The web clip is surfing’s answer to our ADHD-addled, surf-obsessed brains, a saltwater ekphrasis of sorts.
In the age of the Internet, the web clip has become the primary window between high-performance surfing and the surf community. No other media form offers a more succinct, immediate display of the sport’s progression. Few other subjects lend themselves to the camera as wholly as surfing does.
The web clip has given us the Flynnstone Flip, epic Pipe drone poetry, and it even got Nick Rozsa his sponsor back, all the while exponentially pushing surfing’s limits. Meanwhile, the highlights from most WSL events would barely make Marine Layer’s B-sides (may it rest in peace). The web clip is surfing’s answer to our ADHD-addled, surf-obsessed brains, a saltwater ekphrasis of sorts. In honor of this inviolable art form, I bring you my top five web clips of all-time. Disagree? Let the debate begin.
5. “INDONESIA,” featuring Julian Wilson
Date published: November 25, 2012
Production: Kai Neville Studios
Music: “Indian Hills” by Mood Rings
The barrels, the bombs, the blue… In a web clip as vivid in color as Julian is on an open face, Mr. Wilson paints a masterpiece of spray upon a seemingly boundless supply of cerulean canvases. No frills here, nor nonsense. Any non-surfing image is brief, well-composed, and compelling, adding richness to the montage as a whole. As to be expected with any Kai Neville offering, the production value is elite, not to mention 4:13’s backside barrel-to-finner-reverse-to-sushi-roll. 20-point ride?
Highlights: 1:20, 1:31, 2:24, 2:46, 3:01, 3:28, 4:13
4. “Craig Anderson Moments,” featuring Craig Anderson
Date Published: April 3, 2012
Production: Quiksilver
Music: “Emancipator” by First Snow (Ooah Remix)
The most unapologetic corporate advertisement to make the list, Quiksilver’s second Ando installment in the “Moments” video series had to be special to overcome its branded veneer. And it was. Product placement aside, this clip transports the viewer to an Indo fever dream replete with glowing waves. Ando’s effortless style punctuates those waves, whether he’s sliding through tubes on a big red single fin or throwing backside-double-grab-air-reverses on screaming rights. This clip is also significant in that it popularized the Hypto Kypto, Haydenshapes’ paradigm-shifting “one board quiver.” In the video’s climactic sequence, Ando’s silhouette glides across a blinding green Desert Point wall to the touch of piano keys. The lines he draws are the love letters he leaves behind. Read them at the peril of your heart.
Highlights: :17, :40, :52, 1:06, 1:59, 2:25, 2:50
3. “Fiji Vignette 3/3” featuring Taj Burrow and Jay Davies
Date Published: November 20, 2011
Production: Riley Blakeway
Music: “Frequency” by Unouomedude
Garnering over 890,000 views and a Vimeo Staff Pick honor, Riley Blakeway’s finale to the Fiji Vignette series attains to cinematic eminence and transcends the surfing web clip genre. In “3/3,” Blakeway uses helicopter footage to create a vantage point from which to marvel at the ecstatic dance between man and wave below. The viewer glides along with Taj and Jay as they tear through sheet-glass Fijian pulses. This is surfing in all its profundity. This is surfing as seen through the eyes of God (if you’re into religious metaphors).
Highlights: :50, :58, 1:20, 1:52, 2:07
2. “Excerpt,” featuring Dane Reynolds
Date Published: March 12, 2012
Production: Marine Layer Productions
Music: “Evening” by TOPS, “Underground” by Ariel Pinks Haunted Graffiti
“Excerpt” might just be the best clip that Dane has ever dropped, and, as the man who popularized the form, that’s saying something. With this, he staked an emphatic claim to the freesurfing throne (however reluctantly). His style is unmistakable. It’s exhausting yet efficient. Savage yet controlled, Dane seems ever-balanced on a tightrope somewhere between bending physics and digging rail. This is Dane’s signature clip in which we wonder, jaw agape, at the trademark vicious flare of surfing’s creative genius. To put it simply, no one makes surfing look cooler than Dane does, and no web clip captures his brilliance like “Excerpt.”
Highlights: :19, :38, 1:15, 1:24, 3:02, 4:40, 5:32
1. “KELLY RESTAURANTS X,” featuring Kelly Slater
Date Published: August 2011
Production: Riley Blakeway
Music: “WAY TOO MUCH” by SNEAKPEEK
An obscure clip of King Kelly shot and edited by Riley Blakeway tops the list. Unavailable on Vimeo and with only 15,000 views on YouTube, “KELLY RESTAURANTS X” tells the story of a single, blissful Fijian session by perhaps the greatest surfer ever to live. Brilliantly shot and colored, Blakeway’s edit is at once concise, elegant, and understated—not unlike like Slater’s performance in the clip. Fluid, seamless, and inspired… this is surfing in a dream. These are the halcyon days, and they were over before you even realized they had begun. This clip doesn’t make us want to surf; it makes us need to surf.
Highlights: Just watch the damn thing.
