We use the Back of House articles to highlight people in the snowboard industry who help make it tick. Peter Cirilli is one of those people. Hailing from the East Coast, the photographer/designer has turned into much more over the past couple years. Working with some of the biggest names in snowboarding (and now helping manage one), check out what Peter is up to and how he got there below.

How’d you get into photography?
Loaded question. I grew up in Connecticut. I was snowboarding a bunch in high school and then I kind of got hurt. I compressed two discs in my back and needed to take some time off. I really wanted to keep doing it… so I was just like, you know what, I’m going to pick up a camera. And then I started shooting basketball, actually, at my high school. I kind of followed the team around. I was always into art. I hung out in the art wing of the school pretty much my whole four years of high school. That was kind of the zone that I liked. So I figured that would be a cool way to stay involved and get into shooting photos. I followed the team basically to every game, I would take the photos, edit them that night, and back then I would put them on a disc drive or like a CD. I would burn them onto a CD and drop them off at the coach’s office the next morning. So I did that and would also shoot snowboarding — just get the homies around and we’d go to Ski Sundown and shoot there.

Did you go to college for photography?
No, I went for graphic design because I kind of had a sense that going for photography was going to make me not like it as much. Knowing the whole time that I just wanted to shoot, I felt that learning the design side of things would be helpful. Majoring in it was just another skill I could apply to my photography.

What school did you go to?
Champlain College in Burlington, Vermont. I believe Aaron Blatt went there as well. It was a close distance to a lot of resorts to ride. I had been going there a bit. We had good family friends in Vermont, the Violette family. They lived in Stowe and were kind of the reason I got into snowboarding in the first place. They were always skating, snowboarding, wakeboarding — all the board sports.

Did you do any internships when you were at school?
When I was in college, I worked in a studio setting with Michael Sipe, who is a studio photographer and shot a lot of Burton’s studio stuff for a while. I worked with him and gained a lot of studio knowledge that way. And then I interned at Driven Studio, which is where I ended up working for four years as a photographer and graphic designer. Seth Neary owned that company. He was an ex-pro snowboarder for a long time for Nitro, big during the Stratton and US Open days, very well-known. So working for him was pretty rad. I also worked for Burton my junior year of college shooting the Burton qualifiers. I was in school full time and then doing that on the weekends as well. That was super fun.

What equipment are you running?
I’ve been running a Canon R3, Canon R5 Mark II, and the classic Canon Fisheye 15mm 2.8. A lot of people ask me if I’m going to get the new RF one, and I don’t see a need for it. And the 100 to 300mm. I use Profoto flashes. I also have a Leica Q2, a Leica M6, and a Hasselblad that I really like to shoot on with the old school fisheye.

What’s your job now?
I like to think of myself still as a photographer. I really enjoy shooting photos. I think that’s one of my favorite things to do. But I also manage Zeb Powell — his day-to-day, a lot of his creative direction and producing. I am in charge of that stuff. I gather the team, gather the people, or I shoot stuff for him and his partners. I manage him on a day-to-day basis — booking flights, booking travel, having conversations with partners and brands and working with his agent to kind of make the machine move. It’s a lot more work than people think.

I think when I first started, it was one of those things where it was like, does he really need this? But now that we’re in it this deep, he has a lot of obligations for his sponsors. People think it’s a big team, but we are just a small crew that gets a lot done.

What about in between the design agency and becoming part of Zeb’s camp?
I left the design company in 2019. I was there three and a half years and then picked up working with Zeb while I was mostly doing freelance work. I shot a lot of stuff with Ben and Jerry’s, so that was kind of keeping me afloat. For a better part of a year when I first started working with Zeb, I didn’t make any money. It was just doing it to do it. He was paying for my travel and we were going places and doing stuff, but for me it was more about getting to know him and understanding who he is and what he’s doing.

What is he doing?
He’s creating a movement without really trying. When you’re at an event with him, you see it. You see the energy that he brings. You see the attention that he gives to not only one person or a friend, but everybody there. If he doesn’t know them, he signs something for them, he talks to them. Autograph lines take forever with him because he’s engaging with everyone. It’s not just head down, sign the autograph, push it to the side — he looks up, he says hi, he comments on people’s outerwear or clothing or shoes or hats, whatever. He gives people the time of day. He has time for all of it somehow. He makes time for all of it somehow. He’s doing it because he loves it. He’s not doing it for notoriety. That stuff is all coming to him naturally. And at the end of the day, growing the sport that we all love is something that not a lot of people have the resources to do.

You still shoot a lot outside of snowboarding too, right?
Yeah, I shoot a lot of golf. I shoot a lot of studio stuff at my house for clients. I shoot for a local landscape supply, power equipment, and trucking company here, which is pretty rad. Something different is a nice thing to break it all up. I would get bored shooting the same thing every day.

