I remember it as if it were yesterday that the internet prick told me DVD would be dead by 2011. Here we are in 2016 entering 2017 and the best riding on video is still performed and excuted for DVD. Some of the best riding this past year was seen in the United and BSD videos in which they traveled as a team and put work in together. I was told by many that I would be a fool to not focus 100% on web content and instagram posts. Still today, nothing exerts the type of energy and vibes created with a full length video. With the new Bone Deth DVD, we vaguely worked on it for a few years. Most of the action has taken place in the last year. Working with no true budget. Only the team's own pocket money and my money from sewing clothes and working side jobs to pay the bills and scrap enough money for maybe a one way flight or a few tanks of gas. This video, "The Dirty Sniff" is as blue collar as it gets. especially for a hard goods brand. The entire team put their own time and money in to making their parts happen. 

One failing factor was the locations of the deadman team. Almost every rider on the team lives in a different corner of the world. Kert Petersel in Tallinn, Estonia. Jay Wilson in Perth, Australia (the most isolated city in the world) and Dirt Ron in San Diego, Waffle and Bungay in Hastings UK, the list goes on. I had to rely on some of the riders to film at home and track down a filmer since none of these guys own video cameras. Its not like we have any type of budget to hire a filmier. The way it ended up turning out was that not much got done unless Dean Dickinson and I were there to shoot it. Although there is a number of bro cam clips... the video happened a bit slowly but surely. 

Video production in BMX has its ball ups. I would say more ball ups than smooth drilling perfections. Especially when it comes to injuries. We don't call our team deadman team for nothing. I would say more than half the team spent almost the entire year's filming injured. Or partially injured. Taping up limbs and super glueing cuts on the verge of infections and hair line fractures. When we eat shit, we eat shit hard. And when we crash and it doesn't look bad, it actually hurts worse. A lot of my own painful spills were not even showcased in the video because they just were not entertaining enough. This had a huge factor in our delayed release. No one wants to put out a large quantity of scrap. Although is anyone ever satisfied with filming? You can keep it going forever but at some point you have to step in and call a deadline. 

Another huge factor for us is the spots we ride. From pools, to government property, roofs, etc. They are not spots you can hit and session for hours on end - a lot of the time you can't even peek over the fence for a quick glance without getting screamed at. The amount of detective work, construction and landscaping we did to make some of these spots happen would normally drive a rider away. An instant loss of interest due to the work that needs to be put in. From cutting down large trees, tying electric cables together, altering run ups with dirt and silly putty, emptying pools with rented Home Depot pumps. 

Even the amount of time we spent doing stake outs. We had to stake out spots days in a row to find out when property owners went to lunch every day. We had to rearrange their signs to different hours so customers wouldn't park there at certain times. Break glass in parking spots to prevent incoming parkers. Having people call businesses while we filmed a setup so that we could use that as a distraction while we rode the roof. Yes, and screaming on the phone with them so they don't know if the roof bounced or if the customer was so loud on the phone that it made the phone vibrate with eruption. We had to be sneaky. Multiple revisits to get a trick done. It is most certainly is an adventure yet at the same time it is a lot of work. 

Meatman Albie Bennett for some reason always decided to fire out stunts a half hour after he woke up and a half before he had to be at work. Showing up and serving chips and salsa covered in blood. There were a few times his boss sat me down and told me I can't keep encouraging him to die five minutes before work. At first I think they thought that I was his abusive boyfriend as they did not understand he rode bikes! Photo: Sean Burns

Another interesting fact about The Dirty Sniff is that 80% of our team is over 30. Half the team is either engaged with a full time job or in school training to become engaged with a full time job. It ain't no easy eggs and carrots baby. Finding time between these things to go ride and kill yourself whilst breaking laws and pissing off authority is tough. It can add a lot of stress to someone's life. With all the stress involved, the fun of it all out-weighs any negative factor. What else would I be doing in life? Sitting on my ass watching football, picking my boogers and running out of Keystone lights? No Thank you. We will try to keep making DVDs until are limbs fall off or we have spunked too much offspring to the point of overzealous responsibilities. 

After years of infectious cuts in the palms and nasty bacteria skin nasties, I can't commit to riding a pool without wearing bar gloves. I also can't ride a pool for more than half hour without completely eating shit. Luckily this was a quick dip. Photo: Pat Burke

I can't really go into detail about some behind-the-scenes situations within the video because hot damn there are just too many. Nearly every single clip has some wild back story. I will however bring to light that with all the roofs we rode, pools, etc... No one was arrested or fined during the making of this DVD. Bones were broken, lips were cut in half, pretty positive everyone went through multiple sprained ankles and wrists and even caved in a number of buildings. But lawfully, we won. We fought the law, and well... we won. We evaded certain situations with absolute bullshit. There definitely were a number of times we gunned out of a spot driving off into the dust. But hell, we made it. And we can't wait to make another one.