Rocky’s getting some company. Steve Casimiro and Michael Frank, editors of Adventure Journal, are joining Rocky on The Goat. They’ll be posting their ever-entertaining “Links We Like” in four daily installments from here on out. Consider it more Goat for your buck.

Wondering who the heck Steve Casimiro and Michael Frank are? Well, said without a lick of hyperbole, they’re heavyweights. Steve is the former editor of Powder - The Skier’s Magazine, the founding editor of Bike Magazine, and the West Coast editor of National Geographic Adventure. He’s also the founder of Adventure Journal. Michael is managing editor of Adventure Journal, and has been an editor at Esquire, Bicycling, and Forbes.com.

Backcountry.com writer/editor Toni Isom recently spent an afternoon chatting with Steve about his career, Adventure Journal, and contributing to The Goat, just so you all could get to know him a bit better. This is how it went:

Q: You edited Powder Magazine for over 10 years, and your “Powder Intros” are famed. They examined skiing from every angle, ranging in tone and topic from a reflection on the symbolic power of maps to a lyrical look at the upside of cat tracks to an eloquent defense of heli skiing. Could you talk a little bit about what motivated you to write the Intros and how you perceive their effect on the ski world?

A: The main motivation was that I didn’t want to lose my job. You kind of have to write them, you know what I’m saying? They chained me to the typewriter, gave me a bowl of kibble, and it was do or die. It was a sweatshop, man, a sweatshop.

No, the truth of the matter was that the bar had been set really high by the editors who came before me. I had tremendous respect for what they’d accomplished, and it was both an inspiration and a challenge to make them proud and live up to the Powder ideal. 

Everything has to be viewed in the context of the times. When Powder was launched in the early 1970s, none of the ski media reflected the amazing counterculture energy in the backcountry, early heli-skiing, and hotdogging. When I joined Powder in the 1980s, the industry was stagnant and boring, fearful of lawsuits and obsessed with grooming the slopes smooth. In both of those eras, Powder tried to stand out as a voice of the people. And each of us editors interpreted that in our own ways. In the first few years of the magazine, it was all very spiced wine and poetry. In the early 80s, under Neil Stebbins, it was flamboyant. When I took over, it felt like a very soul searching time — American resort skiing was stagnating, U.S. skiers were just discovering European freedom in a significant way, and snowboarding was taking hold. Skiers needed leaders, or rallying cries, maybe, and they found that, I think, in both Greg Stump’s movies and in Powder.

The intros reflected both the eras, the perceived needs of readers, and the personalities of the editors in charge. I tend to stand back a bit, reflect, look for the deeper connections and try to be in touch with the emotion that underlies the action. Why skiing? Why not surfing? What is it about snow, mountains, cold, that unlock these things we feel as skiers? How does that impact our lives, our decisions, our relationships? How do we get more of it and how do we fulfill this passion that takes over our lives? Those were the issues that I was examining personally and the intros reflected that, too. 

As for their effect in the world, I’m the wrong person to ask. I just wrote how I felt about skiing, how it made me happy, how it made my hungry, how it made me fulfilled or how it left me empty.  Perhaps they articulated things other people felt about skiing, perhaps they connected on a more personal level. But I don’t rightly know.

Q: You also founded Bike Magazine and oversaw its content for six years. What were some of your favorite things about this experience?

A: Building something that didn’t exist and seeing it succeed. Creating a market for a whole new genre of bike photography and watching it explode. Sharing amazing talents like Mike Ferrentino or the incredible crew of photographers with tons more people.

Q: You currently contribute to the National Geographic Adventure blog, and back when NGA was still a print publication, your gear guide photography was (and remains) iconic. The yokels at Backcountry.com refer to it as “the swimsuit edition of adventure travel” while the more articulate among us describe it as “the stuff of legends. Back when print was still print and editorial expression wasn’t just the sycophantic quest for what readers want.” Describe your artistic approach to these guides. What inspired you? What expectations did you have for your finished pieces?

A: You’re talking about the NGA apparel and travel guides. Yeah, those were pretty darn fun: Twice a year I’d get to take a small crew to some exotic location and shoot them in the latest clothes. It was amazing. Absolutely exhausting, 18-plus-hour days for a couple weeks at a time, but an unbelievable opportunity.

The shoots actually began because I was complaining about how lame we’d been covering clothes — ill-conceived “urban adventure” clothes shot on the streets of New York or a pile of soft shells thrown on a table top in a studio. It didn’t feel like how a National Geographic magazine should cover clothes, and I was constantly bitching about it. Finally, my colleagues got tired of my nagging and said, “Okay, smartypants, you do it. You can go anywhere you want. Oh, and by the way, you have no budget. ”

I was, like, uh-oh. Because then the whole thing fell into my lap — and by that, I mean everything. I called all the manufacturers to borrow clothes — on average, 100 brands per shoot — which arrived at my house in UPS truckloads. I dealt with all the travel arrangements. I cast the models. I put the outfits together and handled whatever styling we did. Once we got on location, though, one of the photo editors was there to help, thank goodness, and the models we cast were always awesome people who really pitched in. Almost without exception, we really came together as a team.

