Chairman of the boards

• Local shaper too busy to surf
• Film's plain-folk honesty appealing

By Wayne Harada
Advertiser Entertainment Writer

The new documentary "The ShapeMakers" takes a look at those who craft surfboards. Photos by Rebecca Breyer • The Honolulu Advertiser

Bill Hamilton is among the surfboard shapers in "The ShapeMakers," which premieres tonight at The Art House at Restaurant Row.

Surfer, shaper, filmmaker Who: Paul Kraus Home: Ft. Bragg in Mendocino County, Calif.; also, Kilauea, Kaua'i Business owned: North Coast Surf Shop Favorite surfing spot: Hanalei Notable quotable: "I've pretty much worked a 9-to-5 job for years. I realize that life is a short experience, so if you want to experience life fully and affect others with happiness and direction, you have to do what you enjoy. I enjoy my success; if I fail, at least I tried. And failure is a good learning tool." Chords next Next up for filmmaker Paul Kraus: A yet-to-be-titled documentary on Hawaiian music. "My interest in Hawaiian music is pretty high, and I've played 'ukulele and guitar all my life," Kraus said. "So my next film will be on the music here. It's still in the creative stages, but I know I'll do it in Hawai'i. This fall, I'll be promoting 'The ShapeMakers,' so I imagine I won't get a script for the music film till next year. But I want to focus on the music, the 'ukulele, the dancers." — Wayne Harada

Like: "How do the fins work? And the rocker?"

Shapers work differently, he said, "so their answers are not necessarily the same, but they're very interesting to the public, who always want to know," Kraus said.

His self-financed documentary, "The ShapeMakers" — previewed last Friday in Honolulu and Sunday on Kaua'i, to cheering hometown crowds — premieres today at The Art House at Restaurant Row. Dana Brown's "Step Into Liquid," another surf documentary, also is screening at the Art House. Together, the films bring respect and illumination to the masters of surfing and surfboard-shaping.

"John Severson, the founder of Surfer magazine, told me I should do this film now, with the masters still around," said Kraus, who took two years to complete his film.

With a new generation of shapers getting into the biz, he doesn't think his art is a dying tradition. But newer shapers are using new technology, somewhat altering the tried-and-true method of his livelihood.

"That prompted me to do the movie," said Kraus, 57. "My link (with surfing) goes back to ancient Hawaiians, who were shaping wooden boards, and I'm glad there's a new breed (of shapemakers) out there. But technology is changing the way surfboards are made today," he said.

Kraus shapes boards for his North Coast label, based at Fort Bragg, in Mendocino County in Northern California.

He said shaping remains a competitive field, and surfboard makers generally have their own methodology. The common bond is the love for surfing, the pride in creating the perfect board.

"Some are secretive, others are open," Kraus said of his peers, many of whom were enlisted for his films because of longtime friendships. "Most of the shapers were open and candid about making and shaping a surfboard," he said. "I don't think any real secrets, per se, are revealed, but it's quite fascinating to hear the philosophy of what goes into making a board."

While young shapers, influenced by the past and current masters, are learning the ropes, Kraus said technique is changing. "It's a whole different trade now, with pre-shaped foam blanks," he said. "If you started in the '60s, like I did when I worked for 'Ole' in California and was influenced by Dick Brewer and a few others, you would have started with wooden boards and balsa."

"The ShapeMakers" includes chats with Brewer, Bob "Ole" Olson, Bill Hamilton, Tom Morey, Terry Chung, Rennie Yater, Midget Farelly and others who have greatly influenced modern surfing.

A lifelong surfer, Kraus has had a remarkably fluid and varied career, embracing special-effects work for Hollywood films, page designing for Surfer magazine, designing new homes, filming national commercials, even making 'ukulele.

"I feel very lucky to have been in the right place at the right time," he said of his ever-changing careers. "My early years were in Hawai'i, where my mother was an artist and my father was a pilot who opened an aerial photographer service after World War II. We lived in Hale'iwa, so I have Hawaiian roots," he said.

He attended grade school at Waialua Elementary and remembers hitting the surf at 3, but lived most of his adult life in California, where he attended high school and Long Beach State, graduating with a degree in design.

"I went to work for George Lucas at his Industrial Light and Magic," he said of his Hollywood heyday, including Steven Spielberg classics such as "Indiana Jones." He toiled on the earthquake sequence when a temple disintegrates.

All the while, he said, surfing and shaping were part of his life.

"I was making surfboards for myself and my friends, and retired from the film biz in 1990, to go back to making boards. When there was surf, I'd close the shop and hit the beach — but would run into my customers in the water.

"My customers know me, and I know them, so it's easy to custom design a board for them. We talk in the water, while we're surfing — the essence of serving your customers."

So what makes a good board?

