(Photo: Chuck Fallon)

I’ve always found riders who are also into photo or video interesting. I’ve known Christian for about a year but didn’t really get to hang out with him much til recently. He’s a pretty awesome rider and takes filming pretty serious too, and since I didn’t know much about him til recently I figured it’d be cool to fill everyone else in on what he’s all about.

What’s your name and where are you from?

Christian Rigal and I’m from Moraga Ca (Bay Area) but I now live in San Diego

How’d you get into BMX?

I remember watching BMX in the X-Games on TV and it made me want to get a bike and try what they were doing. I always had mountain bikes as a kid and then one day a family friend of mine gave me a sick old school bike (red tires, red plastic seat, and all chrome). After I got that I started riding around the neighborhood jumping curbs and then building little mounds in the backyard to jump off.

How did you first get sponsored? Who do you get hooked up by these days?

My friend Connor who I grew up riding with was getting hooked up by Volume and Demolition so I would always ride his old parts if I could and liked there stuff. I had always wanted to film a video of myself so we borrowed a friends camera and filmed an edit and that ended up getting me on Demolition.

Aside from Demolition I also ride for Nike 6.0, Gatorade and Volume hooked me up with a sweet Rob Wise frame.

You got on Nike via Dennis Enarson right? I know he’s a good friend of yours and your roommate, how crazy has it been watching him blow up over the past few years?

I meet Mark Losey and everyone at Nike through Dennis going on Nike Cali trips and being at different events. A little while before Writing on the Wall was coming out Losey had asked me if I wanted to be on the team.

It’s been wild seeing how far Dennis has come from when he was 14 up to now. I knew he had a bright future ahead of him when I first meet him but I had no idea it would be as crazy as it is today. But being only 18 I’m sure there’s a lot more good things to come. Watch out for his part in the new Demolition video, It’s going to be ridiculous.

How did you get into filming and editing?

At the time I had thought about getting a camera I was traveling back and forth from the bay to SD a bunch because the scene and riding out there is amazing. I always hated going to a spot where you want to do something but would rather wait and get it on camera. Or the other way around when you or someone does something crazy and no one filmed it. So Dennis and I went half’s on a VX2000 and a MKII and we started filming all the time. We probably filmed 3 or 4 Vital edits together that Mark Losey would edit for us and put online before I got Final Cut and started trying to make my own edits. After that I was hooked. A while after my VX got knocked out of my hands and broke so then I stepped up to an HD camera and that’s when I really got into filming and editing.

What projects have you worked on video wise?

The first video I did where I really went out and spent time with someone was my Eastpak/Carhartt edit of Stefan Lantschner. Aside from the random Vital videos I did Dennis Enarson’s Demolition edit, Denni’s Day in the Life, Volume Rob Wise edit, Volume Tate Roskelley edit (Kris Bennett filmed some clips), Demolition 2009 mix, Josh Harrington how too, Nyquist, Darden, and Mckay how too videos are dropping periodically for Haro/Premium. I worked on a 5 month project with Nike filming Dennis for him and Garrets MTV show, 5 months till freedom. I’ve also done a bunch of filming with Dennis at most of big contest this year for Matador for some monthly edits on there site. Those edits aside I’ve got about 9 videos that are done or a couple clips short to drop this year through next year with all the same companies so look for those coming up.

How different is it filming contests versus filming on road trips? Are there a lot of dudes you run into with crazy competitive attitudes and shit, or is everyone pretty cool for the most part?

Filming contest is weird because you want to make it a good video and use different tricks from practice (not just the runs everyone else filmed), but it’s hard to ask guys to film stuff when they only have a certain amount of time to ride. That’s not always the case as a lot of guys don’t take practice too seriously and they’re always down to shoot some stuff. Others I’ll just keep and eye on what there doing and get in a good spot to film them. Road trips are awesome because the trips are to film so every ones motivated and put’s in work. I don’t think there’s really anyone with a bad competitive attitude, but there are a lot of guys that sweat contest too much and it shows during practice. I’ve come to notice a lot of the time that it’s those guys that end up doing worse. Go out, have fun, have a drink if you want. If you do bad the next day at least you had fun the night before. If you do good, you can go do it again. That’s how I see it, but hey I just film them.

Are you doing the new Demolition video? What’s the time table like for that one?

Yea I’m going to be filming most of the DVD but I cant be everywhere and we have a lot of dudes on the team so Glenn PP has been filming a bunch with the OG crew. Were shooting to have filming done by August of next year and have the video ready for interbike. But we have a crazy crew of dudes that have other things going (contest, school, work, jumping out of planes etc) so if it comes to August and people don’t have enough clips or whatever the situation is were going to push the date back.

Are you trying to have a full part in the Demolition DVD? How would you describe the kind of stuff that you are into riding wise?

No, I’ve got a DVD I’m going to start filming next year that I will have a full part In. So far there Is 6 guys locked down, and the crew it’s pretty diverse. There Is 4 Cali guys and 2 foreigners and there is already a trip planned to Spain. That’s as much as I’m going to say for now.

