Shin [Biyajima] rides down with this big ol' Japanese grin and giggle and I'm like what? Two years later, when I started planning the trip, I knew Shin was from the Hakuba area, and I didn't want to come film in Japan without a Japanese rider. Shin had the time and availability, and it worked out perfect.

Now you're gonna take beatings. It's written in our DNA, you know. You're gonna go down. You get up, it's that simple.

We needed to do "Community Project" to feel comfortable doing our own thing, and then "That's It That's All" was this experiment with camera technology and shooting snowboarding a little differently. "Art of Flight" was that dream of "That's it That's All" realized. Then we didn't want to make an "Art of Flight 2," so we stepped back and tried to take a different approach to create a more multi-faceted film. "The Fourth Phase" has more of a storyline, and it was much more personal for me.

What is snowboarding to me? I'd say it's when I feel passion. That is, if passion is a combination of utter joy, frustration and rage. It's my life.

Bryan [Iguchi] had this beautiful philosophy about our connection with these incredible cycles. There's a line from one of his poems that always stays with me about 'This process we follow; this cycle we ride' and it's almost become a strap line for the film.

One of the proudest things for me with this film [The Fourth Phase] is that year after year we put ourselves right out there making it and no one got seriously injured.

We pretty much had crazy weather, historically speaking, in every location we filmed [The Fourth Phase]. Nothing has been normal in the past three years.