Monday, September 23, 2013

Danny Renaud #2.



"You know what I like about Habitat, Alien, Seek and all the DNA companies? They never felt they had to move the company to California to compete. They just made all their brands amazing with great videos, the best riders and quality products. Their attitude of "we won't let anyone else dictate what we're doing" comes across in everything they do. Everyone on the team kills it, as we all know, but instead of singling anyone out (Danny Garcia, Freddy Gall, Kerry Getz, Danny Renaud, Tim O'Connor, Wenning, Janowski, etc.), I'd rather point out my favorite overall elements of this video: spot selection, the spills and the lines. Now that I opened NJ Skateshop, I watch far too many videos repeatedly to pass the time, and every spot seems to mesh into the next one, and that didn't happen with Mosaic. I was constantly asking Freddy where spots were, like a little kid. Usually I could care less because why do I need to know where a 20-stair rail is? I also liked how they threw in random slams and spills into people's parts and didn't separate it into a "slam section." It reminded me that these guys are human and eat shit just like us. Most importantly, there are lines for days. You remember lines, right? It's when someone does more than one trick in a row and actually demonstrates how they skate rather than hitting a rail, landing it and jumping off after hitting a patch of dirt. All I'm saying is - I don't even know what I'm saying. I like Habitat, and this video made me feel like I was 12 again, and there's not many things in this world that have that kind of power anymore." - Chris Nieratko

Time for a quick look back at Habitat's Mosaic. It's one of my favorite videos ever.

Habitat released their first video in 2003. It featured Danny Renaud, Tim O'Connor, Brian Wenning, Kerry Getz, Stefan Janoski, Fred Gall, Danny Garcia, and Rob Pluhowski. There was also an Alien Workshop section with Danny Way, Steve Berra, Heath Kirchart, Anthony Pappalardo, Ted De Gros, Jason Dill, and Anthony Van Engelen. Most riders had full parts, but there were a few shared sections due to other videos the team was in, such as the DC Video and Emerica's This Is Skateboarding.

Ian O'Connor took the photo.

For the quote: Big Brother - January 2004 Issue 104

Transworld - May 2003 Volume 21 Number 5

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