with a broken arm) as he waits patiently for the various cameramen to take their positions, is gnarly enough. Then Curt leans over and shows me his perspective. He\\u2019s holding a small monitor that\\u2019s displaying what the heli camera is looking at: Jeremy, in the center of the frame, is solidly in focus, while the valley floor beyond spins around him like a room after a night of heavy drinking.&lt;br \\/&gt;\\nAnyone who\\u2019s watched a decent snowboard movie in the last ten years has seen Jeremy standing on top of a miniscule mountain peak, preparing to descend some hairball spine in Alaska. But no one has ever seen anything like this. From this perspective Jeremy is less like a snowboarder, and more like Luke Skywalker in that scene in Star Wars where Vader\\u2019s just chopped off his hand, and he\\u2019s dangling by one arm from the bottom of a floating pod building above an endless sea of clouds. The depth-of-field captured by the camera is frightening. It looks like the slightest wrong move will send him tumbling thousands of feet to his doom. Terror rips up my spine, and I fight back the urge to vomit. And finally, I understand what all the hype around this movie is about.&lt;br \\/&gt;\\nThe hype is a bazillion-dollar Cineflex camera system mounted to the bottom of the helicopter. It\\u2019s hard to get a technical description in layman\\u2019s terms of exactly what this thing is. Until now, most snowboarding captured on film from the air has been the result of some brave lensman in a harness leaning out of a heli door with a handheld camera. In contrast, this camera sits in a ball-in-socket mount that\\u2019s fiber-optic gyro-stabilized, which means it doesn\\u2019t rattle, so the images it captures are smooth like butter. And it has a 360-degree rotational view, which means it can spin in all directions, making it possible to film a subject regardless of where it\\u2019s positioned under the heli.&lt;br \\/&gt;\\nThe Cineflex (which, incidentally, was used exclusively to film the award-winning documentary, Planet Earth) is similar in design and function to the more famous Wescam and Pictorvision XR, which are the camera systems most commonly used in the filming of blockbuster Hollywood movies like Lord Of The Rings\\u2014both of which have also been employed to film a good portion of this movie. The main difference between the three systems is the Cineflex is lighter and shoots HD, while the other two shoot 35mm film. Beyond that, they\\u2019re basically the highest-end camera systems around that, according to Curt, deliver \\u201csuper high-def, IMAX-quality footage\\u201d that \\u201cno one of our age or bank-account status could ever really afford to rent or borrow or buy.\\u201d&lt;br \\/&gt;\\nAnd therein lies the reason no other action-sports movie production crew has tried to use a Cineflex or Wescam before. It\\u2019s not that they don\\u2019t want to, it\\u2019s that few companies\\u2014including Brainfarm\\u2014can afford to. So how has this duo supposedly been able to obtain these Holy Grails of cinematographic equipment? Apparently, in the case of the Cineflex, Curt tracked down a few of the small number of people in the world who own one and talked them into letting him use it.&lt;br \\/&gt;\\nThe feat sounds deceptively simple. One of the things that makes Travis and Curt such a fearsome team is that when it comes to obstacles, they both seem to have been born with a kind of superhero ability to walk right through them like they\\u2019re not even there. When it comes to the art of persuasion, though, Curt\\u2019s in a class of his own. The universally agreed upon opinion among all who know him is that he can talk anyone into just about anything.&lt;br \\/&gt;\\n\\u201cI\\u2019ve always wanted to see more aerial riding shots,\\u201d says Curt when asked about what motivated him to attempt the impossible. \\u201cIt\\u2019s my favorite way to watch snowboarding. And there are some great shots out there, but I\\u2019ve always thought it could be done better.\\u201d&lt;br \\/&gt;\\nI watch Curt in action on his version of \\u201cbetter.\\u201d The scene inside the heli is hectic. Mark Hryma\\u2014a Cineflex designer and operator who has over fifteen years of experience, but is relatively new to shooting snowboarding\\u2014is sitting shotgun in the cockpit with a monitor and gianormous knob-filled control panel on his lap. Curt is sitting in the back seat next to a stack of whirring electronic boxes, looking into the monitor on his own lap, directing. The flow of orders from the back of the heli is constant, as Curt coaches Mark through every aspect getting the shot just right.&lt;br \\/&gt;\\nBoth Mark and Curt are trying to direct the pilot\\u2014an ex-army vet who\\u2019s flown more hours than almost any other pilot in Valdez, but has never had to fly with a camera before, and can\\u2019t quite understand what Mark and Curt are trying to get him to do. The situation is tense for everyone. Because the heli is hovering above the riders, he can\\u2019t see them, has no frame of reference for where he\\u2019s supposed to be, and often gets confused. Just when they think they\\u2019ve got a shot lined up, the pilot drifts off course, and they have to circle around and start over. At one point he even accidentally lets the heli drift down on top of the riders, who have to yell over the radios that he\\u2019s about to blow them off the mountain with his rotor wash.