From the good old KBR movies back then to his World Peace edits, the latest WOP movies, Antti Jussila has been smoothly filming heavy street clips for a fair bit now! He’s definitely part of this generation of very stylish Finnish street riders that we love to watch rip the steel, stairs, or any jibable object in sight. On the very first day of the year, Seamus Foster presented the latest K2 snowboarding project, ‘Orange Things’ to the world, and as expected from him and the crew involved, it is as heavy as it is beautiful. Antti jumped on this project for a two-week trip to Japan, joining Jake Kuzyk, Mark Wilson, Aito Ito, Justin Phipps, Seamus, and Marc O'Malley. It was a good reason for us to catch up with Antti and get some insights about filming for this project. Not sure if 'orange' is the new thing but this is talking 'Orange Things' with Antti Jussila.

Intro & Interview - Justin Dutilh
Film & Edit - Seamus Foster
Photography - Marc O'Malley

Hey Antti, Happy New Year! 

Happy New Year!

Any cool projects, wishes, or personal resolutions for 2024? Please don't say you wish for world peace.

*laughs* I always wish for world peace, of course. We are now filming for a Vans video with Benny (Urban), Nils (Arvidsson), and Sebi (Springeth). It's going to be fun to film with the boys again, but it's supposed to be -20 degrees next week. So it’s gonna be pretty freezing. But I haven’t managed to make any personal resolutions for 2024 yet. 

“Orange Things”, the K2 project, just came out on the first day of the year, so that's a good start. What did you think of the movie? And how did you take part in it? 

It was exciting to see it for the first time when it dropped. I haven’t even seen any preview or anything before, and I really liked how it was put together. Seamus did an amazing job once again. 

You went on one trip with them, right? 

Yeah, I just went on one of the trips. The video is filmed on two trips, basically. So Seamus, (Justin) Phipps, and Mark (Wilson) filmed some clips in Utah earlier last season. Then, we made the main trip to Japan in February.

Muroran is a pretty special area to go film to. Can you tell us a bit about why you went there and what it’s like over there? 

Yeah. So, we were trying to figure out where we were gonna go in February. There was no snow in Helsinki, and pretty much all the places were pretty dry except Japan. So we decided to go there. Jake (Kuzyk) had been in Muroran before. So he knew something about the city before. It’s a couple of hours from Sapporo and by the coast. Apparently, they don't get snow that often. It's like an old industrial city. You can see it from the rails. Most of them are really rusty and old. There are probably 100,000 people living there. It’s a cool city.

How did it all go? I mean, Japan is known to be a pretty hard place to film. 

Obviously, for me, coming out from Helsinki where is like the easiest to film that I can think of. It was a bit different. You're actually not allowed to ride in the streets or like, anywhere apart from parks. So yeah, there were a lot of kick-outs. Once, Mark hit this one creeper rail, and after landing in the run-out, he did a quick boardslide on this little guard rail that was separating this old guy’s yard from the road, and that was like really old and rusty.

The guy or the rail? *laughs* 

The rail and the guy as well. *laughs*. That boardslide scratched a bit of rust and paint off the rail. This old man got so angry at us he that called the cops. Language barrier played a big role in this situation as well. So, we had to go to the police station to figure this out. Then we had to come back with the cops to solve it with the old man. It all ended after we apologized and gave him some money for painting the already rusty one-meter-long guardrail. Actually, when we were speculating what we wanted to film there, the cops were excited about it and hyped on the brands we ride for  *laughs*

*laughs* Well, that's funny. I guess it helps that you had a Japanese rider with you with Aito, right?

Yeah, but all this was before Aito joined us. After this situation, we figured out that we were going to need a local rider, so Aito joined us a few days later, and it was a game-changer for us. Luckily, he had time to join us. He made the trip so easy and fun for the crew. 

That's cool. How was it just filming with that crew?

Yeah, it was a really good crew to film with. Everybody helped one another, and I feel like we all work in pretty similar ways.

Why do you think this movie is called “Orange Things”? 

I actually don't know, I need to ask that, but one of the song seemed to be called “Orange Things”. 

Let's talk about Seamus a little bit. He's been editing your “World Peace” project for a few years now. I think he has a very sensitive approach to filmmaking that shows the rider's personality very well, and it worked pretty well with you, too.  He just edited these movies and didn’t actually film them, right?

Yes, that’s right, and I agree with you. He’s very good at that. It was pretty interesting to just film it all with Jamie (Durham) here in Finland and then deliver the footage to him. Obviously, I trusted him. But yeah, with the first world peace video, I was kind of stressed and was hoping that it was going to be something that I would have pictured. But he made those videos look so much better than I could have ever imagined myself. It’s always been a pleasure to work with him.

Would you say that he successfully showed the ambiance and what you guys felt when you were filming and how it all went without like actually being there, or did he just do something totally different that just matches? 

Yeah, he does translate the ambiance really well. I guess knowing him personally helps to bring up the feelings and find those right moments from the video clips.

Yeah, of course. That's rad. So you definitely noticed it from his editing, but did you also realize it while he was filming for “Orange Things”? 

Yes and no. I guess he does it so naturally that you don’t pay attention to it that much.

Well, the movie looks sick, so he's doing something all right for sure. Was it your first time filming streets in Japan, or have you been there before?

Yeah, this was my first time filming streets in Japan. I've been to Japan four times before this trip to ride powder though. I love that country.

How is it different from filming streets in Finland? 

I mean, there's so many cool-looking spots, but you kind of know that you only have a certain amount of time to make it happen. It's so different. If you’re at a spot that seems to be really quiet and don’t see people outside, you can be setting up the spot, and all of a sudden, cops show up out of nowhere in 15 minutes to tell you that you can’t snowboard on the streets. So yeah, it's way harder than back home.

Yeah. So you probably have less space to experiment with tricks and stuff. 

Yeah, for sure. It would be a dream place to film if you could hit anything there and spend more time riding spots. 

Yeah, I’m sure. And that’s what you've been applying a lot lately back home in Finland. I mean experimenting with new spots, new ways of filming stuff, so I guess it’s a bit difficult to do it in a situation where you don't have a lot of time. 

Kind of, yeah. Then, you just choose something that you know will work. This is hard for me since I've always been pretty selective about what I want to ride.

So you prefer filming in Finland then?

*laughs* That's a good question. I mean, at this point, it feels like it's getting harder and harder in Finland, having filmed here for so long. Sometimes, I feel like it would be just better to go somewhere else. But even now, we were thinking about doing a trip somewhere else with Vans. But it seemed like there weren’t too many other countries with good snow.

I mean, you managed to bring really original stuff within that situation, so that's pretty good. I think there's hope in that. Your opening part in “Wop For Sale” is a perfect example that it is possible. How did it feel to put together a rad opening part in Tobbe’s movie by the way? 

Thank you. It felt amazing. I’ve always been a big fan of WOP’s videos.

Is “WOP” really for sale actually? 

Yeah, it might be.

For how much would you buy it? 

I think I can’t afford it, that's the problem. 

I hope whoever buys it will keep it real. The Scandi scene needs WOP. In fact, we all need WOP. 

Yeah, we all need WOP.

Okay to wrap this up, I'd like to know what are your favorite “orange things”?  And please don't say oranges. 

I kind of have to say oranges at this given moment, but foxes are cool, too.