Below the 
breaking waves, ocean culture life

Matt Porteous documents his passion for the ocean by capturing the beauty below the breaking waves. Dynamic flow, colour, vision, depth of field and charm all contribute to Matt’s photographic perspective.

Interview by Steve England Photos by Matt Porteous

Having grown up along the rugged coastline of Jersey in the Channel Islands, Matt has surfed, dived and swum his way into a peaceful and respectful relationship with the sea. His first yellow, underwater Minolta accompanied him everywhere. It was through that simple lens that he learnt to capture the sublime beauty of nature.
What Matt photographs, perhaps, is a sense of freedom and a sense of adventure. His latest project Ocean Culture Life, built from passion alongside a friend and ocean filmmaker Googsi aims to form an ecosystem of oceanographers, free divers, surfers, filmmakers, lifeguards and ocean dreamers whose lives have been shaped by the sea. In short, OCL is a global community of positive ocean storytellers who collaborate on various projects. OCL’s team creates thumb stopping content for their network of ambassadors and charities, collectively spreading awareness on all things ocean related.
We caught up with Matt to discuss Ocean Culture Life and how he plans to harness the power of the ocean to nurture a meaningful connection between mankind and nature.

“The more we all 
understand the ocean, the more we appreciate and want to protect it”

What inspired you to take the camera beneath the surface?
It’s a world that many are afraid to explore and most don’t take the time to view. It fascinates me every time I step into the water.

What’s so different about shooting underwater?
The freedom you feel, a meditated state with open eyes looking up from below the surface resembles a fast moving storm of change above. I find it hard to feel this relaxed anywhere but in the ocean. Even after hundreds of immersions, every time I descend to capture my surroundings I am arrested by that same sense of wonder and humbleness.

How does your lifestyle inspire you?
When you’re born on an island and you grow up on its shores, the ocean shapes you. You gain a certain respect for the ocean, a respect and love that only people connected with the ocean can truly understand.

Why is OCL central to what you do?
I work in a busy commercial world, my ocean life has always been my release, a personal love. I’m passionate to focus my time creating art that I feel passionate about and hopefully touching the hearts of people with the same love. There’s too much negative energy in the world, I feel motivated to create something positive.

What’s inspired you to dedicate so much of your time to a project with no clear profit?
I recently heard a quote “ There are two important days in our lives. The day we are born and the day we realise why”
My work is built on passion not money, I first wanted to share what I see with the world, now I want to invite ocean storytellers to join and share their stories with the world. Helping shine light on ocean ambassadors and projects along the way.

What is on the agenda for you and OCL this summer?
We’re currently organising a local event here in Jersey which aims to celebrate World Ocean Day. We have invited anyone with a love for the ocean to St.Ouens bay for a night walk to shine a light on change. This is all about supporting local charities, conservationists and whoever shares a similar respect for the ocean. We plan to use the content captured on this day to highlight World Ocean Day moving forward and hopefully inspire local communities around the UK to get involved and host their own awareness event.

Who are your ambassadors and what’s their involvement?
Our ambassadors are a network of like minded individuals who all share a common love for the ocean. They are freedivers, lifeguards, filmmakers, fishermen, photographers, ocean conservationists, charity founders, journalists and entrepreneurs. We may not have the same occupations, religions or even locations but we all share the same respect for one thing… our oceans. Which is why we all depend on OCL to become the platform to collaborate and support hot topics, pressing issues and help steer change to healthier oceans.

Where does your funding come from?
Money raised from print sale’s, merchandise and corporate sponsors are all put back into funding OCL projects, capturing powerful content which tells a story. Each item of OCL merchandise holds a token value which individuals can award to their chosen OCL cause via our website. The token scheme allows us to record which topic our community would most like us to support with our award winning content. All profit is then injected back into creating content for our ambassadors and charities.

What motivates you to continue doing what you’re doing?
The privilege to share our experiences with the world how OCL observes, records and celebrates the cultures of the oceans with communities and our audiences. What better than working in the vast oceans to highlight issues, bring them to the surface and make a difference in restoring healthy oceans?
Telling the ocean’s story with all its wild power and beauty is what drives us on, that’s how our project Ocean Culture Life started. The more we all understand the ocean, the more we appreciate and want to protect it.

