Tag Archives: bouldering

How to Make a Climbing Movie

make_a_climbing_movie

Video is all the rage these days, and thanks to increasingly affordable and powerful cameras, not to mention social media and the mobile web, the barrier to filmmaking stardom is thinner than at any time in the history of planet Earth. If you like climbing and you have a DSLR, there really is no good reason to wait. All you need is a subject (a strong-ish climber and a good route or problem), an afternoon, and a laptop with a pirated copy of Final Cut. That, coupled with the following 10-step structure will help you make a hot vid that’ll get you rich, 100% guaranteed.*

1. Set the scene… - Slider footy of beautiful natural places surrounding the climbing area. (“Footy” is slang for “footage,” if you’re not in the know.) If you can’t afford a slider, a simple pan will suffice, I guess… but you should really get a slider.

Bonus footy: Grab a time-lapse of sunrise, clouds zooming over crag.

2. Hi, my name is… - Sit your subject(s) down in front of idyllic landscape or at least a nice-looking tree. Have them say the following: “Hi, my name is [name], I’m from [location], and I’ve been climbing for [number of years]. Cut interview footage with shots of your climber getting geared up: pulling on shoes, tying in, brushing holds, etc. Pro tip: Be sure to bring your sticks (aka tripod) for rock-solid talking-head shots.

Bonus footy: Have your climber tell the story of how he / she started climbing at a friend’s climbing gym birthday party, or whatever.

3. Introduce the area - Show images of the crag — shallow depth of field always a plus — and splice in close-ups of running water, birds in trees, common insects, and / or grass blowing in a field (this is called B-roll in the biz… hey, you got that slider, right?). Have your climber endorse the area: “[Area X] is one of my favorite places. I’ve been climbing here for [number of seasons], and the routes / problems are as good as anything else I’ve seen. [Something positive about the rock and / or local culture].

Bonus footy: Throw focus (i.e., make the image blurry and then sharp) a bunch.

4. Introduce super rad route / problem - Have your climber say something along these lines: “This one route / problem in particular really caught my attention — it’s called [route / problem name] and it’s about [grade]. It follows a super aesthetic line. It’s really classic…” Etc.

Bonus footy: Have your climber drop some knowledge about the route / problem history: the original route developer / first ascentionist / funny story behind the climb’s name.

5. Capture the struggle - Show your climber trying and failing on the route / problem over and over again. You almost can’t show too much failure, as it simply builds the suspense (“Will he / she send?!”). In a bouldering video, it is good to show the climber falling on every move of the problem two or three times. Have your climber show the camera his / her chalky, calloused, possibly bloody fingers as proof of dedication.

Bonus footy: Show us a real-life wobbler — a fully grown man / woman screaming obscenities, kicking a wall of solid stone, or whipping his / her chalk bag, all because he / she was unable to climb up a rock.

6. Show progress - Show the climber linking sections of the climb, but make sure he / she still repeatedly falls at the crux. We need to taste the excitement of a possible send before it actually happens. At this point, the climber should describe the crux section or sections: “The crux is really tricky and powerful — it involves a [shallow mono-pocket / skeezy knee bar / all-points-off slab dyno to double fist jams]. After that, you get a quick shake and then have to [fight the barn door / make a blind toss to a razor-sharp undercling / execute a full bat hang]. The finishing jug is guarded by [the world's smallest crimper / a below-the-waist lock-off on a completely natural five-mono "bowling ball" hold / a rabid Chihuahua].”

Bonus footy: In the middle of this section, show your climber breaking off a key hold and then shouting, “Shit!” [dramatic pause] “[Sigh…] I don’t know if it even goes any more.” Fade to black…

7. Build the dramatic arc higher - Show your climber triumphantly working through the crux against all odds. If you got the broken-hold money shot in the previous step, make sure to show your climber working out a new-and-improved sequence. A glimmer of hope when everything seems darkest.

Bonus footy: Candid shot of your climber sitting alone, eyes closed in meditative silence, methodically rubbing chalk into his / her fingers.

