What inspired you to enter the Nike 6.0 Media Apprentice? Did you always feel you were in with a chance?

I'm not sure I was inspired. I got a call from a friend suggesting I do a submission and it went from there. It would be pretty crazy entering something if you didn't think you were in with a chance.

How do you feel about your Media Apprentice opportunity? Are you nervous, excited, intimidated?

A bit of everything really. Lets just say there's a warm fuzzy feeling running through my body that makes me feel happy. It's a bit of a privilege to be in position where anything's possible and there's so much opportunity. Priceless.

What do you think your biggest challenges will be in the role?

Maybe controlling saying the wrong things at the wrong times, I'm quite tactless but ill work on it. Probably best you ask me again in a few months.

How did you find been thrown into the Boot Camp scenario, was it a challenge having the other finalists there trying to get similar shots?

Not really, it was quite fun working amongst everyone. It's quite a healthy environment to be around and I'm really looking forward to seeing what everyone came up with. There was a bit of camera envy going on but at the end of the day I had the bigger camera :) To be honest the amount of equipment everyone brought was slightly off putting, I felt under prepared.

Had you thought out a specific plan before you got to the Boot Camp, did you have a game plan worked out?

Yeah the plan was to wait till everyone went out the night before and steel all their equipment. Didn't work out.

I'd thought about the brief, ways I could position the camera etc but apart from that it was just go with it and see what happens. Alex came with a broken bike so it gave me a few hours to come up with something.

How did you find it presenting your final submission to the Nike panel, were you nervous? Are you confident presenting your work to people?

You tell me! I blacked out. Before I went in to the presentation I had sticky hands and when I came out they were dry. If anyone gets the chance to visit the Nike offices and happens to use the toilet, the tap leavers pull forward not to the side.

What parts of your filming and editing are you most keen to improve?

EVERYTHING !

How/why did you get into film?

When I started riding the only thing we had was a field, so I started digging jumps and was very proud of the way they looked and bought a JVC tank to film us riding them. I always say if your going to eat dirt then it may as well be on video makes the pain seem worth it!

Are you up for the traveling?

Over the years it's safe to say I've been envious of people that have amazing jobs and get to travel the world doing what they love. There's nothing I would rather do.

Where would you like to be sent as part of MA?

Hawaii, Bondi, New Zealand, French Polynesia, New York (USA) , Japan, China, Vietnam, India, Angola, Kazakhstan

What would you like to have got out of the experience by the end of the year?

A dream job and some great new friends

We heard that you made a 50ft Nike Swoosh in a skatepark, what's the story behind that and where did the inspiration come for it?

The original idea for 'A DIFFERENT PERSPECTIVE' was much bigger than it ended up, and I was hoping I would get the chance to re film for the second part of the apprentice. The plan was to do the Nike swoosh across the entire span of INGS skatepark in Hull, it would have been around 60 foot traveling across many different transitions of the park leaving a very disorientating pattern. I had arranged to borrow some track and dolly equipment for the panning shots, but that fell through at the last moment meaning I couldn't get the shots I needed, which was the reason we ended up using a warehouse. So I guess there should have been two versions, Park and Street. There were also problems with the colors when it was being tested. The film was going to be black and white and the only color showing would be hints of the orange creating a contrast with more impact. Due to the different gradient and shadows this ended up being more complicated than I'd imagined.

When I started riding the idea of a company like Nike being involved with BMX didn't seem possible, to kid's just starting out in BMX nowadays it's pretty normal for them, I still don't see BMX as a sport but I still think It deserves all the same opportunities that mainstream sports have. Without companies like Nike getting involved it's difficult to expand. So I think the transition between now and then is what inspired me. Everyone will have their own opinions to whether large sports companies should be involved in extreme activities but to the older and younger generations it's a very different perspective. The optical typography in the film was the perfect way to show something in a different light.

You also had another swoosh in the edit that made it into the final, how much preparation did that take?

When the park idea fell through Sandy, Nath and myself were on a mad hunt for abandoned warehouses where we could mark it out. Luckily Sandy's a creature of the streets and pretty much had blueprints for every hole in Hull, it's a shame his knowledge wasn't always reliable. I guess I should start with what went wrong! I'm sure you all know that Hull was voted the worst city in England for several years, somehow it lost it's title but be under no illusion, it's a dive.

SPOT 1 - an old AIRFIX warehouse.

