Big-wave surfer films inside monster barrel

A renowned big-wave surfer has braved a notorious south coast slab to capture world-first virtual reality footage inside a monster barrel.

Big-wave surfer Mark Mathews teamed up with film producer Michael Lawrence to get the amazing footage at The Right, a secret big-wave location off Denmark in WA’s south.

Mathews has been a regular surfer of The Right, but this ride almost ended in disaster.

Using Trigger 360 Technology, Mathews headed to The Right last Saturday with a waterproof camera rig.

The usually pumping swell at The Right didn’t start churning out big waves until almost sunset, but it was enough for Mathews to emerge with some breathtaking footage from inside a 5m wave.

Mathews caught the same massive wave as his friend and professional skim boarder Brad Domke, but midway through the ride Domke was sucked up by the wave in front of Mathews.

“The barrel at The Right is so big so I figured that there would be plenty of room for both of us,” Mathews said.

“It all happened so fast. I just remember coming into the wave and thinking ‘I’m on the perfect line here. There is plenty of room between the two of us’.

“Then I saw him struggling to deal with the water drawing off the reef as the wave was sucking up.”

Mathews relived the scary moment of Domke hanging in the wave above him as he powered through the monster.

“At that moment I was like oh no but I held my nerve and my line and just ducked as low as I could hoping he wouldn’t drop on my head,” he said.

“I saw his board fly by then out of the corner of my eye I saw him.

“It was like he was falling out of the sky. The scene was so strange a picture of it is tattooed in my head.”

Mathews posted two images of the “scary moment” on his Instagram page today, one gathering nearly 6000 likes.

To read more about the close call and see the incredible virtual footage, click here to visit the Garage Entertainment website

Garage Entertainment is planning to release more footage later this week.

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