8. Witness the fitness - Cut to your climber setting out on the route / problem from the beginning, but this time be sure to up the volume on the music track (hip hop or electronic, preferably), to signal something sick is about to go down. Multiple angles (from above, from the side, from the ground) will allow the audience to experience the movement in a sort of 3-D hyper-reality. Close-ups of fingers and toes grasping tiny edges and pockets are key to show the viewer that, No, those are not jugs. Tight shot on the climber’s face as he / she grasps the finishing hold and hoots or yodels in victory.

Bonus footy: Get creative — super-slow-mo or GoPro POV footage add “depth” to your “story.”

9. Coming back down - All that training and paleo dieting paid off, so be sure to nail a shot of relieved joy on your climber’s face as he / she is lowered to the ground / stands atop the boulder with arms raised in victory. Interview footage here would include phrases like, “I’m so psyched to be able to climb this [awesome route / rad problem]; it really filled the aching void in my soul,” “That was pretty sick, for sure, but I’m a badass so I never really doubted it would go down. In fact, I’m surprised it took as long as it did,” or, ”I’m glad that’s done; now I can eat a burrito.”

Bonus footy: Fist bumps for everyone.

10. And… scene - A few good cuts of everyone packing up their gear and cracking brewskis. Grab that time-lapse footage of the sun coming up and just flip it to create a sunset / feeling of closure. The climber should offer some heart-warming nugget of wisdom like, “You know, sending felt really good, but just spending a day out with good friends is the best part. It’s really special…” Classic heroic journey drama set in nature. It’s in the bag.

Bonus footy: If your video has any sponsors, now’s a good time to put their logos on screen. Go ahead and thank mom and dad for getting you your camera, while you’re at it…

–––––

*Not guaranteed.

Bouldering Alone

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When from our better selves we have too
Been parted by the hurrying world, and
Sick of its business, of its pleasures
How gracious, how benign, is Solitude

— William Wordsworth, The Prelude

For the most part, climbing is a pursuit of two or more individuals—climber and belayer is a typical arrangement—and many a word has been written about this unique relationship. Among climbers, few things are held in higher regard than the so-called brotherhood of the rope, the mutual trust and interdependence of two people whose fates are literally tied together. (On the other side of this equation, few things are less appealing than partnering with one you do not fully trust or respect, or with whom you share no natural connection or understanding. At best, such a pairing is annoying; at worst it’s dangerous.)

Bouldering is a particularly social sort of climbing. Many boulderers feed off the energy of a small crew and push higher and harder when cheered on by others. It is not uncommon for a herd of boulderers to descend on an unassuming rock, liberally pad every inch of exposed ground, flick on an iPod speaker, and commence to crack some brewskis. Such gatherings are as much about hanging out as they are about climbing, which is all well and good, but…

But bouldering is also a perfect activity for those seeking solitude, as long as you can manage to find some rock away from the crowds, which isn’t always easy. In such settings, I seek reprieve from the ceaseless piling on of responsibilities that grows only heavier as years advance. A man “must sequester and come again to himself,” writes Montaigne in his essay “Of Solitude.” For me, few things are as suited this task as a cool day among the smaller stones, the trees and sky, where the only sound of humanity is the distant passing of a car, or not even that, if I am lucky.

One short week has passed since images of the bomb-ravaged Boston Marathon and the smoking ruins of a Texas fertilizer plant filled the news. Only a few months since the Newtown school shooting. North Korea continues to posture, Guantanamo is still open, the drones are buzzing, the gun lobby screeching, half the nation cries for one thing while the other half cries for the opposite. Deaths in the family, work overflows its nine-to-five boundaries, the lawn needs mowing, the dog wants a walk… sometimes, I find, a solo mission to the boulders is as necessary as sustenance or sleep.

I drive into the canyon known as Little Cottonwood, its spring-lush slopes littered with pale granite blocks cast off from the soaring slabs above. A slow Sunday, cool and breezy, I park on the snaking road’s narrow shoulder and wander into the trees, just as two other climbers take their leave for the day.

Perfect.

I lay down my old crash pad, faded by sun and chalk dust and beaten soft by the repeated compression of falling bodies. There is no one here for me to converse with or consider. The air is free of ego or competitive spirit, of the half-urge to make a connection or ask some question.

