It is already being touted as what will be the best photo of the 2024 Olympic Games: the seconds after surf star Gabriel Medina has ridden the biggest wave of the day in Teahupoo, Tahiti, to secure the largest-ever individual surfing score in Olympic history – a moment immortalized by French photographer Jerome Brouillet.
Yet it’s not the photo of Medina inside the barrel of the wave doing his thing that went viral, but when he exited the wave, celebrating the feat with an eye-catching kick-out, a moment that photographer Brouillet was ready for.
The almost surreal but entirely real photo of Medina nonchalantly floating in the air, aligned perfectly alongside his surfboard, has millions of likes on Medina’s Instagram and will go down not just in Olympic, but in surfing history too. But how did all the elements combine to make this photo, and how did Brouillet capture it?
“Preparation, devotion, timing, and a touch of luck”
In keeping with the sport, the story behind the incredible photo is actually more about feeling than technical elements. However, for the technically minded, we know Brouillet shoots with a Nikon Z9, one of the best cameras for photography.
And despite the speedy Nikon Z9’s ability to shoot at a rate of 20fps in RAW and JPEG format with continuous autofocus and autoexposure, which can be upped to 120fps when shooting cropped JPEGs, the viral image was, in fact, one of only four photos of Medina catapulted into the air.
In humble fashion, Brouillet says that capturing the moment was a matter of “preparation, devotion, timing, some experience and a touch of luck.”
As you can see in a short sequence of images shared by Brouillet on Instagram (above), he had been photographing Medina surfing the gigantic wave. But even when the surfing action had finished, Brouillet knew his job wasn’t done.
Brouillet is an experienced surfing photographer who has done his homework: Medina is known for exciting tricks, like the now infamous superhero-like kick-out, and Brouillet was primed to capture it.
“I and the other photographers on the boat were supposing he [Median] was going to make a kick-out, and that’s what he did. He is at the back of the wave, and I can’t see him, and then he pops up, and I took four pictures, and one of them was this one. It was not hard to take the picture. It was more about anticipating the moment and where Gabriel will kick off the wave.”
Brouillet was prepared and had the right camera gear, but that doesn’t guarantee success. He couldn’t have imagined how he would freeze Medina in time, perfectly aligned with the surfboard and seemingly relaxed despite the terrifying speed at which he is flying through the air.
What’s striking is that Brouillet, with virtually no time to react, was able to shoot only four images despite toting a pro sports camera, one of which has gone viral. That’s the slice of luck, and we’re the lucky ones that fortune was with him that day.
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