Rewind: Mini Video 37 – Irresistible

Rewind, Skating Videos


Originally posted March 29, 2007.

My grand idea is already falling apart. I thought it’d be easy to to look through the archives and find a bunch of great photos.  Then the “awesome” anecdotes that go with them would come rolling in like the waves on the sea. Alas, the reality isn’t so nice. Back then we didn’t wield cameras all day long like we do now. Or perhaps not much happened between the last one (end of February), and this one (end of March). I’m coming up dry.

This video does feature my favorite manual trick I ever filmed.  Danny did a great one.  I’ll usually straight up refuse to even try to film a manual.  Not my cup of tea.  Solid ending celebration too.  Russ reused the gorking out for his weirdo video segments he had on Fuel TV.  Remember Fuel TV?  Wow, what a time to be alive.

I hope the next one goes better.  Until then, heres several photos without any skateboarding whatsoever.  Actually, the site used to rarely feature skateboarding, so maybe it is perfect.


I do have these photos of digging out the polejam from the snow. Freeing it from it’s icy prison. Allowing us to express ourselves freely on our skateboards. But no photos of us skating it.

Molly did tear her ACL running to the car. So excited to visit Uncle Will at Cream City. So unsafe. She had to wear the cone for weeks. I had to manually bend her leg daily to cure it with physical training. She came out of it strong, regal.
Danny and the dirt gap. Again, some photos of the spot skated in the video. Again, no photos of the actual skating. The mud does look nice.
Me and “THE DUDE”. I never did catch the Dude’s name. He was at our Friday night dance party every single week. The Dude knew what was what and where to be. He was the man. I do wonder where he is today. Dude, if you’re out there, give me a call.
Who doesn’t love Frosted Mini Spooners?
Big Charles! This was the night where Danny got the nickname “TROY”. An infamous night. Unfortunately Charles is no longer with us. It’s great to remember the times we had together. Charles was definitely a real one.
After a BIG night in the city, Comet. Worst service, worst experience. Lesson never learned.

Rewind: Mini Video 36 – Love

Rewind, Skating Videos


Originally posted February 28, 2007. Get it, Valentines Day, Love?? So clever.

I’m having a hard time even thinking of anything to say about this one. It seems several of the clips came from the same sessions as when we were filming Beez 3, so it has a little bit of a beezy edge to it. I think some of the clips do even appear in Beez. It’s been awhile since I watched. I’m old, I can’t remember anything.

I do believe that this vid, and the following one were kind of just a mish mash of things I had filmed in the previous months.  I had no project in mind to use them for, so I just kind of threw them together with this stupid song.  None of this stuff was intentionally filmed to be used as a so called “mini video”.

Here are some period appropriate images from this moment in time:

Lord Jesus Wonky God Bless
Name a more classic moment at Grand Avenue Mall, I’ll wait.
It seems we had an art show during this period of time. These are all of the classic wiskate members. Maybe our last time together!
Nate Heilberger. Off the hip gap to noseslide.
Mike and Danny hitting the pole jam in the “Unusual Protocol” style. This spot still existed until recently. That’s a long time for a bent pole to exist.

This was indeed the time period of the Beezing. This mini video was made just as we were filming the outro to Beez 3. I have an incredible amount of photos from “behind the scenes” from the infamous Deer Wizard/Johnny 5 scene. Some favorites are below.

Rewind: Mini Video 16 – MPLS

Rewind, Skating Videos

Mini Video 16 from Josh Ellis on Vimeo.

For true completionists only!

On the same Hi8 tape that I found “Gone Wild”, I also found this piece of ancient wiskate history, thought lost forever.  This was a weekend trip to Minneapolis in Y2K (we survived) where we skated such illustrious spots as the two stair in front of my girlfriends’ house and the old 3rd Lair.  Surprise guest appearance by Chad Benson doing a nollie hardflip stinkbug fakie.  I’m not sure how he came into play, but I’m glad he did.  Also starring myself, Mark H, and Boban.

