Stab Magazine | Is Buying A Surfboard Online About To Get A Whole Lot Better?

Live Now — Episode 3 Of Surf100 Challenge Series Presented By Pacifico

359 Views

Is Buying A Surfboard Online About To Get A Whole Lot Better?

New tech to help you avoid those pesky surf shop lines.

hardware // Mar 4, 2020
Words by Stab
Reading Time: 2 minutes

Shopping online for a surfboard is no way to, well, shop for a surfboard. There’s no fondling of the rails. No balancing under the arm. No shop rat that thinks he knows more about what you’re looking for than you do.

Worst of all, you don’t get a free bar of wax when you buy it.

Alas, there is now a new technology that appears capable of improving the online experience and helping you pick out your next sled without leaving confines of your couch.

Huntington Beach shaper Jeff ‘Doc’ Lausch, who whittles under the label Surf Prescriptions, has been working with a company called Augmented Island Studios to make surfboard shopping as easy as pulling out your phone. Swipe down to keep reading…

Based in Portland, Oregon, Augmented Island Studios describes itself as a “creative AR/VR development studio…which serves the retail, entertainment, industrial, publishing, food and beverage and creative industries.” The CEO of the company, Enrique Sánchez-Rivera, is a former Surf Prescriptions licensee.

Using Google and Apple WebAR tech (still not sure what that means), Doc and Augmented Island Studios have bent the matrix to offer a full virtual reality, 3D view of the board you’re shopping for, without the use of those expensive head sets (all you need is your phone). 

Strictly for mobile devices, the prospective board buyer goes to SurfPrescriptions.com, selects the board they want to look at, and using their camera’s phone, a 3D rendering comes up right in front of you. You can walk around the board, check the rails, check the bottom contours. You can pretty much do everything but touch it. You don’t have to download an app or anything, it’s pretty much as easy as clicking and waiting for the image to load. 

The video shows Doc holding up one of his boards in front of Huntington Surf and Sport and it is pretty dang impressive. There’s another shot of a board hovering in a backyard patio…as if the user was bragging to his bros about the new stick he’s got on the way. There’s even a dog in it! Dog’s love surfboards.

I played around with the technology at home. I was skeptical at first, but the more I got used to using it the more the real-world applications became apparent. I actually had a lot of fun with it. I could easily see other big board brands like Firewire, Channel Islands or HaydenShapes picking up on this tech.

I’ll always relish the feel of resin and getting foam dust up my nose when I go in to order a board, but for those that do their surfboard shopping online, Doc and Augmented Island Studios are definitely onto something. It beats a few static photos of a board and offers a more accurate representation of what may actually show up in the mail. 

Comments

Comments are a Stab Premium feature. Gotta join to talk shop.

Already a member? Sign In

Want to join? Sign Up

Advertisement

Most Recent

10 Shapers To Watch In The Next 10 Years — Part One

“It’s like a drug empire, man. Cut the head off the snakes, and more will…

Jul 7, 2025

Mason Ho Joins Ritual Vision, Releases Remix Of Greatest Hits

Dion Agius riffs on the eyewear brand’s U.S. expansion, Ritualistic Tendencies, and the new stars…

Jul 7, 2025

Is It Time For A New Judging Format?

We have a modest proposal — a WSL head judge disagrees.

Jul 7, 2025

Luke Thompson Turns Last Year’s Priority Disaster Into Ballito Gold

+ earns himself a wildcard into Jbay.

Jul 7, 2025

Fiji Has Its First Professional Surfer, And He’s Unbelievable

16-year-old James Kusitino’s incomprehensible tube lounging leads to a deal with Former.

Jul 6, 2025

Laird Hamilton on The Limitations of Being a Purist, Invention vs. Ownership + Why He Never Had a Sticker Deal 

Untold stories from his How Surfers Get Paid interview.

Jul 4, 2025

Surf100 Challenge Series Presented By Pacifico: Episode 3

"The tribe has spoken," Dane Reynolds pronounced, and a surfer's torch was snuffed.

Jul 3, 2025

When Surfer’s Eye Is Actually Cancer

Erin Campbell's brutal journey from surf camp dreams to chemo drops, cryotherapy, and surgical horror.

Jul 3, 2025

Surfing’s 2025 Q2 Report

An assessment of surfing's vital signs throughout the second quarter of 2025.

Jul 2, 2025

What Actually Happened to Occy’s Mad Max Plunger Pool In Yeppoon?

Surf Lakes’ brass talks: internet hecklers, the unplugging of the plunger, and the Tom Curren…

Jul 2, 2025

Poor Goofy Foots 

Data shows that the world is stacked against goofs — they even make 15% less money than…

Jul 1, 2025

Britain’s First Wavepool Has Closed — What Really Happened?

Bankruptcy, social media hackings, debts unpaid — and yet, reopening looms.

Jul 1, 2025

Watch: Was Matt Meola’s Air Actually Better Than Hughie’s?

Watch the full Swatch Nines highlight reel and decide.

Jun 30, 2025

Houshmand Bludgeons Field To Win Second CT — Molly Picklum Tastes Blood, Snatches World #1 In Brazil

You can't argue with big surfing — that's Saquarema wrapped.

Jun 29, 2025

37 Years Old And World #1 — What’s Changed For Jordy Smith?

On rediscovering decades old surfboard templates, having a personality on the CT, and why this…

Jun 27, 2025

Tom Lowe Stars in ‘Let Me Live’

The wild, improbable ascent of Britain’s best big-wave surfer.

Jun 27, 2025

Saq Wrap: Italo Celebrates Mid-Heat, Griff Drops A Freestyle, Jordy + Yago Continue BBQing 20-YOs

Top seeds sow ruin, Final 5 starts to crystallize.

Jun 27, 2025

Surf100 Challenge Series Presented By Pacifico: Episode 2

Our seven surviving surfers confront an oddly large California beach break.

Jun 26, 2025
Advertisement