Big/Small

Yahagi and the guys put up a small album of photos from the Fish Fry the other day, give 'em a look see!

Japan Fish Fry '10

My brother, his friend Kevin and I are going from their town, Tochigi, into Tokyo today so they can show me whats up in the city...so far I've learned that Japan kicks ass, and they have BY FAR the sweetest surf vehicles of anywhere.  they're everywhere, and I want to take one home!

Ah so!

VeloSimmin' all up on the front of Japan's Blue magazine, along with many other fine offerings!

I want a translated version of Blue, the photos and features that they do are great, I wish i could read Japanese because I'm pretty sure it's my favorite magazine in the world!

The fish fry yesterday went great, I met lots and lots of people and hung out with Tyler W. and Christian Wach for a bit, Tyler rode Yahagi's 1939 kookbox (the real kind) for a bit and drew quite a crowd of gawkers when they hit the water!  

Photos coming soon, I have to find a new cord for my camera, i forgot mine back home like a dork.........

FishFrying Overseas!

Hanging out in Japan for the week with Yahagi and the crew, fish fry is tomorrow and i'm reeeeeeally excited, the surf is absolutely pumping!  nice onshore wind, slight chop on the water and a heavy 1'-2' windswell with rain in the forecast...you're jealous!

EXXXTReme

right. on.

6'10 She

She Hull currently for sale at Shelter down in the LBC!

5 - 4 - 3 - 2 - 1

Off to Japan tomorrow!

5!

Happy 5th Birthday to PC!

Nick Cook, Hulling his life away...from Steve H.

Streaming Consciousness

It seems as though I haven't written anything of substance on here lately, so I'm not going to do so now.  But I will share a few upcoming events and things that are interesting me...

On monday I turn 24, that'll mark another year of my board building life since my first board was built on my 19th birthday...since then I've shaped nearly 400 boards, 39 of which happened in the last 2 weeks, all hand shaped, all glassed by me.  every board, every time.

And in comes my first interesting thing: I've been teaching a young (17 year old) friend of mine, Conner Lyon to glass for the past few weeks, he's been running between shops with me learning the ins and outs of a solid color lam job, cloth inlays, half and half colors, and countless resin dots.  I'm about ready to set him free on my boards so I can spend my time in the shaping bay as orders from all over the world are stacking up.  

...I guess I put myself in an odd corner when I decided to not let anyone glass my boards for the past 5 years...BUT, I wouldn't have done it ANY other way.  I can safely say that I know every inch of my shapes intimately and have ridden the sh*t out of them and fine tuned them to no end.  and to this date i've never disliked a single board i've made for myself or a friend or a customer, they all have something to offer and teach us about the water's movement and interaction with the planing surface of a board.

Which is my next point.  When is it ever enough?  For anyone, for an artist, where does the desire and the motivation come from?  I've been digging to find it, and in all honesty I don't think there is an end.  Every time I nail a shape exactly how I want it...the question is raised, "but what if I did THIS?!?!"  It seem to be an endless well of "what if's", which must be why my father paints like he does, each painting has a very similar look and feel but each is a tweak or different composition or different emotion to evoke from the handler, just like a surfboard.  It truly is a personal path of exploration...it just happens to end up in the hands of someone else when he or I is ready to hand it over and share the experience gained.

I didn't grow up in a pure surf community, I used to think that was bad for what I was falling in love with in my first year or two of board building.  Pretty quickly I found that it is a total blessing.  I'm free to explore my own brain and put my thoughts into shape.  I've always done things the hard way, and now I know I learned this on my own and I put my sweat and blood into what I sign my name on every day.

I feel like my work is more of a search through curiosity and exploration of the classic battle between form and function and I've found my muse particularly in hulls and the effects that their features can lend to everyday surfers and making it EASIER to surf, as opposed to what normal perception of hulls being hard to surf...

If you are the right type of person, stepping onto one will be second nature, pure flow and power.  Connection.  With the water, with the deck of the board, through the bottom and the rails, everything is connected and flowing.  Speed through MORE interaction with the water's surface than the idea of pumping to get OFF of the water; that doesn't sound like fun to me 90% of the time.

wow...I sat down to write about my birthday and my travels next week and ended up spewing out that...I guess I'll stop there.

