Blog

In early October, Gold Coast-based photographer Josh Bystrom thought his time on Namotu was up. He'd spent a month there as staff photog, caught a number of good swells, including one that Jack Robinson, Joao Chianca, and Yago Dora had flown in for, and was ready to head home. Yet one more swell appeared on the forecast, and word was Ethan Ewing was leaving his North Stradbroke home to catch it.

Every season there's one period where the swells just doesn't stop. Could be early November, could be late January. This year it was mid-to-late December, which perfectly overlapped with Josh's trip.

One Perfect Day

Songs have been sung about it, movies scripted, stories written. It's an idea flirting with cheeseball cliche, that threatens to undermine the idea itself and reduce it to the merely mundane. Then someone experiences it, sun up to sun down, just flawless, couldn't have been any better, and the celebration begins anew.

As a Gold Coast based surf photographer, trying to stand out in a heavily saturated industry is a difficult thing. Shooting from the water for me has become my niche with only a small percentage of photographers willing to risk life and limb bobbing in the impact zone during a swell for the shot.

Introducing our new segment ‘Behind The Lens’ – where we sit down with some of Queensland’s best surfing photographers and they talk us through some of their favourite images. We were lucky enough to catch up with Currumbin local Josh Bystrom as our first guest.

As I sit to write this - sunburned, with bloodshot eyes, and if I smile anymore my bottom lip will crack - I reflect back on what truly was an incredible few days of surfing.

Can you be in Fiji in a week? If so can you book by tomorrow and send me confirmation ASAP? It’s so rare to have everything fall into place, but when it does it can be a beautiful thing.

All of my photography and achievements (although somewhat minor) can be attributed to my late father, Chris.

We were on a chartered spearfishing trip with Benthic Ocean Sports in Destin, Florida approximately 40 miles out to sea.

When I was asked by close friend Nathan McNeil to accompany him photographing a car rally across Australia I thought ‘what do I know about cars, or even the country’. All I’d ever known during my Australian travels was visiting our vast coastline.

I was fortunate enough to get a double spread of Steph Gilmore in Issue #337 of SurfingLife magazine and humbled to get a mention from one of surfings greats. Below is an exert from the magazine from Steph.

The Australian is arguably Australia’s most established newspaper and I am fortunate enough to have been selected for their weekly “Heart of the Nation” photo award for my image, “And then there were two”.