Follow Matt on Instagram here 
Check out what they are doing and get involved at oceanculture.life

Skindog On The Ranch

The middle of california is one big farm. that and kelly’s mad wave pool. ben skinner has just become the first brit to ride it…

Interview by Steve England Photos courtesy WSL

As we go to press the Surf Ranch Pro is on. Just before the CT crew took over the joint for the big show the WSL invited some of the world’s top longboarders for a test session. Ben Skinner was one of the golden ticket holders who got the nod and so becomes the first British person to ride Kelly’s tub. Steve England racked up the phone bill calling Ben in California as he waited for the Relik longboard event at Trestles to start.

So how was the Ranch?
It was insane. It is actually even better than it looks. Obviously, it takes a few waves to work it out, and I didn’t have too many, so I can only imagine how much better it is once you get it totally dialled. The people there were amazingly welcoming and just made the experience even better.

How did the invite come your way?
Basically, through the WSL, They wanted to start bringing longboarding to Kelly’s wave, and I was one of four lucky men to get the call. Thank you WSL!

How many waves were you allowed to ride?
I caught four rights and three lefts, and then poached a few waves through the session which was a fun part of being there. If someone fell in front of you, then you go!

What board did you ride? Did you have to shape one up for it?
Well, I wanted to make something for the wave to try and fill its full potential on the nose, off the tail and in the tube. So I made a board similar to what I ride in hollow waves, but with more of a nose for nose riding. It felt great.

How does the wave compare to Wavegarden? Lining it up, catching it and power wise?
The power and speed are the first things you notice. You are definitely going faster and the wave as a real punch to it. Catching it is very similar, in fact, a little bit easier because of the extra power of the wave. They basically tell you to line on pole 21 and wait. The wave comes to you.

The power and speed are the first things you notice

What are the sections like? I heard they can change one to make it more doable on a longboard.
The hardest part about surfing the wave is reading the sections. On a normal wave you can see ahead of you what is going to happen, whereas, on Kelly’s wave, you just have to know where to be because it happens right under you. But yeah, they have a lot of different settings, that part was mind-blowing. So we got to choose between two different settings, ‘CT2′ and ‘CT3′. One has the two barrel sections, and one has more of a wall with the barrel at the end. Pretty insane!

Looks like a little step in the barrel section that could be tricky as the bottom drops out?
Yeah for sure, that is what I was saying that it literally happens underneath you. If you’re not in the right spot, you miss the barrel, or you lose the whole wave.

How did Harley and the other longboarders find it?
Loved it. The boys smashed it. Harley and Taylor were standouts to me.

Did you see the air section in effect? How was that?
Yeah, watched Pat G hitting it quite a lot, it looks good, but again, its all about timing.

You can follow Ben on Instagram here

The Tom Kay Interview

In 2003 a young chap named Tom Kay had an idea to make a surf brand. He named it after an area on the shipping forecast that many surfers of the time used to listen to. It was a transfixing, wondrous thing, especially when you heard it late at night. You should listen if you haven’t. Much like the skippers listening to the forecast Tom has been at the helm of his brand, sticking to his course through storm and calm, refusing to be swayed by currents. This year Finisterre is 15-years old, employs 60 staff and, holding true to it’s founding principles, has become one of the UK’s few B Corp companies.
Steve England caught up with Tom to find out more.

Interview by Steve England Photos courtesy of Finisterre

So you took the big step of becoming a B Corp company. What is this and why is it important to you?
Yes this was a big moment for us. It takes nine months to become certified and B Corp stands for Benefit Corporation, the aim of B Corp certified businesses is to use business as a force for good. To become a B Corp we underwent a rigorous assessment process that looks at every area of the business. You’re scored against strict criteria, from your operational footprint (our C02 emissions and environmental impact of our business operations in general), to labour conditions throughout the supply chain (ensuring that our suppliers meet regular quality assurance reviews or audits around third party social and environmental standards) as well as accountability and transparency (ensuring that we are open and honest about how we operate as a business e.g. allowing customers to easily find out where stuff is made and what it’s made from). If you exceed their rigorous standards, you become B Corp certified. For me an important part of becoming a B Corp was that we had to alter our articles of association (logged at company’s house), meaning we have a legal commitment to a responsibility towards our environment, people, suppliers and communities.

“At the moment we seem to be at a turning point with marine plastics”

What kind of sustainable goals have you had to build into the business to achieve this?
We didn’t have to build any in; sustainability is part of our founding purpose and is what we’ve been doing for since 2003. Achieving B Corp certification is both a recognition of this, as well as giving us areas for us to work and improve on as a business – things we are already starting to put into place.

