Surfing Thread

[Nords]

Speaking of action shots, I came across this interesting technology, which unfortunately, is pretty useless:
SOLOSHOT - $50 off Limited Quantities
You put a device on your arm, and the camera base tracks you.
I say it's useless because who is going to leave a $400 device and a video camera unattended on the beach? Great idea, though.

SECURITY: For those situations where there is no one around to lazily read a book while SOLOSHOT does all the work, SOLOSHOT has built in security features that allows your camera to be locked to SOLOSHOT and the SOLOSHOT TriPod can be locked to any permanent or semi-permanent structure (such as a large pieces of driftwood, lifegaurd stand, park bench... so be creative!).

I think it fills a gap.

Last year we spent a couple hundred bucks for prints and high-res images from a beach photographer. He invested a few thousand in housings, tripods, & lenses. But best of all, he caught my daughter and me in the action shots that had eluded our DIY attempts for a decade.

If I screwed a GoPro into the nose of the board, or even used that bowsprit extension to get it out in front of the board, then the shots would just show closeups for the whole surf set. I'd also be fiddling with the camera all morning long. I like the idea of setting it up on the beach and then just surfing.

It could inspire some creative photography, too. Imagine if you hooked the remote to the dog's collar and turned it loose in the yard while the camera output was connected to an Internet feed.

These shots really make me want to go to Waikiki again. But I don't understand where all the other surfers are.

It's a problem. Technically a surfing contest can't prohibit anyone from surfing on the break. Realistically, though, the lifeguards and the jetski safety crew will make sure you don't catch a wave.

Every year the North Shore communities and the state regulators have prolonged disputes over the contest schedule. The guys have more competitions than the women. The adults have more than the kids. The shortboarders get more than the longboarders or the SUPs or the boogieboarders. Some sponsors get more special treatment than others. Millions of dollars are at stake, and the infighting gets pretty vicious.

People have learned to stay away from the beach on competition days unless they want to watch the competitors have all the fun. You also learn to be very aware of the winter competition schedule before you drive up to Haleiwa, or you'll end up driving into a parking lot before you even get to the outskirts of town...

 

[TromboneAl]

Talk, talk, talk, talk, taaaaalk, and, talk, talk, talk, taaaalk,....and no action shots! You're depressing me. Any action picture is worth 5,000 words

Well, it's been 5 years. How we doin here?

It was really fun to finally get a picture of myself surfing. Usually the waves are just too far out.

This is in Brookings, Oregon, and I had the place to myself. The waves looked too small to go out on, but I wanted to try out this new spot.

Water temperature around 52 and the air was 55 with clouds. I had a great time.

 

[Nords]

Water temperature around 52 and the air was 55 with clouds. I had a great time.

Yikes.

I've lost all thermal resistance out here. Even 70 degrees feels like torture now.

 

[TargaDave]

.

Woohoo! Soloshot would be great for shallow water stuff we do.

If I screwed a GoPro into the nose of the board, or even used that bowsprit extension to get it out in front of the board, then the shots would just show closeups for the whole surf set. I'd also be fiddling with the camera all morning long

Professional photographers? Good grief, you attach it, flip it on, go ride....... Hard to beat the impact of an in-the-action closeup. Shore shots are great but GoPro surf vids I've seen are amazing...

 

[TromboneAl]

BTW, I tied the board with a cord to the front of the car and there's no more humming.

 

[TromboneAl]

Seen here.

 

[Nords]

Shore shots are great but GoPro surf vids I've seen are amazing...

I think mine would be more like "Look, he's paddling into a wave... he caught it! Now he's standing up... he's standing up... he's almost up... there, he's up! Look, he's turning left! And right! And left again! One more right, and here's the cutback! Ooooh, that's going to leave a mark. You hate to see that happen to a surf geezer..."

 

[TargaDave]

I think mine would be more like "Look, he's paddling into a wave... he caught it! Now he's standing up... he's standing up... he's almost up... there, he's up! Look, he's turning left! And right! And left again! One more right, and here's the cutback! Ooooh, that's going to leave a mark. You hate to see that happen to a surf geezer..."

Oh contraire, I'd would seriously luv every second of it! Nords, we're all gettin older, and any action is great action, wipeouts included!



My family was just laughin away at my first pathetic attempt at boat wake surfin

 

[TromboneAl]

My air horn arrived today. Now Lena can signal me when I'm out on the waves. Three blasts will mean "Get you butt in here." Super blaster pump model.