Alone, the simple acts, typically done with haste and mind churning on some distant task, expand to fill my consciousness. Tying my laces, arranging the pad with the predicted plumb line of my fall, placing the pointed toe of my climbing shoe on a little cluster of crystalline points. Without distraction, I explore the granite texture with my fingertips and consider its implications. I begin to puzzle out these physical koans, minutely controlling seldom-used muscle groups and the position of limbs in space. Such thought just to move! But the mind can only get you so far; the body must come to its own understanding.

A quick rest. Chalk particles dance in an angled bar of sun. I taste my water, lukewarm and metallic as it rolls from the lip of this old stainless steel bottle. Thoughts traverse the space of my mind, twirling, frictionless, and disappear. I reside in each dust-laced breath like a yogi. Maybe on this day I climb better than usual. Maybe I complete the climb I’ve been working on…

Or not. Either way. In solitude, it’s easier for everything to be just right, or to be alright with everything.

But the real trick is to carry that self-contained peace of solitude back into the world of people, to hold it, undisturbed like a fragile, gem-like flame in the wind and chaos. That’s the long game, but in the meantime, a quiet wood and a fine chunk of granite to puzzle over will do.

Connecting the Dots: Climbing and the Creation of Meaning

Hueco Lessons

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Hueco Tanks

I tendered my resignation via email from the computer in the Hueco Rock Ranch.

The year was 2007, and I found myself stranded in the Texas desert. My flight back to Ohio, back to my job writing words I didn’t mean for companies I didn’t care about, had been delayed due to ice storms slicking the country’s midsection. The upshot was a few extra days spent among the cactus and creosotebush, honey mesquite and soaptree yucca. I got to see the rock art of Cave Kiva and the Starry Eyed Man with his unique green pigment. With held breath, I spied a family of mowhawked javelina trotting through low vegetation. From the front deck of the Rock Ranch, I regarded the star-sprayed flank of the universe, sublime in the crystalline February night, and the neon yellow and orange sunrise in the morning. As I climbed, my bones and sinew played a tune on the textures of eons-old syenite porphyry like the needle of a music box clicking over its patterned wheel.

How could I go on doing something that didn’t inspire me in a world where places like this exist? I knew I had to make my way towards something more fulfilling, even if that meant multiplying the uncertainty in my life. I sat down at the small desk by the door of the Ranch and clacked together an explanation of my decision for my boss, certain in a way I rarely have been in my life.

What I take from this story is the power of a place like Hueco, where all kinds of time — geologic, cultural, and personal — intersect on an extra-dimensional plane not unlike “The Dreaming” aboriginal Australians speak of. I’ve felt a similar intensity of being in places all over the country and the world. Looking out over the autumn fire of trees gone red, yellow, and orange in the Shawangunks in upstate New York; staying in the deserted Mount Stapylton Campground in Australia’s Grampians National Park; hiking the serpentine trails of Antelope Island, populated with long-eared jackrabbits, bison, and antelope like some sort of parallel reality afloat in a great saline lake.

In a 2012 New York Times article, Eric Weiner talks of “thin places” — spots where the atmosphere separating heaven and earth narrows so much we can see to the other side. In such locales, Weiner writes, “for a few blissful moments I loosen my death grip on life, and can breathe again.”

“Thin places are often sacred ones,” the article goes on. It lists churches and mosques rich with history. Other thin places on Weiner’s list include airports, bars, Rumi’s tomb, the Buddhist village of Boudhanath, in Nepal… All very human places — places made by our hands and our conscious ingenuity. I too have felt a transcendental pulse in such places, but more often I find it in coördinates that evince little trace of human busywork.

This year I returned to Hueco for the first time since I wrote my resignation email. As I circumnavigated the giant jumble of textured stone known as East Mountain, our tour guide offered to take us to another of the area’s ancient petroglyphs.

“Can we please hurry up and get to the rocks you climb instead of the rocks with drawings on them?” said one of the other climbers on the tour, sounding like a spoiled kid. It pulled me out of the moment and reminded me that we climbers must approach the beautiful places where we ply our trade with eyes, minds, and hearts open. From the most broke dirtbags to the richest trustafarians, we do ourselves and each other a disservice when we climb with nothing but the masturbatory self-satisfaction of ticking projects in our hearts. We must remember that reverence and respect don’t stifle the mood of climbing but deepen it. In an era of rapid growth in our little sport, the time to live and teach this lesson is evermore upon us.

