RED Digital Cinema Announces Winners of REDirect Surf 2015

RED Digital Cinema and SURFER Magazine announced the winners of REDirect Surf 2015, a contest for 11 short surf films shot on revolutionary RED cameras. Aaron Lieber claimed the Grand Prize for his film “The Wild,” featuring Noah Beschen, earning him the RED EPIC DRAGON camera package worth over $50,000 he shot on during the competition.

Erik Knutson took home the Fan Favorite award for his film “Being a Surfer is Fun,” featuring John John Florence.  Awards were presented Monday night at the ArcLight Hollywood where all 11 films were screened to a packed house of filmmakers, athletes and special guests.

REDirect Surf was created to find the most unique and original surf short of the year. It’s a celebration of surf filmmaking and a nod to the technology being used these days to document surfing like never before. Responsible for the entire process of making their vision come to life, each contestant shot their film using EPIC DRAGON camera kits as well as REDCINE-X PRO’s post-production workflow to edit their film. Each camera kit consisted of an EPIC-M RED DRAGON with REDMAG 1.8” Side SSD, three 240 GB REDMAGs, DSMC Side Handle, DSMC Ti Canon Mount, and RED Touch 5.0” LCD—all packaged in Lowepro’s innovative DryZone 200 backpack to protect against the elements. G-Technology made sure that the post-production process was covered with both G-DOCK ev storage options for the footage.

“Working with RED to bring this project to life has been an incredible experience,” says SURFER Editor-In-Chief Todd Prodanovich. “With the help of RED’s state-of-the-art cameras, these filmmakers were able to raise the bar for surf cinematography and create truly unique and captivating films.”

This is the second installment of the REDirect series; RED and The Berrics joined forces early last year to launch the first ever REDirect showcasing the most renowned skateboarding filmmakers in the world.

“Once again, the submissions for this year’s REDirect competition exceeded our expectations,” says Jamin Jannard of RED Digital Cinema. “This year’s winner, Aaron Lieber, brought together gorgeous cinematography and subtle narrative to tell a beautiful story centered around surfing. A huge thank you goes out to all the filmmakers for the time and effort they put into their submissions. They really took surf filmmaking to the next level. Also to SURFER Magazine, who proved to be a vital partner on so many levels.”a