It may have been a Sunday, I can't remember but Nath and I pulled up to check it out, next door was some sort of haulage yard and the car park was empty so we asked one of the guys if we could park up for an hour whilst we checked the warehouse out, the guy said no so we drove up the road and parked in what looked to be a quiet back street, what we didn't see was the clamping zone signs (£250 on the spot fines) we parked up and proceeded, climbed in and spent an hour planning out where it would be suitable to paint. The heavy rain began which was an incentive to stay put in the warehouse until it let up. The guy that had refused us parking began to shout through the fence, we ignored him and 30 minutes past and we made a break for the car. We arrived back at the car and everything appeared normal until we began to drive off and something felt odd. Turns out the guy from the haulage yard knew it was us in the warehouse and went hunting for my car. I presume he had rang the clampers but as it was a Sunday and they were not in the area he had let my rear tires down in a desperate act to allow the clampers time to come and fine us. I'd just bought my car and had not picked up the jack so that made the situation impossible so our only choice was to haul tail out of the zone and on to the main road where we pulled into a bus stop and sat in the pissing rain for hours until Nath managed to sort out some help. The AIRFIX warehouse was a no go.

SPOT 2 - blue ink factory near the center of Hull

Sandy had told us stories about the factory and how it was abandoned and it wouldn't be a problem filming there. We set off in pursuit of this mystical factory where everything was blue from the ink powder. There were rumors that there was a guard dog on patrol but Sandy assured us that this wasn't true and the place was derelict. We parked up and began the mission to enter the factory, climbing some fences that had probably taken the lives of some poor gypsies salvaging copper pipes over the years. These fences were life takers. After a nervous entrance we started to scope it out and it was truly amazing, the only problem would have been getting all the equipment in but luckily our decision was made for us. We were deep in the centre of the factory and getting a few shots and out the corner of my eye I saw something moving. It was moving fast and towards Sandy, A monster of a man resembling Sloth from the Goonies ran at poor sand dog with a brick ready to clobber him to death, obviously it wasn't the first time Sloth had chosen this red oven baked weapon of death as I can imagine many a pikie had felt it's wrath before. Luckily Sandy talked the beast down and explained we weren't steeling copper and that we were filming for a BMX video, the guy spoke his own language that non of us could understand. If we didn't have our bikes with us I get the feeling we'd have been buried 6 feet under a pile of ink powder but Sloth decided to spare our lives and escort us off what was a fully operational work site, not an abandoned factory! And just to make it that little bit scarier as we were escorted out the front gates we were met by the biggest loudest dog I had ever seen in my life, it looked at us as if to say, if this was a Sunday and I was on patrol you would have been lunch. As we exited we met a few guys that had had a few stories to tell about the dog. Turns out it's allowed to kill if people are trespassing, if that had been a Sunday I don't think I'd be telling this story.

SPOT 3 - Lord lines abandoned warehouse, Hull dock front.

Heartache. This would be the final straw and the most disheartening thing to happen throughout the filming. We hunted the warehouses and found the perfect place to start chalking up. I spent the night before around at Nath's so we could have an early start. The place gets busy so we got down there around 5 am and by 10 am we had marked everything up ready to be painted. We left the site to go and get some breakfast and pick up the rollers and brushes and returned an hour later. We had put in about 5 hours work in order to get to the painting stage and on our journey back to the warehouse we must have been spotted on a security camera half a mile away. We began to paint and all of sudden we heard something downstairs, we were quite safe doing it where we were, it was the second flour of a building on its last legs and I'm sure if we hadn't made any noise we would have been ok. We heard a knock and Nath decided to pop his head around the corner to see what it was, turned out to be two security guards wondering what the hell 3 guys with loads of painting equipment where doing in a warehouse that could collapse at any second. Anyway our cover was blown and the legal risk was to high to even consider going back since they had footage of us leaving my car, therefore had my registration number. That was a nasty feeling walking away from what seemed to be our last chance at pulling it off. The day went on and moral was non existant, then Sandy had a brainstorm. He mentioned he worked for this guy who runs a recording studio and that the attic was haggard and might be a good place to film, so the boy pulled a few strings and managed to save the entire project. We arranged to meet the owner and take a look around and It ended up being perfect! The fact is we could have done this project 4 times over if we hadn't had so many setbacks. Also I would not have been able to do it without Sandy and Nath so I'm really grateful to them.

Preparation about a day.