The original 2014 concept behind the Apex campaign was to combine our love for street art, with the idea of bringing the board graphic into a larger than life format. We had South African Installation Artist Tim Goodman, interpret the Apex graphic onto a 3.6m x 3.6m "canvas" which we used as a backdrop. The photographer on this shot was Airush Marketing Manager Marc Schmid, his first major shoot behind the lens instead of directing. The rider was Oswald Smith, as a relatively new member of the team you can see his absolutely fearless approach in 1 foot of water.
For 2015, the evolution of the concept was developed by Graphic Designer Lucia Bosman; "I wanted the Apex Campaign to capture the essence of the board and thought the use of the mirrors would be the perfect medium to capture this feeling of movement, while showing of the graphic from multiple angles."
The result is one of more surreal action shots ever done, with photographer Ydwer van Heide having the challenge of triangulating Dutch freerider Bas Koole in both mirrors, while dealing with the light coming from all angles and still ending up with perfect composition.
The 2016 Campaign was the final attempt to take the concept to another level, by combining the complex angular shapes of the 2014 shoot with the mirror concept from 2015. The Challenge was aligning every single mirror as best as possible with the expected position of the rider. The wind provided huge challenges along with the weight of the wood backed mirrors, which are much larger than they appear in the final photo. As with previous campaigns, there is no photo tweaking to remove the lines molding each of the mirrors in place. The results of Ydwer’s photography capture the offset the sharp lines of the board and mirrors, with the incredible natural background of the Africa landscape and sky.