Stab Magazine | Mark Mathews and virtual reality at The Right (feat. Brad Domke)

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

277 Views

Mark Mathews and virtual reality at The Right (feat. Brad Domke)

The sequence above is what happens when two of surfing’s biggest Internet hypebeasts meet. Mark Mathews, not content with the beating he was taxed during his last trip to The Right for a Stab concept shoot with Taj Burrow, recently returned to WA’s most infamous. This time, he had a Virtual Reality project in mind, hence the freaky 360 shots below. Brad Domke, surfing’s favourite skimboarder, was there too – hence the absolutely perfect in every way sequence above. But, let us allow Mark to describe the session, and how it came to be… “About a month ago, Michael Lawrence and the guys from Garage Entertainment brought me in and said they wanted to show me something. Without saying any more they just handed me this VR headset. I put it on, and I was totally blown away. All of a sudden I was transported to sitting at the edge of a lake, to flying a helicopter, to this beautiful villa in Europe within a matter of minutes. “It was crazy! Then I had the thought – ‘Wow, what if you could take someone inside a barrel with this?’ This was exactly the reaction the boys from Garage Entertainment wanted me to have. From that moment we were on a mission to make this happen. “It just so happened that two brothers, Bruce and Rob Allan from Triggar, had just built a waterproof 360 camera rig and were actually willing to let me hold it in a 15 foot wave. I’d hoped to test the camera in small barrels first but the first swell to pop up on the charts ended up being at the The Right and I just couldn’t help myself. Mark Mathews at The Right. Photo by Mark Mathews. “That day down at The Right the swell didn’t kick in until super late in the afternoon, so it was a race to get waves before the sun went down. I had a couple of average waves and it was already getting dark. My heart was sinking. “My friend Brad Domke (professional Skimboarder) was next in line when a bomb set reared up. He started to tow into it and I just couldn’t help myself. I yelled out to Phil Read my tow partner ‘Go, go! Tow me behind him.’ I’d seen footage of Domke making the the craziest waves lately so I figured there was a good chance he would make it. “The barrel at The Right is so big, so I figured that there’d be plenty of room for both of us. It all happened so fast. I just remember coming into the wave and thinking ‘I’m on the perfect line here. There is plenty of room between the two of us.’ Then I saw him struggling to deal with the water drawing off the reef as the wave was sucking up. Selfies just aren’t what they used to be. “At that moment I was like ‘Oh, no’ – but I held my nerve and my line and just ducked as low as I could hoping he wouldn’t drop on my head. I saw his board fly by then out of the corner of my eye I saw him. It was like he was falling out of the sky. The scene was so strange a picture of it is tattooed in my head. “Because I was crouching so low as I was coming out of the barrel my arm holding the camera caught the face of the wave and sent me spinning. By then the serious danger had passed and I was rolling around underwater laughing at the sight of Brad doing his mid air running man in the barrel! “The POV footage and 360 platform are so cool but I can’t wait until people get to put on the Virtual Reality headset and have this experience for the first time. I think it’s going to make a lot of people take up surfing… maybe not behind a skim boarder in 12 foot barrels though!” This is what it looks like (sans warps) prior to WA’s scariest hold-down. You can now watch some clips from Mark’s session (filmed by the gent himself) right over here.

news // Mar 8, 2016
Words by Stab
Reading Time: 3 minutes

The sequence above is what happens when two of surfing’s biggest Internet hypebeasts meet. Mark Mathews, not content with the beating he was taxed during his last trip to The Right for a Stab concept shoot with Taj Burrow, recently returned to WA’s most infamous. This time, he had a Virtual Reality project in mind, hence the freaky 360 shots below. Brad Domke, surfing’s favourite skimboarder, was there too – hence the absolutely perfect in every way sequence above. But, let us allow Mark to describe the session, and how it came to be…

“About a month ago, Michael Lawrence and the guys from Garage Entertainment brought me in and said they wanted to show me something. Without saying any more they just handed me this VR headset. I put it on, and I was totally blown away. All of a sudden I was transported to sitting at the edge of a lake, to flying a helicopter, to this beautiful villa in Europe within a matter of minutes.

“It was crazy! Then I had the thought – ‘Wow, what if you could take someone inside a barrel with this?’ This was exactly the reaction the boys from Garage Entertainment wanted me to have. From that moment we were on a mission to make this happen.

“It just so happened that two brothers, Bruce and Rob Allan from Triggar, had just built a waterproof 360 camera rig and were actually willing to let me hold it in a 15 foot wave. I’d hoped to test the camera in small barrels first but the first swell to pop up on the charts ended up being at the The Right and I just couldn’t help myself.

MM360_01

Mark Mathews at The Right. Photo by Mark Mathews.

“That day down at The Right the swell didn’t kick in until super late in the afternoon, so it was a race to get waves before the sun went down. I had a couple of average waves and it was already getting dark. My heart was sinking.

“My friend Brad Domke (professional Skimboarder) was next in line when a bomb set reared up. He started to tow into it and I just couldn’t help myself. I yelled out to Phil Read my tow partner ‘Go, go! Tow me behind him.’ I’d seen footage of Domke making the the craziest waves lately so I figured there was a good chance he would make it.

“The barrel at The Right is so big, so I figured that there’d be plenty of room for both of us. It all happened so fast. I just remember coming into the wave and thinking ‘I’m on the perfect line here. There is plenty of room between the two of us.’ Then I saw him struggling to deal with the water drawing off the reef as the wave was sucking up.

MM360_02

Selfies just aren’t what they used to be.

“At that moment I was like ‘Oh, no’ – but I held my nerve and my line and just ducked as low as I could hoping he wouldn’t drop on my head. I saw his board fly by then out of the corner of my eye I saw him. It was like he was falling out of the sky. The scene was so strange a picture of it is tattooed in my head.

“Because I was crouching so low as I was coming out of the barrel my arm holding the camera caught the face of the wave and sent me spinning. By then the serious danger had passed and I was rolling around underwater laughing at the sight of Brad doing his mid air running man in the barrel!

“The POV footage and 360 platform are so cool but I can’t wait until people get to put on the Virtual Reality headset and have this experience for the first time. I think it’s going to make a lot of people take up surfing… maybe not behind a skim boarder in 12 foot barrels though!”

MM360_05

This is what it looks like (sans warps) prior to WA’s scariest hold-down.

You can now watch some clips from Mark’s session (filmed by the gent himself) right over here.

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

Expect No Kiss, All Climax At The “World’s Most Perfect Pointbreak”

A Corona Cero Open J-Bay 2025 preview.

Jul 9, 2025

SEOTY: Liam O’Brien stars in ‘Friction of Perception’

"Hopefully I don’t come across like too much of a peanut."

Jul 8, 2025

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
Advertisement