How can I be a figure that helps connect people back with the sea, basic elements, and the unitive light of nature, and how can I spread the thrill of the art of surf while helping spread the understanding that it is such an aesthetic and energetic delight at the same time?  It took me quite a bit of brain storming and imagination exploring to finally come up with a novel and sustainable idea that I can create and work with especially in this world of already oh so much rubbish and trinkets. So one night while listening to the rain and packing some things for the next days venture to the ocean I took a moment to just sit and enjoy the rain drop like symphony going on outside and the rich air sweeping through my apartment, and in that timeless moment I started spacing off at my surfboard leaning up against the wall looking gorgeous and all, and then the idea came outta of nowhere right from left field and struck me and I knew just what I should create and work with for our programs mighty 3d printing project which I decided then was gonna be surfboard fins. Which is perfect because there is a whole wave of youth that are really starting to want to clean up the sea and appreciate surf as a source of wisdom and aesthetic glory. For the late Tim Leary once wrote “you could almost say surfers are outcast mutants, throw-aheads of the human race”(surfermag.com, January 1978)  The idea of a fin is also ideal for me personally because Ive surfed since childhood and its always been such a zen like omega experience of magical clarity and heightened sensations. When Im out surfing or sheerly just playing in the sea I swear its like overdoses of satisfaction.  So I look forward to being able to have the technology which will enable me to give back to the surfing community with sustainable, and artistic fins.

Basically I want to print three different types of fins all for dealing with different waters, primarliy big waves called thrusters, cold water fins, and hard drive fins. Also I’m using orcas, sharks, humpback whales, and dolphins all for inspiration as to how to shape the ultimate fin design, so far it seems like orcas have the ideally evolved fins to try and shape and replicate my designs to be like. Its important to me as well that the fins have an artistic quality and touch, I really would like to put the Japanese aesthetic symbol the enso on each fin or do a little hand brushed calligraphy or perhaps even come up with a cool lightning bolt logo or some fractal designs and abstractions of color.

The fin is a simple and fabulous shape, and although surf is for play I feel creating my own eco friendly fin technology is rather important and at least has meaning to me and Im sure there are others out there who would agree. For surfing is great in the sense that it is for play, for isn’t  life like a cosmic joke anyways? Its a positive that it counters seriousness as well as fear and takes you out of mind and ego dualistic rubbish which allows people to have a complete encounter with life’s mystery where they can forget calendars and clocks and come back to sheer consciousness not the movement of thought. Like when Im on a wave I can’t help but get that feeling of all is one and one is all and that my body is and instrument for the cosmos and my brain a great reciever. In those moments I feel intrinsically pure and electric as can be and wholly receptive taking in all the incoming data and stimuli, but more than that it gives me sensations of sheer wholesomeness with the inexplicable which is great for to know the always so is to be illuminated.  The next few weeks I have with this project I look forward to quite so for its going to involve a lot of my own personal study as I set to design the supreme fin and continue to gather information on orca and other marine life’s fin style. Its going to involve a lot of experimentation to master the craft, and Im going to have to experiment a lot with tinker cad as well with enso and calligraphy painting.

“Not to sound too deep or weird, but I think that the times when you really appreciate surfing are the times you’re really sort of becoming one with nature. Surfing’s as raw of a sport as it gets”.(http://www.changemakrs.com/kellyslater)

After surfing the internet trying to collect some info as to who else is doing a similar project,  all that  I was able to discover was just a handful of people who made attempts on thingiverse. Which I suppose is a misfortunate fortune for me, due to I won’t have many people to connect and learn from, but this also means there basically is a wide open market when it comes to 3d printed surfboard fins, so hopefully I can craft a novel design and style that I can share with others in which they can than create with there own printer and means, and hopefully one day will all be able to just 3d print and customize our own boards right from our casa.

“surfing is an aesthetic style of the liberated self, and thats the hopeful model of the future” (quote source unknown)