 As for the images, what inspired me was wanting to do better. You can’t just criticize, you have to step up and deliver, you know? My goal was to produce photos that showed the clothes, that felt authentic and true to the experience, and that had feeling and energy and a sense of enthusiasm. I didn’t want to sell anybody on anything, but rather to create or find scenes that were so attractive that you wanted to be there — at that location, with those people, in those clothes. And it’s harder than it looks to find the right balance between…fashion and function, for lack of a better way of putting it. Too far in one direction and the photos feel silly, too far in the other and they’re stiff. There’s always going to be tension, of course: The more “real” the adventure, the crappier you look, generally speaking.

Q: Your latest project, Adventure Journal, occupies an interesting space in both the gear and editorial worlds. It seems to focus on the relationship between gear and art, and in many ways it IS art. Perhaps its role in the vast scope of the Internet is similar to the role you describe of cabins in the “Weekend Cabins” section: “It’s about the longing for a sense of place, for shelter set in a landscape…for something that speaks to refuge and distance from the everyday. Nostalgic and wistful, it’s about how people create structure in ways to consider the earth and sky and their place in them. It’s not concerned with ownership or real estate, but what people build to fulfill their dreams of escape.” Do you agree with this take? Or, if you disagree, how would you contextualize Adventure Journal? Who are your followers, generally speaking, and what have their reactions been like so far?

A: Hmmm. Well, yes, I do think there’s a certain longing that underlies the appeal of Adventure Journal, but I think it’s a longing for a voice that reflects outdoor adventure as it really is. My goal with AJ is to share the outdoor experience honestly, authentically, and openly. Adventure Journal is about the stoke of adventure, the inspiration, the dreams, excitement, challenges, and payoff. Commercial print magazines are restrained by a finite number of pages and all too often governed by an attitude of commoditizing their readers and, frankly, a lack of imagination or willingness to take risks on stories that fall outside their safe zones. We don’t have any limits on space, of course, and I’m striving not to have any limits on imagination or story selection.

 So, I would say that I hope AJ occupies an interesting space, period. Gear is only one part of what we do. The same for art. And I don’t think it’s exploring the relationship between gear and art, I think it’s exploring a multitude of relationships: between our spirits and nature, between effort and emotion, between our asses and our bike saddles. I mean, here’s the thing: Adventure Journal ultimately is about me wanting to entertain and inspire both myself and my friends — the friends I already have and the friends I haven’t yet met. It’s about having the outdoor magazine I always wanted to see but never existed. And if you follow the threads through my career — or this Q&A — you’ll see that the underlying themes are emotion, introspection, passion, stoke, and the search for meaning and connection, whether it’s on skis, a bike, via world travel, or something else. Adventure Journal is a vehicle through which those elements can be explored even more broadly and deeply.

The readers…I hate to speak for them because 1) they’re so disparate and 2) they seem to do a pretty good job speaking for themselves in comments. We now have about 600,000 page views a month and every measure of engagement is improving, so it appears that people are liking it, but distilling one common reaction is impossible. I’m hoping for “life-transforming joy” but would be thrilled with “S’okay. I might come back.” Adventure Journal’s content is extremely wide-ranging, if you have an adventurous spirit, you’re probably going to find something you like there.

Q: You’ll soon be a voice on The Goat. As a writer/editor/photographer, what attracted you to this gig? What do you like about The Goat?

A: I think it was when they offered me free shipping on all orders over $50.

Funny enough, I can remember when Backcountry.com existed as piles of avalanche transceivers stacked in boxes in my friend’s spare bedroom in a Park City condo. From the beginning, it’s always been about meeting an unmet need (access to great gear) and about real people. The Goat is refreshingly honest, it’s funny, and it’s real. Who wouldn’t want to be a part of that?

Q: What do you think about current Goat-dude Rocky Thompson? Do you think he’s a pompous windbag? Do you find him refreshingly honest, hilarious, and on-point? How do you envision your and Michael’s voices working with Rocky’s on The Goat?

A: Simon and Garfunkel, baby. Crosby Stills Nash and Young. Sweet harmony.

Yes, well, ahem. Coming back to earth, Michael usually writes in a more measured tone, I tend to rely on heavy use of brobonics, and dude-goat Rocky is the finger in the eye of absurdity and hypocrisy.

We don’t have any particular game plan about who’s going to do what or how, but because we generally take a less sardonic approach at AJ, Rocky should feel absolutely no compulsion to be politically correct. We all have this expectation that he’s going to provide a daily dose of snark, sarcasm, or the expertly played skewer — as longtime fans of the Goat, we’re just hoping to see more of it from him.

Tags: Adventure Journal, Michael Frank, Rocky Thompson, Steve Casimiro

This entry was posted on Thursday, November 10th, 2011 at 7:50 am and is filed under Story, Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.