All Board Shots by James Frost

Art: Brodie Bannerman

Nathan Henshaw Photo

Matthew Mollison Photo

Team Rider: Steven Pogson

Jack Kavanagh Photo

Morelife Media Photo

Nathan Henshaw Photo

Matthew Mollison Photo

The red board I am riding in this photo features heavily in this look book. It was one of four Totem Brand bodyboard prototypes made by Nick Mesritz. After three or four emails requesting different aspects of design, Nick melded those ideas into an amazing shape and high performance ride for me to test. All this movement towards getting boards made came about because good mate Will Black and I had a plan to get a limited number of high end boards shaped under the Totem Brand name - mas-sive shout outs for this Will because he made these initial steps a reality. Anyways, a few weeks later we travelled down to Terrigal to meet with Mez and pick the boards up. It was a good couple of hours of discussion on industry matters and the history behind how the industry is were it is today. It was a real privalege indeed - Nick is truley a wealth of knowledge and upstanding guy. That afternoon another good friend James Frost met up with me to shoot some photo’s of the boards. The typical mod-ern day product shots tend to be a touch boring in my opinion. I miss the old school board reviews, they used to do the best ones in 90’s, on the beach and real life style. I always invisiaged a product shoot similar to those days and James just made the whole experience and shots epic - he is a true gent with amazing skills!

It was a touch surreal placing these boards on the rocks that I used to scramble over as a kid. Never in my wildest dreams would I have thought it possible to have boards with my own brand stamped on them. A day or two after the board shots were taken I got to testing the boards at Merewether beach which has been my local of late. I tried the board out in junkie 2ft waves and as with all good boards, it felt good in those conditions so I knew it would feel good in some juice. This day was made even more special because I decided to ride the red board with my daughter, who was 2 1/2 at the time. She had never caught a wave and if there was going to be a time this was it. I positioned her on the board and carried her out to waist height water. I waited for a wave and kicked on, riding it into shore. Her initial trepidation turned to ela-tion and well, the moment just seemed natural and I wasn’t filled with an amazing sense of achievement - it kinda was like how it was always going to be.

Even though the stock boards didn’t work out I approached Todd Quigley from QCD about helping me out. He was cool with everything and offered his expertise and business set up to help produce boards but infortunately in March 2013, he couldn’t do those any longer. It was gutting but all good things come to an end and thanks a heap to Todd for the opportunity. Life takes these directiona’ swings at one point or another and it’s in these times we learn to be intuitive across all aspects of our lives. It was diffucult trying to move on through the dissappointments and just let things be, not force anything, just do what I do and really tap into the ocean and family life.

I share this jounrey because I am proud to have learnt that, through these fluctuations I have never let go of what the ocean means to me and like many riders in my gen-eration, who still surf, I work tirelessly to keep that connection alive. The boards for me are about this connection, about being stoked on riding something new, some-thing a touch different and messing with ideas and passing that knowledge on. In relation to the boards and doing the company with it’s many facets and kinda putting myself out there at the front - I don’t pretend I am better than your average rider, rather I feel I am a good representation of that demogrpahic.

Just recently after re establishing a focus for the brand I approached a new manufacturrer for an opportunity to be involved and help out. Funnily enough it turns out they were thinking the same thing!! So - everything everyone worked so hard for is given new life. I can’t wait to move into 2014 with the boards being shaped by Glenn Taylor at Project Bodyboards. Before Totem Brand even started we had a good relationship. We’ve conversed a lot and seen eye to eye on a lot of aspects of board design, the industry as well as sharing the set backs. His current set up is as flexible and “corporate puppet” free as a business can be - thats fresh. I go into my 29th year on a bodyboard in 2014. I continue to put time in at the local breaks when it counts and have travelled to Hawaii 3 times in the last 10 years. I know my strengths as a person and these strengths have really developed through working on Totem Brand as a whole.

This brand has been born out of people giving their time, experitise and skills just to get things off the ground. This brand requires the best intentions of all those in-volved, its been a bumpy road and we’ve gotten to a point where the truthsayers are still down and willing to help. So these people need shout outs. I’d like to thank Matt Mollison and his dad Paul (Pat) Mollison for their support with the brand. In particular Matt for his surfing shots and for this shot of Josie and I together on the red board. Thanks also to James Frost and his wife Lauren for being so supportive with everything. Big thanks to Nathan Henshaw for his time in the water and letting me run these shots, same too for Michael Jones - without these two guys efforts in the water the bodyboarding scene would be nothing without them.. Huge shout outs to Jake Evans, Elliot Swift and John Welsh for producing amazing work for us. Keo Match for his passion and dedication for all things design and art - making things look dope in bodyboarding and just in general. Solid Bodyboarding Shop Crew - proud to ride with the bulls always and too Steve Pogson for sticking by and being the most patient person on earth - he’s our first team rider and we’re proud to show you his exploits and abilitie sona lid.

Boards are available as of November 11th, 2013 so contact Dan via totembrand@gmail.com for prices, colourways and design ideas.

THANKS FOR THE SUPPORT

ELMS MEDIA