At Hueco, regulations abound. You can’t climb until the park is open and you must be out before 6 p.m. You need guided tours to travel in most of the park and must reserve spots for self-guided tours in the rest. Newcomers are required to watch a 20-minute instructional video before entering the park and several of the most popular areas — the Mushroom Boulder being only the most recent — are closed indefinitely to protect the fragile environment and cultural artifacts. Climbers, like artists, are an individualistic bunch. We chafe against rules and restrictions — I’m certainly no exception, but I also believe in the strange magic of places like Hueco. For me, the thing that makes such places thinner than the those I inhabit on a day-to-day basis is their natural state, the possibility of solitude, and the lingering echoes of eons past.

As climbers, we find ourselves in such places more often than most, and more than most we should respect and defend them. Thin places are keys to understanding important things, though what those things are differs greatly from person to person.

Back in 2007, Hueco helped me to see deeper into myself and make a simple decision that I’ve never really doubted since. “In thin places, we become our more essential selves,” Weiner writes. Once you realize such places exist, it’s no waste to spend the rest of your life questing to find them again and again.

The Language of Stars

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Boulders and stars, Triassic, UT.

If the stars should appear but one night every thousand years how man would marvel and stare.
- Ralph Waldo Emerson

This Friday I turned 34. Other than that fact that the first and second digits are consecutive, it was not a particularly significant birthday. Rather than throw a party in honor of the occasion, Kristin and I packed our trusty Honda Element and headed south and east of Salt Lake City, to a bouldering spot called Triassic, which feels every bit as prehistoric as the name would imply.

Located between the rural town of Elmo (pop. 368) and the Cleveland-Lloyd Dinosaur Quarry, site of “the densest concentration of Jurassic-aged dinosaur bones ever found,” Triassic is a desert sandstone bouldering area comprised of a few caches of rock in what was once an ancient seabed. The feeling one gets in this desolately beautiful spot is one of timelessness, as if a herd of Allosaurus fragilis might at any moment come lumbering over the crest of a hill.

Triassic: the land that time forgot

Although the environs at first appear lifeless, an attentive eye will pick out the movement of many a creature — little rock-crawling lizards, chipmunks, jack rabbits, and even antelope — all camouflaged in the dusty tones of the landscape. Humans tend to be the least represented creatures in Triassic. Which is half the reason why Kristin and I chose the spot in the first place. We went there to climb, but also to spend the night isolated in a more wild setting, enjoy a celebratory drink in front of a camp fire, and, among my favorite pastimes in nature, stargaze.

That night, the stars were out in their full regalia. By 11pm, the sun was long gone, the moon had not yet crested the horizon, and all the constellations were razor-sharp and twinkling. Through the middle of the sky was a broad swath of diffuse light, the combined glow of billions of stars forming the spiral-armed Milky Way, seen from on edge like a cosmic Frisbee hurtling towards us.

Communing with the campfire

Dinosaur fossils, the pictographs of ancient civilizations, great geologic landscapes like the Grand Canyon or the Himalaya, the open ocean — all of these are magical to behold, but nothing puts a person in his or her tiny, insignificant place quite like a full-blown sky full of stars, viewed on a clear cold desert night.

To each observer, the vast starscape becomes a celestial Rorschach test. What we see in the unfathomable vastness is a testament to what our hearts most want to see. St. Thomas Aquinas said, “How is it they live in such harmony the billions of stars – when most men can barely go a minute without declaring war in their minds about someone they know.” To him, stars were an example from God of how humans can better carry out their lives. Marcus Aurelius saw them as exemplary of a realm above and beyond petty human concerns: “Look round at the courses of the stars, as if thou wert going along with them; and constantly consider the changes of the elements into one another; for such thoughts purge away the filth of the terrene life.” Van Gogh said simply “The sight of the stars makes me dream.”

Basic view of the Milky Way

To me, the stars serve as proof that we’re the center of nothing in particular, and that our actions leave not a scratch on the broad side of the universe. In the Zen tradition, they remind me to take “serious” things more lightly, and “small” things more seriously, and remember that our only legacy is the example we set in this life, and our ultimate return to the elemental star dust of which we’re made.