&lt;br \\/&gt;\\nWe make another practice pass over Jeremy, and Curt explains to Mark what he\\u2019s trying to achieve: \\u201cWhen we come over the top, I want to see what he\\u2019s seeing. We want to start off blind and see the drop just as he gets over the rollover and sees it himself. Everything in the shot should be revealed to us just as it\\u2019s being revealed to him.\\u201d Curt turns his screen toward me so I can watch. My stomach heaves again. \\u201cI want people to feel,\\u201d he continues, \\u201cI mean, really feel, what it\\u2019s like to be up here, riding things like this.\\u201d&lt;\\/p&gt;\\n&lt;p&gt;Travis Rice: Producer\\/Star&lt;br \\/&gt;\\nIn the third That\\u2019s It, That\\u2019s All teaser, Travis explains how he wants this movie to show what snowboarding is like for him. A montage of shots of Travis getting angry and chucking his snowboard flashes on screen while Travis says, \\u201cI\\u2019d say it\\u2019s when I feel passion. That is, if passion is a combination of utter joy and frustrational rage.\\u201d It is a strange thing to watch. It\\u2019s a side that those of us who are mostly used to seeing Travis when he\\u2019s home in Jackson, happily ripping pow laps with his friends sans camera entourage at the resort, haven\\u2019t really seen before.&lt;br \\/&gt;\\nFour days into the trip I get to witness an outburst live. The wind has blown a giant, perfectly shaped orb of snow directly above a beautiful, long, steep-transitioned landing, and the crew has built a massive cheese-wedge takeoff on the other side. Viewed from the top of the ultra-long, steep run-in, it looks like the jump will send them right into the glacier crevasses in the valley beyond. It took them almost a day to construct, and to say Travis and Mark Landvik are excited to reap the fruits of their labor would be an understatement.&lt;br \\/&gt;\\nUnfortunately, when we arrive at the jump in the morning, the sun has heated up the snow so much that Mark and Travis can\\u2019t get enough speed to clear the orb. Fortunately, they brought a bag of rock salt to throw on the takeoff. Unfortunately, when they start to spread it out they realize that it\\u2019s rock salt mixed with gravel.&lt;br \\/&gt;\\nThey experiment with alternative solutions. One of the helis hovers a few feet above the takeoff in an attempt to cool down the run-in with the wind of the rotor blades. Travis strips off every top layer down to his polypro, to eliminate wind resistance, and points it in a full tuck at the jump from what seems like 10,000 feet away. But for all his effort, he still has to throw his board sideways at the top of the takeoff because he knows he\\u2019s not going to make it.&lt;br \\/&gt;\\nHe hops off the wedge, unstraps, stares up at the run-in for a long minute, and then with a cry, turns and savagely attacks the bag of gravel-salt with his snowboard. The moment lasts maybe seven seconds. No one else even seems to notice.&lt;br \\/&gt;\\n\\u201cTravis is intense, man,\\u201d laughs Brainfarm filmer and production assistant Brody Thompson when I mention the salt-bag assault during dinner later. \\u201cBut this is his job. Aren\\u2019t we all intense at our jobs when we really passionately care about what we\\u2019re doing?\\u201d He points out that less than five minutes after the jump was declared dead, Travis had a new plan.&lt;br \\/&gt;\\n\\u201cTravis likes to turn everything into a competition,\\u201d he explains. \\u201cNot because he has to win, because he\\u2019s cool if he loses. It\\u2019s just more fun for him if he\\u2019s trying to win.\\u201d&lt;br \\/&gt;\\nThis is Travis\\u2019 movie; his level of involvement goes beyond being a rider\\u2014he\\u2019s a producer, he\\u2019s a director, and, make no mistake, he is the star, not by words, but by actions.&lt;br \\/&gt;\\n\\u201cHis level of snowboarding is so high,\\u201d says team photographer Tim Zimmerman, \\u201cthat when I try to shoot with other people, I just get bored. When other snowboarders ride with Travis, I swear they ride better. And I get so used to what I see that it just becomes normal for me. Like the Mosquito Creek gap he did this winter. He jumped a canyon! And I show people the photo and they\\u2019re like, \\u2018Holy shit! That guy\\u2019s crazy!\\u2019 But I\\u2019m so used to it. Then I try to go shoot with other people, and they\\u2019re doing like a regular backcountry jump, and I just\\u2026 can\\u2019t get excited about it. It\\u2019s a problem.\\u201d&lt;br \\/&gt;\\nAsked if he thinks he rides better when Travis is around, Landvik responds: \\u201cI think he and I feed off each other. But there are times when he\\u2019s throwing double cork 1080s and shit when I\\u2019m like, \\u2018Well, what am I going to do now? Am I going to do a 720 off this jump?