This was the first mini video to use music.  Quite an evolutionary step.

Rewind: Mini Video 0 – Gone Wild

Rewind, Skating Videos


This is the first(ish) complete edit I ever made. I thought it was lost forever for a long time. Earlier this year when the ‘rona hit I spent a bunch of time capturing some old Hi-8 tapes, and by miracle(?) this video was on one of the tapes.  This is essentially unseen, because in those olden days there was no way to easily share a video of this length via the internet.  It was functionally impossible.  The reason I thought the video was lost was because it was transferred onto some unlabelled VHS tape, which has since gone missing.

The whole thing is completely embarrassing.  I suppose something you made twenty years ago should be.   I did choose the song as a joke, I remember that much.  It is sort of a compilation of a lot of the footage from the earlier Mini Videos that were posted in the early days of the site.  These actually are lost for good.  Let’s say contains footage from Mini Videos 1-15.  Plus additional content.

This was edited using a program called Ulead Video Studio Pro. It was an unsuccessful competitor to Adobe Premiere. The only reason I used Video Studio was because it came with the video capture card one needed back then to get video clips onto your computer. Yeah, you needed special hardware to get video onto the hard drive. Uphill both ways in the snow, etc etc.

Congrats if you watch the whole thing, it’s pretty painful. Featuring the antics of Ben Vance, Pat Gaynor, Mark Heiderich, Greg Lutzka, Boban, Pat Forster, Jon Bunch, and Nate Heilberger.

Here are some period appropriate photos that exist in the same timeline as the above video:

“There’s one more thing…it’s been emotional.”

Skating Videos

I recently moved from Milwaukee down to Chicago. In the midst of a national uprising and public health crisis, I definitely got really emotional. Now as I settle into a new life, and as I write this, scramble to get myself ready to start my new day at my 9-5, I’m feeling a lot of things. But the beauty of skateboarding is that it challenges your emotional and physical responses in the most intricate ways. Not to get too heady but shit hits different, ya know?

I initially wanted to wait to post my video until the right time but you know what? The people need something to make them smile, yell, gasp, or downright loathe at the 11 minutes of footage the boys and I compiled in a matter of 3 months.

I present to you…”Emotional Fashion.”

Which Area Code Has The Highest T?

Skating Videos

Over the last few months there has been a lot of debate about which local area code has produced the most well rounded skateboarders. Well, I’m here to stoke the flames of this debate in the form of photographic evidence over the last few months. I must caution, as I’m only one man with one camera, the below evidence is not all decisive.

We will begin with area code (262)

Pat Murphy, Pivot Fakie
Vince Stranc, Switch Wallie Crook
Tavis Schulz, Wallie
Jacob Mumford, Ollie
Alex Keck, FS Nose slide

Ok, damn. Didn’t realize 262 kinda goes until I uploaded all the above photos to this post. Let’s not forget that this is an ongoing debate though! Here’s a couple photos from Brett Favres favorite area code, (920)!

Drew Rickaby, BS Smith
Sean Hanley, FS Lipslide

Now we may only have one photo for the next area code, but the man is a beast and some would say could likely push his area code to victory on his own. Below is (608)

Nick Mistele, Switch Front Board

Now it’s time to travel to a couple area codes that are near and dear to my heart. As a former FIB you could say I’m a little biased but as I’ve said before, this is a on going debate! Let’s start with someone else who is more than capable of pushing his area code to victory all by his self. (779)!

David Gackstetter, Nollie Crook

And here are a couple guys who I think may help put their area code in the running for top code, (847)!

Cory Stubing, Crook
Tyler Luth, Ollie

And as this is a website based out of Milwaukee we travel back up north to the one and only (414).

Max Murphy, Ollie
Max Murphy, FS Fence Ride

I hope you find the provided evidence helpful in this ongoing debate. Thanks for your time.

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