The next morning when we woke, the stars had once again disappeared behind the blue veil of the sky. We approached the day with no particular goal in mind. Alone, in the desert, with some water and a few crash pads, we set off walking to see what we could see. But the stars had left their faint impression in our minds and, at least for a little while, we would follow their example.

Photo Friday: Southeast Bouldering Moderates – Part 1

Injured Reserve

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At my office, we enjoy the luxury of an in-house climbing wall. Located in the vicinity of the warehouse and measuring 15 or 20 feet in height and maybe 50 feet in length, it’s no Excalibur Tower, but it does offer a goodly amount of bouldering for the vertically inclined among us. On any given day, around the lunch hour, you might find three, four, or even five individuals climbing there, music pumping from a boombox in the corner. When the weather is right, we open the loading-bay door to let in the fresh air and sunlight. But for some reason lately, the number of people rehabbing shoulder injuries in the workout area has equalled the number of climbers. Perhaps it was the long winter spent pulling plastic. For me, it’s yet another cycle in a longstanding rotator-cuff issue that’s been plaguing me for years.

It all started when I worked at the rock wall at Chelsea Piers. I climbed at that damned wall five days a week, adding on campusing and hangboarding and weight lifting… Basically, I overdid it. One day, when I was campusing past the point of exhaustion, my left shoulder started to ache and feel weak. I backed off, even did a few months with a physical therapist, but things would never be quite the same. To this day every time I start to get fit and work on “harder” routes and problems, my shoulder falls apart. It gets loose, pops, and generally hurts. When I try to pull with my left arm, everything just kind of powers down. On a recent outing in Joe’s Valley, I had to find workarounds for sequences that, were they on my right side, would have been piss. So, once again, I’ve decided to stop climbing for a while and attempt to address the problem.

My friend Rick, whose shoulder was similarly in a state of disrepair, visited an orthopedic specialist not long ago. He came back with a Xeroxed list of exercises called the “Thrower’s 10,” which, as the name would imply, was developed to help those engaged in throwing activities (pitchers, quarterbacks, dodgeball players) recover from and prevent injuries to the all-too-vulnerable shoulder joint. Rick took some time off climbing and did the Thrower’s 10 religiously, reporting excellent results. I have decided to follow suit and will report back with my findings.

Still, all this has me wondering: Why have so many of my friends and co-workers been injured as of late? And why, specifically, have they had shoulder issues? If I were to hypothesize, I might guess that it is the nature of climbing on plastic, with its high friction and lack of intermediate holds. On plastic, people end up doing a lot of long, dynamic moves and snagging distant grips with very jarring results. Of course, it could just be that we’re getting old…

I was also interested to see that there still don’t seem to be any exercises specifically for climbers with shoulder issues. At least, I have not come across any. These throwers movements seem fairly universal and may well do the trick for climbers, but I imagine there are some very important differences between the act of throwing and the act of pulling down that are not addressed in the Thrower’s 10. The overdevelopment of the lats common in climbers, for example, and the way that can pull the shoulder joint out of alignment. I know a climber who is also an orthopedic surgeon, so perhaps it’s time to see if he has any suggestions for rehab exercises. I’ll report back with any findings on this front, too.

If you have have any tips, tricks, or tales of injury woe, please do share.

Until then…

Spotting: You’re Doing It Wrong

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So this weekend I headed back to the Valley that is Joe’s, to do some practice climbing on the small cliff chunks there. More importantly, I wanted to meet up with my dear friends Nick and Robin, of Boulder, Colorado. Climbing with these two is always a great time, plus Nick promised to bring me some Avery beers, which I cannot find here in Disneyland – Wild West Edition, aka Salt Lake City.

While climbing with these two go-getters, I noticed Nick had a strange habit of climbing up to the top of the boulder and spotting from above. I don’t think this is the recommended technique, but as Robin is super strong and never falls, I guess it doesn’t matter. Maybe it was some sort of early April Fools gag. Regardless…

I’d also like to give a big shout out to the future Mrs. Blockhead Lord, as she broke the V1 barrier with ease this weekend. She’s a Couch Crusher in embryonic form, if I’ve ever seen one.