Now you’ve achieved it, what’s the biggest lesson you have learned over the 15 years in business?
It’s all about keeping momentum, you have to be able to work it out as you go along.If you wait for everything to perfectly line up you will miss it – six or 7/10 is good enough to go for it!   At the moment we seem to be at a turning point with marine plastics, yet every day on the news I see really mind numbing reports of human stupidity in business, politics and race/religion. Where do you think we are at as a race in the bid to save ourselves from ourselves? Yes there’s a lot of depressing stuff out there; I’d like to think of myself as a realistic optimist. By this I mean I don’t think there’s going to be some magic wand that will solve all these problems, but if organisations, activists, scientists, politicians and businesses really work collectively, I do believe we can effect change – we need to get on with it though! I think you’re going to see businesses play an even more important role in this, but people have to get involved, pick their battles and fight for what they believe, then get others to do the same. I guess the empowering thing is that anybody can get involved.

In the surf business there are certain companies trying to take a lead and drive past fast fashion into sustainable production models that achieve fair trade, fair wages right through the production chain. Do you think this is having an effect?
This is really great to see and something that Debbie, our product director, works on and has done for many years. Companies have to take a stand and let customers know what is going on. It’s then up to the customer to decide whether this a company that they want to buy from as it aligns with their values, or not buy from because it isn’t transparent and cannot answer such questions.  

So when you first set up I said “Never discuss business down the beach” because your local has to be somewhere you can escape the 9-5. Do you think I was right, and do you manage to escape the 9-5, or do you always feel responsibility, or have things about business on your mind.
Ha, ha, I remember that and it’s something that has stuck with me! Yes I do think you were right (thanks)! I really value my time in the water, and often I really do escape and switch off. I’ll get in even when it’s not that good and always try and appreciate the fact that I can just get in the sea.

What has been the funniest moment you can think back on in your time at Finisterre?
I can remember laughing a lot on our early trips to Scotland, Norway, Ireland; we were a small, tight crew that knew each other like brothers. They were great times that I hold close; we were really flying by the seat of our pants. Getting Carlos Burle as our first ambassador was pretty funny. Ernie and I hired a van, picked him up from the airport, collected Al Mackinnon from a train station somewhere and we all drove to Ireland. I can remember Carlos asking how big the company was and we replied “You’re looking at half of it!” I think he thought there were 100 people in the business…he was a top 10 big wave surfer that had come from Brazil! But he couldn’t have been a cooler and more down to earth guy – we got some great waves.  

What is in your quiver?
A 5’6’’ Gulfstream Skipper, a 5’8” Omni and a 6’8” bonzer egg for those bigger Cornish days! All pretty fast and fun boards for most of the waves we get down here.

How is the wetsuit recycling programme going?
The more I hear about our wetsuits the more dread I have. Like neoprene is so widely used  (In cars, industry etc) more than I ever imagined, and people have tried to recycle or upcycle for a long time, but all that neoprene is still with us. Is there a chemical recycling solution? It’s early days still but something (as we know!) I’m pretty into. Our outlook is to use innovation to achieve a sustainability agenda, as well as making wetsuits that really last. I’m pretty sure we have the only full time wetsuit recycler in the world and her brief is simple – to find a way to make wetsuits from wetsuits and introduce closed loop manufacturing into the wetsuit industry. The environmental footprint of neoprene is huge and something that we need to do something about – potentially 380 tonnes a year into landfill in UK alone – and that’s only surfing! We are working with a professor of materials re-engineering department at Exeter University to help us look at all possibilities, including looking at radical alternatives to neoprene. The first stage is always to think about recyclability as early as possible in the design process. We’re planning on testing a run of recyclable wetsuits this Autumn.  

Where do you go next?
It’s strange, I’ve been doing this now for 15 years and it feels as if we are only just getting going! There is so much we can do in terms of innovating around more sustainable ways of making product, as well as better ways of running the business and using it as a force for good.

Follow Finisterre on Instagram here 

How a young man in Victoria invented an industry giant… in his garage.

How a young man in Victoria invented an industry giant… in his garage.

