If your three favorite things are skiing, movies and partying, then you should have been in Aspen this past weekend for the fourth annual Meeting. And not just any meeting, The Meeting, where industry athletes, film makers, media and various other industry personnel gather for a season kick off in beautiful Aspen, Colorado. And boy was it beautiful. The tress were in their fall prime with brilliant colored trees lining the mountains the entire way up and over Independence Pass. But foilage aside, let’s get to what happened while in Aspen. The activities kicked off Thursday evening with the 6th annual Nepsa Awards. Channeling his inner diva, the event was hosted by Aspen local Chris Davenport, in his finest drag. Pat Swewll took home first place for his movie “Why It’s Good to Be A Skier.” He took home $2,000 in cash and another $1,000 in Target gift cards.
That night, TechNine lit up Belly Up for the first of three fun-filled evenings hosted by the famous local location.
Friday kicked off with a gathering to discuss HD technology and the benefits of new equipment and technology. Jeff Blauvelt of HD Cinema led the discussion and brought some new gadgets for the kids to play with.
From there, the movies kicked off with Poor Boyz Productions film Reasons and Nimbus Independent’s production, Hunting Yeti. Many athletes including Michelle Parker and Simon Dumont were on hand for those while Grete Eliassen, Angeli VanLaanen and Marie-France Roy were on hand for the Oakley/1242 Productions film Uniquely, which featured Oakley women’s athletes from the likes of skiing, snowboarding, wakeboarding, surfing and skating. Closing off the night at the historic Wheeler Opera House was the Brain Farm Productions film That’s It, That’s All, staring Travis Rice.
Once the crowd moseyed over to Belly Up, Level 1’s film Turbo and Rage’s Such is Life were shown on the big screen while Red Bull Vodkas were served until the night was old. Glitch Mob then took the stage. Unfortunately, dancing was out of the question with the vibe they were putting out.
Saturday morning started off with a round of Bloody Marys and Freeskier’s own Publisher, Christopher Jerard leading a discussion regarding the unification of professional freeskiing. A long time coming, talks of an association representing the athletes and providing a forum for discussions of coaching parameters, course structure, contest development and weighting as well as X Games invites is being established. Stay tuned to Freeskier.com as well as the magazine for more information as it becomes available.
Following that, Michael Lythcott, the CEO and Chairman of VAS Entertainment, held a conference regarding the future of DVD sales and media development for both web and television. Talk about someone who knows what he is talking about, Michael makes no qualms about the fact that he wants to put out the best action sports movies, hands down, and will do what it takes to promote and develop the distribution of his titles.
A media reception kicked off the nights festivities at 39 Degrees bar in the lobby of the host hotel, the Sky. from there, it was back to the Wheeler Opera House for the two Mack Dawg films as well as Tanner Hall’s The Massive and Matchstick’s Claim. Post that, Belly Up once again took us in and showed Bluebird Films movie and Rome’s No Correct Way. DJ Mel then took center stage and more than one bootie was seen shaking on the dance floor. In fact, at one point I think there were more people on the dance floor than at the bar ordering drinks. After the party it was the Hotel Lobby where we were more than once asked to head to our rooms and go to sleep. No after party for us. But big props to the Sky for putting up the snow sports industry and showing us an amazing time while in Aspen.