Photo Friday: Seven Utah Bouldering Spots

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This is actually a belated Photo Friday post. You’ll have to excuse me, as I was in Joe’s Valley bouldering yesterday and didn’t get around to putting it together. On the up side, I grabbed one more photo to add to the gallery. Unfortunately, I also grabbed a nice sunburn.

Every spot pictured below is worth a visit except Stansbury island. That area has very little good bouldering and is also home to an active shooting range. The geniuses who were shooting there during our visit did not seem particularly concerned with safety; from up on the hillside, we could see their bullets sending up dust plumes less than fifty feet from where we parked, seemingly outside the island’s loosely designated shooting areas. Of course, no one stopped shooting in our direction as we walked back to the vehicle, very visible in our brightly colored clothing and with a massive crashpad sticking up in the air. The constant echoing report of the bigger guns alone was enough to put us on edge for the few hours we were there. Proceed with caution.

…And I guess I wouldn’t drive too far to go to the Ogden Boulders, either, although they do offer some good lines and are perfectly climbable on a sunny winter day.

One classic granite bouldering spot I frequent that’s not represented here is Little Cottonwood Canyon. Maybe I’ll get a LLC-specific gallery together for a future Photo Friday post. Until then…

Andrew B. working Resident Evil (V10), New Joe's, Joe's Valley, UT.

Nate W. warming up at the Ogden Boulders, Ogden, UT.

An unknown climber on Golden, at the Triassic Boulders

An unknown climber on the moderate classic Golden (V1), at the Triassic Boulders, UT.

The Blockhead Lord posing down on some unknown hard problem in Moe's Valley, UT. Photo: K. Marine

Chris S. sending Ju (V7), on the Big Red Monster Boulder, Ibex, UT.

The Blockhead Lord on a random slab on Stansbury Island, UT. Photo: K. Marine.

The Blockhead Lord on an unkonwn arete problem outside of Moab.

The Blockhead Lord on an unknown arete problem near the Big Bend Boulders, outside of Moab, UT. Photo: K. Marine

Daniel Woods Crunches Numbers at the Rock Rodeo and Comes up with 76… AGAIN!

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Daniel Woods – Hueco – 76 V-Points from Louder Than 11 on Vimeo.

This video gives a clear picture of what cutting-edge bouldering looks like in 2012. The formerly bleeding edge of difficulty is now just a stop on a circuit. This is the way of progression — nothing new, really — but it somehow it never grows old. In the vid, you’ll see Woods send the following:

Nagual (v13)
The Machinist (v14)
Crook by the Book (V14)
Phantom Limb V12)
Full Monty (V12)
Two Days With Gene (V11)

Worth noting is the fact that Daniel scored the same amount of points when he won the Hueco Rock Rodeo last year, though with five V13s and one V11. He increased his peak difficulty, but not his average. In the 2011 Rock Rodeo, Woods sent these problems:

Li (V13)
Liane (V13)
Mo Mojo (V11)
Evangelion (V13)
Slashface (V13)
Crown Royale (V13)

Oh, and in 2010, Woods ALSO scored 76 points, but with a higher high point than even this year. (Oddly consistent, isn’t he?) Here’s his ticklist from that comp:

Desperanza (V15)
Alma Blanca (V13)
Tequila Sunrise (V12)
Loaded Direct (V12)
Barefoot on Sacred Ground (V12)
Diaphanous Sea (V12)

And while we’re one the topic of Daniel Woods and his incredible powers of crush, it appears he recently declared his intent to climb Jumbo Love (5.15b; unconfirmed, since no one has yet repeated it), Chris Sharma’s king of the king lines. How do seventy-six V-points translate to a monster 250-foot 5.15b? I, for one, am excited to find out…

The Stone Mind

Exploring the intersection of mind and stone

Tag Archives: bouldering

How to Make a Climbing Movie

Bouldering Alone

Connecting the Dots: Climbing and the Creation of Meaning

Hueco Lessons

The Language of Stars

Photo Friday: Southeast Bouldering Moderates – Part 1

Injured Reserve

Spotting: You’re Doing It Wrong

Photo Friday: Seven Utah Bouldering Spots

Daniel Woods Crunches Numbers at the Rock Rodeo and Comes up with 76… AGAIN!