Skate parks are fun, but I really just like street. Rails and ledges are what I have the most fun riding, flat rails and hubba’s are my favorite. Tranny spots are cool but more fun to just mess around on for me.

(Photo: Ed Subias)

What’s it like riding/working for Brian Castillo? Does he get an attitude when you go and one up him on spots he killed in Nowhere Fast 10 years ago? Haha.

Working and riding for Brian is still pretty crazy to me. One of the only videos I bought as a kid was the Primo vid Made in Taiwan. He had the best part and was one of my favorite riders, now he’s the guy that signs my checks. He’s fun to work with, it’s nice to deal with someone who has good input on things from being in the industry for so long.

Haha, I actually just told him about that like 4 hours ago at lunch and he seemed siked on it. But he could hate me for it on the inside? I didn’t technically one up him yet, I still have to go back. Well see if it’s in my video part or not.

When you watch a video, how important is the filming, editing and quality of the footage compared to the actual riding?

You can watch a video where the filming,editing and quality are amazing, but the riding is kinda boring, that aside it’s still a good video, just boring. But if you watch a video with an amazing rider but the filming and editing are horrible and its on your family camcorder, I think that makes it a shitty video. I really feel that the way you document a rider has a huge impression on how they are seen by others. It’s not that your trying to make them look better or anything, it’s that your making them look as best as you can, doing whatever trick they are doing. If you film a clip so bad that it gets people talking more about how poorly it was filmed then the trick they did, that’s taking away from the person you were trying to showcase ya know.

Is it hard for you to balance riding and filming when you’re on trips? I know a lot of dudes who are good at both have a hard time doing both at the same time.

It depends on the trip for me. Demolition trips are hard because even though I was on the team before I worked for them, I go on most all trips as a Filmer. I wont hesitate to try an get a few clips on a trip though, I just wait until no one else is doing anything to try an get down. Any other trip it’s not a problem, I can have just as much fun filming as riding most of the time so I don’t mind it at all.

What are some of the videos, DVD or web based that you’ve been a big fan of lately and why?

Anything from 4Down seems to always be really good from filming to editing and the riders they shoot with. I’m a big fan of all of Darryl’s kink edits as well as Safety First and Range of Motion. He knows how to make a VX look good and the way he edits is so clean and simple looking. As much as I like to use different effects, a dolly, glide cam etc, Darryl sticks with his camera and a skateboard and makes it look awesome. Will Stroud is someone who has been really helpful towards me, and all of his work from back in the day up until now has always been top notch. The way he goes about his filming is very professional and i think we need more dudes like that. I know I can watch one of the Levis mixes or a Dak, Nathan or Corey edit to get pumped to go out and ride. The last person I really admire is Joe Simon. I’ve never met him, but his filming and editing are on another level and watching his videos makes me want to go film. From his wedding videos, web videos, or one of the DVDs, I don’t think I’ve ever seen him put out a “shitty clip”. Chances are he didn’t have who he was filming keep doing it until he got it good, he just seems to film everything good.

People always talk about how much better skate videos are than BMX videos. Do you agree, and what’s the biggest difference between the two? What do companies need to change about our videos to catch up to skating?

I’ll agree in a general way. Skaters are still hooked on filming with a VX for the most part so i feel were ahead in high quality hd filming. One of the things that really separates bmx from skate is they have the bigger companies and a more mainstream sport so they can get a much bigger budget for a DVD or web stuff. But the budget for a skate video is a lot different then for Bmx. I don’t think we need to catch up to skating videos, I just think we need more money in it and good direction. If most BMX companies could afford to send there whole team plus some flow dudes to France to film for 2 weeks, stay in nice hotel, get a rental car and all of the food paid for it would make things come along awesome! Instead for a lot of guys it’s a couple riders on a quick trip in the states, staying at a friends house if you can, etc. It’s not always that way, but i know a lot of companies cut corners when they can to keep within a budget. Sucks, but you gotta work with what you have.

How hard is it to make a living as a videographer these days? I know you do work for a bunch of the websites that pay for web videos and work for a few companies as well, is it tough making ends meet doing video?

It’s not easy that’s for sure. It would be weird for me to say it’s hard, because I have so much fun doing what I do it doesn’t really feel like work. But at the end of the day filming and editing pays all my bills so I cant slack and that keeps me on top of things. I’m lucky enough to have some steady paying jobs but that’s not forever so I’m always making videos on the side, looking for more work, and starting to film outside of bmx. There’s more and more people getting into filming so I guess it’s hard to be a standout. Just like BMX there’s good people, bad people, trends, etc. So I’m just doing my thing and I’m happy with how things are going. Even with doing all that, I was and always will be riding my bike and staying on both sides of the lens.

Any shout outs or thanks?

I want to thank all the companies I’ve done work for, my sponsors, parents and friends for everything they have done. Without all those people I wouldn’t be anywhere today. I also want to thank Adam for this interview and for helping out BMXer’s as well as the Filmers and Photographers that shoot them by putting them up on The Come Up.