\\u201d No. I\\u2019m going to do the biggest method I\\u2019ve ever done in my life.&lt;br \\/&gt;\\n\\u201cIt seems like every trip I\\u2019ve been on he\\u2019s trying some new crazy trick,\\u201d Landvik continues. \\u201cAnd he gets it, like every time. It doesn\\u2019t matter if it takes him one try or 50. He\\u2019s going to get that trick no matter what. If it breaks him, then he\\u2019s broken. From what I\\u2019ve seen, though [laughs], he never gets broken.\\u201d&lt;br \\/&gt;\\n\\u201cFrom what I\\u2019ve seen up here so far,\\u201d says Jeremy, \\u201cit\\u2019s clear that Nicolas [M\\u00fcller], Landvik, and Travis are all leaders. They\\u2019re so professional and so motivated. But Travis is just one step beyond \\u2026 for example, one thing I\\u2019ve never seen before\\u2014he can spot jumps from the air. I can\\u2019t tell you how many times I\\u2019ve been up here with freestyle riders who fly around trying to find jumps for weeks and find nothing. Travis is just like, \\u2018Boom, there\\u2019s one. Put us down right there. We\\u2019re going to build the thing this way, and it\\u2019s going to be sick.\\u2019 And it is.&lt;br \\/&gt;\\n\\u201cAnother thing is, I\\u2019m watching his riding progress like every run\\u2014I mean, real big-mountain freeriding. He just has a really good sense. It\\u2019s hard to explain. Mark and Travis are very similar-type riders. They\\u2019re really powerful\\u2014stomp everything. And Nicolas has his own totally original, creative style. I just think you have to be a little demented for some of the bigger stuff, and\\u2026 [laughs] Travis is a little demented. If he decided that\\u2019s what he wanted to do, he could really take true big-mountain riding to a new level.\\u201d&lt;\\/p&gt;\\n&lt;p&gt;Moving Forward&lt;br \\/&gt;\\nThough praise of Travis\\u2019 shred skills by riders who are praise-worthy in their own rights is not unexpected, considering the main complaint about Travis and Curt\\u2019s last movie project was that Travis\\u2019 riding overpowered everyone else in the film, to hear it is somewhat troubling. Asked if that might be a problem with this movie as well, cinematographer Gabe Langlois answers, \\u201cThe Community Project was an awesome idea, but it was complicated, and there wasn\\u2019t enough time to really pull it off the way, I think, they wanted to. But this is a two-year project, so we\\u2019ve really been able to take our time and plan things out the right way.&lt;br \\/&gt;\\n\\u201cThing about Travis is, he really respects people who can actually snowboard, like who can do a good-looking turn and actually ride a mountain\\u2014as opposed to, you know, sliding around between jumps. So, he\\u2019s put together these kind of \\u2018dream teams,\\u2019 where the people have been handpicked for each trip based on the riding they all are the absolute best at. But, basically, everyone in this film he\\u2019s picked because he completely respects them and loves how they ride, and he really just wants to snowboard with them. And it shows.\\u201d&lt;br \\/&gt;\\n\\u201cThe rad thing about this movie,\\u201d says Landvik, \\u201cis Curt is on the exact same level as Travis, just on the film side. And he really wants to change the perception of snowboarding for other people in so many different ways. It\\u2019s not like your typical shred video, where it\\u2019s all people\\u2019s parts you might only like one or two of them. It\\u2019s like a snowboarding documentary. You get involved with the riders and the places they go to. You care about everything that happens.\\u201d&lt;br \\/&gt;\\n\\u201cA lot of inspiration for this film,\\u201d adds Travis, \\u201cis just wanting to show these places that we get to go and the cool shit that we do. And through a visual lens that can actually give you the feeling of being there. This is the first time I\\u2019ve ever been able to show someone footage and feel like they\\u2019re really getting to see the same thing that we see when we\\u2019re out there.\\u201d&lt;br \\/&gt;\\n\\u201cAnd maybe people will never get to see the things we do,\\u201d says Curt, \\u201cbut we really just want to inspire people to go out and travel and explore for themselves. I know not everyone can afford it, but you can figure it out\\u2014anyone can. You just have to take it one step at a time.\\u201d&lt;\\/p&gt;\\n&lt;h2&gt;Watch the Metal Teaser &lt;span style=\\\"text-decoration: underline;\\\"&gt;&lt;span style=\\\"color: #00ccff;\\\"&gt;&lt;a href=\\\"\\/2008\\/08\\/29\\/thats-it-thats-all-metal-teaser\\/\\\" target=\\\"_blank\\\"&gt;here&lt;\\/a&gt;&lt;\\/span&gt;&lt;\\/span&gt;&lt;\\/h2&gt;\\n&lt;p&gt;For more of Tim&amp;#8217;s photos check out his website &lt;span style=\\\"text-decoration: underline;\\\"&gt;&lt;span style=\\\"color: #3366ff;\\\"&gt;&lt;a href=\\\"http:\\/\\/timzimmerman.com\\/\\\" target=\\\"_blank\\\"&gt;here&lt;\\/a&gt;&lt;\\/span&gt;&lt;\\/span&gt;&lt;\\/p&gt;\\n\""^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
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