Pretty hard to believe but Quiksilver started out in a garage. Just one of those amazing stories of surfers using creativity to make surfing easier and of course to put off getting a real job and allow them to chase more waves.
It all started in 1968 in a small garage in Torquay, Australia when Alan Green started making wetsuits with Rip Curl and moved on to sheepskin boots for surfers in the cold surrounding waters. He had a $2500 loan from his dad and soon after he began experimenting with designs to create the perfect boardshort – a decent short to surf in — built and designed for surfing. Up until then, surfers had to make do with bulky, heavyweight trunks that led to rashes and limited their performance in the water.
“When we started designing the first Quiksilver boardshorts, we just wanted to make them better than the others. I suppose you could say that was our first mission statement, except that we didn’t know what a mission statement was!”

“We” was me and two mates, Carol McDonald from Ocean Grove and Tim Davis from Torquay. It was the start of the last summer of the 1960s; the hippie movement was all over the mainstream news and, in our little world, the summer psyche was all-pervasive. Surfboard design was progressing in leaps and bounds, making them more manoeuvrable and manageable. Jet travel was almost affordable and you could even run a car, as long as your mates waxed the petrol (or, as in my case, your Nanna gave you wheels for your 21ST!).
“Indo was being whispered around, and the best surfers were starting to travel, chasing the seasons. There was a total buzz about surfing, and for me it was quite simple: I wanted to build my life around it. So we made boardshorts.”
Alan’s wife Barbara was reading a novel when she came across the word ‘quicksilver’ describing something as; elusive, liquid, mercurial, changing readily – and she thought that sounded similar to what Alan was trying to do with the company. John drew the cresting wave and snow capped mountain inspired by a famous Japanese woodcut depicting a tsunami wave and Mt Fuji. Quiksilver was born.
In 1973 after tinkering with wetsuit components, velcro strips and metal snaps the world’s first technical, purpose built boardshort was created.

“We sometimes get credited with designing the first “technical” boardshort, but the truth is, we used snaps and Velcro instead of flies because I’d bought a supply of them when I started making Rip Curl wetsuits. (And, although Carol was a bloody good seamstress, maybe she didn’t know how to do flies!)
“The yoke waist, which was higher at the back than the front, was the other difference; they hugged your back and still hung low on your hips. They were distinctive, functional, comfortable boardshorts, and two-toned yokes made them different from the rest. Surfers seemed to like them.”
“Our first customer in the world was the Klemm-Bell surf shop in Gardenvale, Melbourne, and a few months later, their branch in Torquay. Reg Bell was a good mate of mine, and after rejecting my offer of a partnership in the wetsuit company that became Rip Curl, he felt like he owed me one. Anyway, they sold like stink, and soon I was driving up and down the coast, supplying every surf shop I could find in between surf sessions. It wasn’t a bad life. You made the shorts, you went out and sold them, then you started again. It was a lot easier than it is now!”

Green went into business with John Law, another local surfer and by 1975 Quiksilver products were being sold all over Australia. In 1976 Jeff Hakman won Bells and looking for a way to fund his surfing lifestyle negotiated an agreement to sell Quik in the States along with Bob McKnight. In 1983 the brand was distributed in Japan, 1984 Europe, SA and Asia. A listing on the stock market in the US followed. In 1988 the brand made history by signing Tom Carroll, the first surfer on a million dollar contract. By 1995 Quiksilver was turning over $174 million. By 2004 it was a billion dollar company. So 30 years from garage to mega brand.
Along the way the company funded The Quiksilver Crossing – the voyage of the Indies Trader, Young Guns films, sponsored The Quiksilver Eddie, the Quiksilver Masters, Men who ride mountains… Danny Kwock, Tom Carroll (above), Lisa Anderson, Kelly Slater (below), Steph Gilmore and supported a huge global team chasing their dreams through the ’80s, 90s and 00s.

In 2006 Green said, “Quiksilver has given me a great life so far. The thing about this company is that it’s never been about one person, not in the beginning, not now. None of us ever believed that the brand should be guided by individual, stand-alone intelligence. Quiksilver has evolved through interaction of a group of five or six people who think globally and act locally and rule the brand through rough consensus. And I mean “rough,” because if you agree with everything that’s going on everywhere, then you’re not contributing much.”
Despite all this Green and Law remained underground to the point where they almost canned their book “The Mountain and The Wave, The Quiksilver Story.” because “We didn’t think it was such a cool move to write a book about ourselves and then promote it at the time.”
At the time of writing Green was apparently still loving life to the fullest and was on a boat surfing somewhere tropical with his friends. Not bad for 71!

