Shooting with Gus...

Back in the start of April, I had my first few days shooting with renowned Chamonix photographer, Gus Hurst. Some of the finished shots I had seen which he had taken were breathtaking, using the glacial ice, sluffing on steep lines, and epic backdrops of this valley, capturing the moments all us skiers remember, but have no record of, so i was keen to get a few shots of my own with him!

The first day we went out was April 1st, most people stayed off the hill this day as the visibility was terrible, but we decided to go up anyway, knowing how much snow had fallen the night before.

True to our belief, we waited to get the first bin on the Index chair on Flegere, and were rewarded with feet upon feet of amazing powder! No matter how many times we lapped the Flegere, we barely crossed another track all morning, had some of the biggest, scariest sluffs and best powder turns all season. With Gus' knowledge of the area we found our way into a few couloirs, so full of snow you could barely get your head out top to catch a breath on the way down! There was no light to shoot that day, the camera didnt even leave its case, but despite this from first to last lift we only stopped to occasionally dry off a bit and have a few hot drinks to warm up. Seen as we didnt get any proof, you'll have to trust me that it was one of the best days skiing of my life so far!

The Thursday after brought us a day of great sun, amazing views, and more importantly the snow had packed down well, giving us access to some steeper terrain, where we could concentrate on shooting the photos and not the high avalanche risk, which had claimed a few casualties, during and shortly after the storm. We knew that it was to warm up quickly early in the afternoon, so we only had a short time to get a few shots. Today we were joined by another Whitedot rider, Ally (Or simply "Scottish" to those who know him) who had got first bin up with gus to shoot a Massive 60ft cliff drop. I had to race up from a morning at work when I discovered the weather would clear, so the next few shots I would get priority on. We had a quick run down, And found an untracked steep shoulder to ski, and got a cheeky and quick shot, which we were pretty happy with. The final image is here;

During the scout, I had spotted a line which was on, a similar one that i had seen my Norweigan team-mates Fred and Dennis hit during the Team Photo-Shoot in February, and with the light and shadows on this day, knew that between Gus and myself, we could produce a good image from it. Ally also wanted to try a slight variation on my line, so we started the bootpack up. While we were taking our skis off to climb, in one of the more comical moments of the season, Ally put one foot either side of his skis and sunk down into the hollow snow at some speed, taking a pair of redeemers to the baby-makers. At this point it was pretty hard not to keel over laughing, but I didn't fancy the drop below.

The climb was actually quite challenging, neither of us had crampons, as it was my shot, I put the pack in and Ally followed. We knew that if we fell it was gonna hurt for sure, but it mellowed out after a few hundred metres, so it could have been worse. Anyway, we raced up hoping the light would stay good for the shot, got our skis on, and stood on the top of a spine, steep to the point we couldn't really see more than a couple of feet ahead, and hundreds down, so I had a few minutes on the radio to Gus just trying to plan out where I had to go to get the shot I had in my mind from scouting it earlier. Ally counted down to my drop in over the radio. 4,3,2,1,Drop...

So there it is! As it happened, everything came together perfectly, and it ended up being my favourite photo from this season. Cheers Gus! A happy day's shooting!

Steve