 

[REWahoo]

My air horn arrived today...Super blaster pump model.

Perfect accessory for your bicycle.

 

[Nords]

... and any action is great action, wipeouts included!

You make a good point-- I wonder what the shear force is on a GoPro mount and my surf camera...

 

[TromboneAl]

I think mine would be more like "Look, he's paddling into a wave... he caught it! Now he's standing up... he's standing up... he's almost up... there, he's up! Look, he's turning left! And right! And left again! One more right, and here's the cutback! Ooooh, that's going to leave a mark. You hate to see that happen to a surf geezer..."

Super Frozen - Lake Superior Surf Short using GoPro HD #superfrozen by Ryan Patin - YouTube

But what you really want is to go out there with DD and film each other.

 

[Nords]

But what you really want is to go out there with DD and film each other.

We've tried that, and it really only works if one of you is floating in the water (not on a board) when the other surfs past.

And if I'm on the camera then I need my reading glasses.

I really like the idea of the Soloshot doing all the tracking while we just surf together.

 

[ronin]

Today was one of those really rare days when it went from blown to spit, victory at sea, early in the AM to smooth and pumping head-high wedgie south swells. Thank goodness I decided to go out despite the washing machine conditions. Ended up surfing 3 1/2 hours. Hope the swell holds thru tomorrow, but seeing how things change so much, who knows.

We went dry for 2 weeks until yesterday. Gills were drying out and the barnacles were starting to itch.

 

[TromboneAl]

Waves were 6.5 - 7 foot at the buoy, definitely head high, and it was a little too much for me. I get so out of breath battling my way out (very few lulls), and at one point I got knocked under, and I really needed to breathe but couldn't. It would have been better to be younger.

I walked down the beach to where it's more protected, and got some good rides.

It was sunny with very little wind.

 

[Nords]

Friday's surfing (our third day in a row while our daughter's home, and our eighth hour) was so frothy and wind-blown that my eyes were burning. It wasn't as high as Thursday's 6-8, but it was still at least 4-6 and somehow seemed more vicious.

The good news is that I'm more aggressive about pushing the board around when I turn, and my knees don't hurt when I squat into a hard cutback. It's been at least two years since my last knee injury so I guess I've finally built up the muscles to really carve again.

We finally got to one of those situations where we were caught in the break, had to paddle a hundred yards to the side to get back into the rip, and then still had to battle back out there between closeouts. At one point I realized that I'd paddled about 50 yards out and been thrown back around 45. That's when we decided to paddle in...

 

[Purron]

Surfing goats....http://wtop.com/681/2941741/Surfs-Up

 

[Htown Harry]

One man's daydream of surfing in ER

Yesterday I read a Michael Lewis story in the October Vanity Fair. It is a profile covering the working life of a CEO with a stressful job.

Covered in the story are day-to-day aspects of the executive's busy life, the pressures of the job and the tools the executive uses for maintaining his focus at work and a semblance of balance in his life.

Lewis does a wonderful job of capturing the essence of the executive's approach to the job.

The executive is financially independent, but is clearly not ready to leave the working life just yet. As it happens, his employer has a very formal executive succession policy with defined "windows" for holding the CEO's position. The executive could have decided last year to retire this coming January. Instead, he has set a goal to ER at age of 55, in January 2017. (Or maybe it will be semi-ER; there's no indication that the executive has decided.)

Near the end, as all good writers do, Lewis weaves the various threads of the story together.

This passage figures prominently. In what was clearly a thoughtful moment, the CEO daydreams about surfing:

...I’d asked him what he would do if granted a day when no one knew who he was and he could do whatever he pleased. How would he spend it? He didn’t even have to think about it:

. . . . You park your car. If the waves are good you sit and watch and ponder it for a while. You grab your car keys in the towel. And you jump in the ocean. And you have to wait until there is a break in the waves. . . . And you put on a fin—and you only have one fin—and if you catch the right wave you cut left because left is west. . . . Then you cut down into the tube there. You might see the crest rolling and you might see the sun glittering. You might see a sea turtle in profile, sideways, like a hieroglyph in the water. . . . And you spend an hour out there. And if you’ve had a good day you’ve caught six or seven good waves and six or seven not so good waves. And you go back to your car. With a soda or a can of juice. And you sit. And you can watch the sun go down …​

 

[ronin]

Nicaragua

Planning a surf trip to Nica in mid-April or May of '13. Will be in the south, in the Popoyo area. Anyone surfed around there or have any tips?