What kind of golf stuff are you shooting?
I shot the Junior Ryder Cup during Ryder Cup week this year down in New York for the PGA Digital team. That was really fun, just seeing these kids from all over the country and all over the world — it was USA versus Europe. They’re all in high school, super young, insane at golf. Just watching them and following them around the golf course for a week was really fun.

And you shot the Celtics as well, right?
Yeah. I’ve always been a basketball fan. My wife’s family are diehard Boston fans all around — Patriots, Red Sox, Celtics — so it was just kind of natural to root for them. We were going to some games with Zeb and met some people there. I just reached out to one of them after a game and said I would love to shoot photos of a game, just have access to the court to bring my whole kit in. She put me in contact with the creative director, who was just like, yeah, we can invite you to shoot and give you credentials. It was awesome. It was super fast-paced. Obviously, the game doesn’t slow down for you or for anything — but the game. So you just kind of have to jump around or stay in one spot and hope something happens. That was a really fun experience.

Easier to shoot than the high school basketball games?
Haha, yes. It is fast and doesn’t slow down… but better moments, better body positioning, better poise, like, you know, dunking, stadium lighting. All of the things.

What’s a favorite shoot you’ve done in the past two years?
I really enjoyed the Jordan shoot we did last year. When Zeb signed the contract, one of the things they wanted to do was a welcome-to-the-team kind of shoot. They didn’t have a crazy budget for it, so Zeb and I really wanted to make something fun. He was in Japan for two weeks with the Burton crew and then we were planning to shoot when he got back, right before Heavy Metal last year. We were on the phone pretty much every day talking about what we wanted to do. I was back here drawing stuff, writing stuff down.

It was the first time I had done a bigger studio shoot that I kind of pulled together myself — with the team and some friends from New Hampshire who shot the video and lit the whole project. I’m really proud of that one. It was at Gary Land’s studio. Seth Neary knew him really well, obviously from the old Stratton days, and connected me with him a little while back. Gary and I just became good friends after that. He’s been fond of Zeb and friends with him for a bit as well, so they’ve done some shoots together too. He said to me, anytime you need to use the studio, let me know. That day was free, so we went in with all the gear and set it up. He even gave Zeb a Jordan chain that he had — I don’t know why he had it, but he had it. And we used that in the shoot too. It was just good family vibes.

Gary was also integral in starting Homesick out at Stratton, correct?
Yep! Year four and it just keeps getting better. More people are recognizing the event and seeing it for what it is. It’s such a sick celebration of snowboarding — bringing together different generations of riders. This year they put up like $20k for the rail jam. More people are coming out and Zeb is bringing in some of the younger crowd as well.

Do you like shooting natural light or in the studio more?
I like a mix of both, dude. I remember someone — I was listening to their podcast — and they said, my biggest advice to photographers is just stay in your lane, shoot the same thing, get really good at it, and people will hire you for that one thing. And to me, I’m just kind of like, yeah, that’s cool… but also, why can’t you be good at a lot of things? Shooting more than just snowboarding keeps my mind fresh and I really enjoy it. Yes, would I be a better snowboard photographer if that’s all I did? For sure. But it becomes too monotonous for me. And it’s honestly hard to be a full-time freelance snowboard photographer and make a living — with children, living in New England — there are a lot of sacrifices I would have to make.

How do you define success?
My version of success is very different. For me, it’s like… I’ve made a career. I’m 32, I have a house, a wife, a kid, two dogs. That’s success to me versus getting a cover. Getting a cover would be a cherry on top. I still get those butterflies in my stomach when I see something published. Seeing it in print — there’s no other feeling like it, whether it’s a small photo or a full spread. But it’s not what keeps me going.

What keeps you going?
My son. And then also seeing what Zeb is doing — that kind of keeps me motivated.

Would you rather have a cover or your photo on a pint of Ben & Jerry’s?
Definitely the cover of a snowboard magazine. I spent so much time with mags, putting pages on my walls as a kid. I just love snowboarding. But a pint would be pretty sick.

What would you say to someone trying to come up as a photographer in snowboarding today?
If you have an idea and you want to do it, get to your local hill and just go do it. Find the local rippers, kids that are good and have style — just find a crew. Spend time at your hill, get comfortable with them, and talk about ideas and how you want to set up shots. They might have ideas and want to set up shots as well.

Mentors help too. I was lucky enough to work with Blotto for a little while. One of the biggest pieces of advice he gave me was to keep doing the Ben and Jerry’s stuff, keep doing the studio stuff, keep doing all that other stuff — because if you don’t, you get into a position where all your eggs are in one basket, and if that basket goes away, then what? Hearing it from someone like him, someone I looked up to my whole life — that was really cool.