It seems everyone has a Gopro nowadays hoping to capture some nice action footage and photos, but some of you are getting disappointing results comparing to the amazing Gopro promotional videos. Surfing is one of those sports that lends itself to using a Gopro and you can get some amazing footage with it.

I thought I would share a handful of tips on how to get the best results from your Gopro while surfing.

Surfboard Mount

The Gopro surf mount is a must have if you want to capture some of your own surfing footage, you usually stick it onto the nose of your board and have it facing up at you. The main advantage of using this mount is that you can just leave the camera to record and you can concentrate on your surfing knowing that you are capturing some amazing images.

One of the nice features about the surf mount is that it is stuck onto the board twice, once with the actual clip and one is a tether. This means that if you happened to experience a rough bail and the board gets a good thrashing, the camera has two anchor points so if the clip slips off the tether will keep it secured.

GoPole

Using a gopole can get some really nice perspective and you can control where the camera is positioned. As most of the poles for the Gopro are adjustable, you can have the camera really close to show just the board and you amongst the water or have the camera far away to show the entire wave you are surfing!

Water Droplets

If you have any previous experience using the Gopro around the water you may have encountered the common occurrence of having little water droplets right in front of the lens and obscuring the shot. This can be a pain as sometimes when you look back at your footage you find that everything you thought was amazing footage is all ruined by a little drop of water. The easy fix for this is to lick the front of the lens, yes you heard right, just before you start recording or after the camera has just left the water give the front of it a lick and it should get rid of any annoying water droplets and leave the lens clean to record some awesome footage!

Anti-Fog Inserts

If you are surfing somewhere particularly cold or humid a common problem that can happen is that the Gopro housing will fog up. It can be very difficult to tell if this has happened until you look back at  your footage at discover that it’s all blurred because of the fogging up on the inside of the housing. A simple fix for this is to use fog inserts which are small pieces of moisture sucking material that you place in the Gopro housing which will prevent any fogging and keep your footage clear and clean.

Concentrating on the surfing vs the camera

When you first get your Gopro you are eager to rush out and try it, being a little too preoccupied with the camera and how its recording rather than what youre actually doing. This is a balance that you will have to figure out for yourself and it requires a different level of attention depending on which mount you are using.

The important thing to remember is that you may have to put in a bit of time in order to get the results you want. Just practise with the various techniques and you are bound to get some nice footage and amazing shots. It only takes a few small steps to get your Gopro results up to a good standard and you wont have to worry about these little issues ever again!