Professional skate filmmaker and luminary J Strickland revealed the story of almost tossing skate legend Heath Kirchart's precious footage for the iconic "Sight Unseen" video into the river.
The tale sheds light on the dedication and passion of skateboard filmmakers and emphasizes the fight for recognition and respect in skateboarding.
For those unfamiliar with the backstory, J Strickland has been a prominent name in skateboarding for many years.
He is known for his dedication to capturing raw street skateboarding, and his work has graced some of the most iconic skate videos in history.
However, his story reveals independent filmmakers' challenges in an industry where recognition and fair compensation are sometimes elusive.
In the new interview with Transworld Skateboarding, Strickland explained that his itinerary towards almost tossing Heath Kirchart's footage began during the production of the Transworld Feedback video.
Following his experience with Transworld and Birdhouse, Strickland filmed for Baker2G and, notably, for Kirchart.
He became Kirchart's filmer and had accumulated two years of incredible footage of the legendary skateboarder.
However, when Transworld approached Strickland about using Kirchart's footage for their next video, "Sight Unseen," he decided he wouldn't be taken advantage of.
"What happened is like I just gave up all this Andrew Reynolds footage to them was like the kickflip in Paris, he said. "It was like basically a part almost you know like half of a whole part."
"And then I just got a random check for like $500 or $600 bucks for a whole all that, and I was like, wait a minute," Strickland mentioned. "The fool got like this much money just for the photo for that ad, you know, I'm kind of on my own independently, so when it came time, literally in my head, I was like, okay, like two years of this you know and it was like all $10,000 that's like a fair amount, and I think any filmer would agree now that's like a fair amount of money for two years."
He added. "Especially Heath, you know, at that time I was more of a d*ckhad, so I as like, man I don't care. I'll throw Heath's footage in the river like Heath called me and I was like, oh man, I was like I really wouldn't throw this sh*t in the river like come on."
"Heath was like, look man, please just like give it to them." Strickland said, "of course I would have and then we worked it out, and I expensed them."