Photos: Courtesy Quiksliver

Far Field,  Free Friction

Interview by Steve England Photos by Billy Cervi

Every now again you get a random “Wait, what…?” shot through the email that stops you in your tracks. A bottom turn by 24-year old WA resident Jordan Rodin, on a finless craft, did just that this month. He’s full tilt, laid over, only the last third of rail left in the water for drive on one of Derek Hynd’s Far Field Free Friction designs. How did he do that, what was going on? Steve England found out…

This is what I love most about Free Friction Surfing; there are no shortcuts!

So, that’s pretty much the best bottom turn shot I’ve seen since Hynd went on our cover … How do you keep the board in the water when you are so on edge?
Oh wow, big call Steve! Thank you! Well speed and momentum is a great sticky thing. The speed of free friction off the bottom is so great once you lay your board on rail and hold it in the right line there is no slip. The rail sticks to the wall of the wave through speed and carry.

What made you take up FFFF?
At the time I just forgot my fin one day down at the beach, but I believe I was bored with my surfing and it happened organically. 

A lot of groms have got into the friction free vibe since mini-foamies came out. What advice do you have for anyone who wants to take it up technique wise. Have you got any magic shortcuts?
This is what I love most about Free Friction Surfing; there are no shortcuts! I spent the first six months of free friction eating shit, but I would say minimize everything you do on the wave and just trim.

I read the only down fall is you can’t go backhand so well on these craft. Is that so, if so why?
In my opinion backside has a high and low. It works wonders when the waves are hollow and you can adopt a tradition pig-dog stance, but when the waves are flatter rails and get sticky and easy to slip. I took a trip north last year up to Red Bluff to learn more about backside and I proved myself wrong on what you can pull off, which was exciting. I think that’s the future for FFFF. 

On the other side of the coin foils have started to raise their heads and it seems riders are describing a friction free feeling too. Have you had a go?
No, I haven’t those things look really scary ha ha! And I don’t think I even have a wave around West Oz that would suit it. It’s all pretty dumpy around here, but I can imagine the glide speed would be insane. 

Can you ride these things in deep pits. You must really have to have Jedi skills to keep an edge behind the curtain?
Yeah, you can ride the barrel for sure both frontside and back. It’s more the right style of wave you have to look for, rather than snap stall or arm drag in them. You want to backdoor the section and use the FFFF speed to your advantage.

Do you ride these all the time now? The only minus I would see is that it is fun to fully extend on a bottom turn, and actually getting air, which I think you were really good at, is pretty fun too, but your probably not going to do many of these without fins?
I have been riding without fins now for a little over a year, as far as airs go not really, I have landed minuscule airs off reverse sections but would never call it an air. I am just happy going really fast ha ha. 

Have you gone FFFF at the Box or North Point?
Yeah I have surfed North Point a bunch of times, never huge, but a fun size. I definitely want to try some more days out there. I haven’t popped the Box cherry yet.

What is in your present quiver, I guess its pretty interesting, why do yo like each board and which boards do you ride most of percentage wise?
I’m lucky enough to have three FFFF crafts in my quiver: a fish, shortboard and a step up. All under Derek Hynd’s name and helped by Des Sawyer and Mike Myers. Lately I have been enjoying the fish. There’s something about going really fast on a bigger wave with a small board you can’t beat!

What is the key to a good FFFF board?
Hard rails and no short cuts!

18 surfers from WSL to take top places in Olympics

Down the bottom of the latest WSL press is a vital pice of info for most the worlds Olympic surfing hopefuls. WSL surfers will take the top 18 slots…

“The 2019 WSL CT will be the primary Tokyo 2020 Olympics qualification avenue for the world’s best surfers. The world rankings at the end of the 2019 CT season will determine 18 of the 40 places at the Olympic Games (10 men and 8 women). The remaining 22 places will be determined at the 2019 and 2020 ISA World Surfing Games, the 2019 Pan American Games in Lima, and a single slot (each for men and women) for the host nation, Japan.”

“Of these 18 places determined by the WSL, there is a maximum of 2 men and 2 women for each country (e.g. if there are 3 women from Australia in the Top 8, only the Top 2 female Australians will qualify).”

So 22 places up for grabs in the ISA World Games. You can do the maths on that one….