Thank you all for everything you do for me, you keep food in my dog's bowl and foam in my shaping room.  and more than anything, you provide me with the link to my next step into my own curiosity.

-Ryan

PPE

Saturday afternoon sillies...Harry I's 5'3 kneeboard with a funky fresh glasson!

Turn Your Speakers WAY Up

Point Concept Surfboards from Fred Weston-Smith on Vimeo.

Bottoms Up!

9'4 Purps SPecial d.Bowls...  

...7'1 Half-tastic Vampire Hull...

...6'10 Mauve-ish Hullibut...

It's weekend time!

Baotyahrd

A brief collection of phone pics from this week so far, at PC headquaters...

........always keep your elements aligned.......

 ...and your doggy happy...

4 days 'till 24, 6 days 'till Japan!

Dove for Sale

G.K. is selling the original Dove up in santa cruz...check it!

http://sfbay.craigslist.org/scz/spo/1745432451.html

7'6ing

Custom 7'6 x 22 3/4" x 3 1/8"for Seay on the Eastern Seaboard...

I liked this one so much I shaped a 7'8 right after it for kicks...that board is going to be up for sale once its out of the glass shop!

Balsa Greenough

I made Peter a velosim a little while back, I saw him at Sacred Craft where he ordered a hull, then we missed crossing paths when I went out of town for a day and he drove through...this is what he wanted to show me.  His father-in-law's balsa bellyboard, cutsom built by George Greenough when they were young...what a peice of history this one is...by far the earliest GG board I've come across so far.

edit/add-on:

For historical reference, Greenough's general board progression went:

full balsa

balsa railed spoons

foam spoons (velo style)

then triplane designs

then edgeboards

...so this pre-dates Velo and any other GG spoon.

I'd Like To Help You...

...with your struggle to be free...

the first of many spoons to come out of my new mold.

5' to fit...and headed for Mollusk SF shortly.

I Know It Well

Weekend Warriors

But not in the traditional sense...putting full weeks + weekends in the shop has proven more than productive work wise, and less than productive in the social life aspect...but some good stuff has been going down within the red walls...

Hello Vengence, You Look Nice

6'10 Vampire/Hullibut mashup (this board: http://vimeo.com/11095613 )...also at Wetsand Surf Shop!

MMisc

here's your mid-day miscellania for the week:

Oh Shit

9'4" x 23" x 31/8" d.Bowls.

I can't say enough how in love with this board I am...And it breaks my heart, but possibly lightens yours to know than she's for sale.  And, its at WetSand surfshop down in Ventura, along with 3 other sticks that will be posted in the coming days :)

And for the LIFE of me I can't figure out punctuation this morning...not that I usually care but damn...This is pathetic.

6'10"

6'10" She Hull for Shelter Surfshop...the secret She-sauce is powerfully viewable and a little deceptive in these photos...if you don't see it, ride one!

and just wait 'till you see the glass job :)

Morg's Borg

Morgan Maassen's 5'5 TT Quad...Morg took almost 2 months to hand draw 100% of the art on this beauty, I was beyond blown away when he brought it back to me for glassing!

Giftwrapped Glitterati

My good friend Jonny P. and his new baby...Jonny's been wanting to get aboard a hull for a while now and he finally got a few waves on his friend's sled, we were on the phone nailing down his board before he was out of his wetsuit :)

I also wanted to throw out a quick thank you to EVERYONE who's been sending me emails for the past week and a half about the enjoyment of following my work here; it's my pride and joy sharing all the photos and info that I can.  The past couple of weeks have been really difficult to stomach but beyond productive and I coulnd't have asked for a better week to get all the notes you guys have been sending me!  What I post here is my life, my work and my friends...

so thank you for the encouragement...so much!

Happy Sukkaday!

My daily regimen for the past 2 weeks + now, I apologize for slow email response times...but there will be a sh*t ton of rad boards descending upon the PCProgBlog very, very shortly :)