California 2012 – Part Three | US Open of Surfing | Huntington Beach, CA

Continued from Part One, here.

Day Four: We woke up at Malibu Creek State Park to a bit of rain, which surprised us because we heard it practically never rains in Southern Cali. It was our goal to be on the road by 7:00am since heats at the US Open started at 8:00am, especially since Kelly & Dane’s heats were the first of the day. But due to the rain, we neglected to get out of our sleeping bags until closer to 8, putting us in Huntington a little after 9:00am. Another reason we wanted to get there early is because we knew parking was going to be an issue, so we were pretty stoked to find a metered spot fairly close to the pier. We got there just in time to see the tail end of Kelly taking out Jesse Mendes and I meet up with my Buddy Micah from La Verne, CA. Me and Micah hung out on the pier shooting the Men’s quarter finals and a bit of the Noseriding Invitational while John and Allie headed back to the car to fill the meter and John wanted to go for a surf. After me and Micah did a little shooting and walked around the contest area, we headed back down to meet up with John and Allie. Once John was done surfing, we all crammed into our little corolla and headed to our home for the night to check in, the Best Western. Showers. Beds. Heaven. We stopped at a phenomenal little mexican place next door to the hotel called Fiesta Grill, regrouped at the hotel, hung up our wet camping gear, then walked back down to the contest area, a good 3 mile trek.
The US Open of Surfing is a pretty big deal, they close Main St that runs perpendicular the beach because of the large volume of people, it’s quite the experience. So we navigated through all that, walked on the pier, checked out some of the shops, took some photos, then stopped at a little pizza joint for beer and pizza. On two separate occasions, someone put smoke bombs in the port-o-potty, causing the fire department to come. It got pretty late, and Micah had to make the drive back to La Verne, we walked back to Micah’s car and he gave us a ride back to the hotel. We all got showered, nursed our sunburns and climbed into our big comfortable beds.
The next day was pretty much the same story, we hung out on the pier watching the contest. By now the crowds have come in a full force, so there was no way I’d be shooting from the pier. John went for a little surf on the north side of the pier, so we watched him until the Mens finals. Miguel Pupo took out Kelly in the Semi’s and Julian Wilson took out Gabe Medina so it was Julian and Pupo in the Final. I made my way down to the water, which was the only available place to stand and shot some photos as Julian took out Pupo for the win. I always watch the live webcasts of these events online, but it’s so different being there, while it’s awesome feeling the energy of the crowds, I couldn’t hear the scores, so I didn’t know who had won until Julian took a wave to the inside and put his hands in the air. I tried to get a video of him coming onto the beach. Bad idea. Everybody that was standing on the beach behind me mobbed the water trying to get close to the 2012 US Open champ. So we left pretty much right after that. We had to make it to Tami & Michael’s house in San Clemente for dinner!

That’s it for Part Three. Stay tuned for Part Four as we made our way back down the coast to San Clemente.

Hurricane Katia Swell | Carolina Beach, NC | Surf Photographer

Hurricane Katia ran parallel to the eastcoast, sending all of the eastcoast waves while sparing us any hurricane conditions. Thursday was the day here, so after getting in a surf wednesday night I prepared to park it down at Sunskipper, Carolina Beach, NC for the day on thursday. Got down there with clean conditions in the morning, with the local guys getting barrel after barrel. When the winds kicked in, the afternoon session saw more performance surfing. Above is a video sequence from the dawn patrol session. Shane Burn got the best barrels I saw out there, as you’ll see in the video sequence. Below is the gallery I put together from thursday morning and afternoon. Click on any of the thumbnails to navigate through the images.

7th Annual Reef Sweetwater PRO AM 2011 | Oceanic Street, Wrightsville Beach, NC

July 15th-17th kicked off this years 7th Annual Reef Sweetwater Pro Am at Oceanic Street along the shores of Wrightsville Beach, North Carolina. In its 7th year, the Reef Sweetwater Pro Am attracts thousands of spectators, surfers and professional athletes from around the globe, flocking to the North Carolina Coast for a weekend of fun in the sun. Once again this year, we were blessed with a stomach to chest high swell that stuck around all weekend, providing ample conditions for competitors to compete towards the $20,000 prize purse. I shot the majority of the contest on friday, saturday, and sunday, through all divisions: Pro, Junior, Longboard, Womens, and guppies. I’ve put together two slideshows of the event. The first one is of the finals on Sunday July 17th. Finalists include Phillip Goold, Aaron Cormican, Fisher Heverly and Rob Machado. The second slideshow is a compilation of competition highlights throughout the three day festival. Enjoy!

Click the image for a slideshow of the finals!

Click the image for a slide show of the whole event!

Many thanks to the Reef, Sweetwater, Tony Butler, Event Staff, Sponsors, Volunteers and folks who make this event a success year after year!

Full Results can be found here!

Wavescapes…

Put together a new album on my print store. Hover over the slideshow below to be directed to the album.

Surfing – Carolina Beach, NC – January 18, 2011

Had a some good waves a couple days ago. One of those days where all the conditions come together. Sunskipper was doing its thing. Some nice solid drainers coming through, with some dudes out there ripping as usual. Usually for swells like this I’ll just post up on the beach with the long lens to capture the surfing action. This time I wanted to get some nice lineup shots so I opted for the short lenses for a lot of the time. I posted a album of photos from this day on my (personal) Facebook page, but I thought I’d post some up on the blog. (its good for the search engines) Enjoy!

Shane Burn


Phil Goodrich

To view the rest of the photos from this post, click here!

Few more from Earl… C-Street Wrightsville Beach, NC

Not gonna post the whole batch cause they’re not that great. I didn’t get out there until late thursday night, so the the sun was already hiding, therefore the shots are a little on the grainy side. But just to show the size.




Hurricane Earl Swell – Masonboro Island, NC

Went over to Masonboro Island on Wednesday night, August 01, 2010 to catch the first signs of swell from Hurricane Earl. The wind wasn’t cooperating as much as we had hoped, but there were definitely some bombs coming through. I stayed out shooting photos well past sunset, so you will notice a loss of quality towards the end of the gallery. Click on the post title above to view the whole batch.




For more photos please click here or click on the post title above.
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2010 Reef Sweetwater Pro Am Surf Fest – Wrightsville Beach, NC – July 17th

Made it out on saturday to shoot some action from the Reef Sweetwater Pro Am Surf Fest at Wrightsville Beach, North Carolina. Couldn’t make it on sunday to catch the finals, but congrats to Michael Powell for taking the win and Ben Bourgeois for taking second. Heres a handful of shots from saturday. Also be sure to check out the full gallery here.