"There are some basic ingredients in making a board responsive and work well — smooth lines, from the nose to the tail of the board. Curved lines that are all smooth, no flat spots; the rocker — the lift in the nose, the lift in the tail — should have smooth, continuous curves and a natural form. The smoother all the lines, the better the board."

And the variables.

"There are short boards, which are sort of like skateboards, that lift out of water, with maneuverability. And there are the long boards, which have the advantage of floatation and gliding. Widths and lengths are factors, of course. But all things come down to the personal tastes of the surfer. If the relationship between surfer and shaper is good, you can turn out what we call the magic board."

And what's the going rate of super-shaped boards these days?

"Depends on whether you're talking short boards or long boards. Typically, the range is between $450 and $750. And some are infinitely more expensive — a big board can go up to $2,000 or more."

Does he test ride each board he shapes?

"I would love to, but there's no time. The buyer usually wants to be the first one to ride the board. Sometimes, though, I will wax a board and take it for a test."

How often does he surf?

"Whenever there's time — or when the surf's up. I hang up my 'Gone Surfing' sign, which still works, but when I'm out there, I see a lot of my customers — so I'm sorta working, still."

Reach Wayne Harada at 525-8067, fax 525-8055 or wharada@honoluluadvertiser.com.

Local shaper too busy to surf

Eric Arakawa has been shaping surfboards for about 30 years. With a crew of five, he now produces about 200 boards a month.

No, he's not in the documentary opening today. But he is one of the locals who's made a livelihood shaping boards.

Since 1974, Arakawa (brother of Advertiser political reporter Lynda Arakawa) has been one of the many Island shapers surfing into the board business "due to default." Or, as he puts it: "I couldn't afford to buy a board, so I figured it made sense to build my own."

Some Arakawa notes, culled from a quick interview:

• Number of boards he produces a month: 200.
• Busiest season: October through January.
• Starting prices: $500 for short boards.
• Number of helpers: Five; 30, if you include folks up and down his production line.
• His take on his job: "The irony of the situation is that while I have some time to surf, my job is to get everyone else into the water first, and the more my business grows — which is what I want — the less time I have to surf. But my kids surf — my daughters, 15 and 7, and son, 12. And that makes me most happy."
• Most famous of his board riders: Andy Irons, current world champion (Vans Triple Crown of Surfing).
• The shape of things to come: Arakawa is involved in developing new technology with Addidas Solomon, a France-based hard-goods company known primarily for ski equipment. "Their forte is technology, developing a material composite and a particular way it is being engineered and structured to create ski boards. They're not producing Solomon surfboards."
• Notable 'n' quotable: "I post a 'Gone Surfing' sign during the winter surf season; it's one of the fringe benefits working in this industry. No one complains; I see customers surfing, too. I just call it a board meeting."

Film's plain-folk honesty appealing

Paul Kraus' "The ShapeMakers," opening today, is an homage to those movers and shapers of the surfboard.

Also a shaper since 1968, Kraus' documentary provides insight, through candid conversations with a dozen or so shapemeisters, into the making of surfboards. Kraus focuses on artisans in Hawai'i, California and Australia, mostly colleagues who know wave conditions and what works best out there. Clearly, this is a special breed of people, who open up to a friend and share a common bond: the love of surfing and the need to craft that perfect board.

The work unreels like a home movie, somewhat uneven and crude in execution. The informal point-and-talk camera angles are repetitive and the sound and lighting erratic. That said, the movie does have its charm — of being chatty and accessible in a neighborly manner. It's plain-folk honest, not high-tech gloss.

"The ShapeMakers" also provides historical perspective to the sport of kings, popularized by Duke Kahanamoku, who introduced surfing to Californians.

Thus, logical interviews with Hawai'i shapers — including Dick Bewer, Terry Chung, Bill Hamilton, and Bob "Ole" Olson — are included.

Filmed with an obvious mission to preserve the wisdom and the ways of a legendary group of shapers, "The ShapeMakers" captures some indelible images and comments.

Like Dale Velzy, the California craftsman with a walrus-like mustache, who gets 100 orders a week to shape and produce boards — but can't possibly fulfill all requests. "Radical," he says of some no-fin longboards he's encountered over the years, stretching back to his 1938 start.

Like Reynold Yeter of Santa Barbara, who says all that matters in his world is "how well it works, how long it lasts."

Like Tom Y. Morey, who started his business in 1960 in Ventura, who says there's "no money in board-making. It's all hand-to-mouth."

Kraus' filmmaking style is deliberately and surprisingly straightforward, with some Island music (the Pahinui Brothers, Cindy Combs, Pekelo Cosmo) sparingly heard in the soundtrack. He succeeds in bringing this friendly but competitive surf community into the mainstream and thus becomes a vital resource in one aspect of surfboarding history.