Larry “Flame” Moore, an influential surf photographer and former Surfing magazine photo editor who led the first surfing expedition to Cortes Bank, the legendary big-wave spot more than 100 miles off the Southern California coast, has died. He was 57.
Mr. Moore, who was diagnosed with brain cancer in late 2002, died Monday at his home in Dana Point, Calif., said Robert Mignogna, a close friend and former publisher of Surfing magazine.
Nicknamed for his red hair, Mr. Moore served as photo editor for the San Clemente, Calif.-based magazine from 1973 to 2004, with time out for a brief stint as photo editor for the launch of the Internet surf site swell.com.
With 43 Surfing magazine covers to his credit–as well as covers for many other surf publications–he was known for his close-up, front-lighted, razor-sharp action shots.
“He defined a whole genre of surf photography,” said Evan Slater, editor of Surfing magazine.
The magazine recently published “30 Years of Flame: California’s Legendary Surf Photographer,” a coffee table book of Moore’s work, with text by former Surfing editor Nick Carroll.
“Larry treated ocean waves with the same attention to lighting and color as a photographer would in a studio,” said Steve Hawk, former editor of Surfer magazine. “He was always looking for spots he could shoot in the morning that were brightly front-lit. He told his surfers to wear bright wetsuits and use brightly colored surfboards, so that his photos would pop.”
In his pursuit of great surf photos, Moore studied worldwide weather charts to determine where and when the best waves would hit.
Mr. Moore, the son of a Los Angeles County fireman, was born in Whittier, Calif. He began surfing as a teenager.
He said he began shooting surfers with a camera given to him by a friend who was headed to Canada to avoid being drafted during the Vietnam War. When he graduated from college in 1970, he already was a regular contributor to Surfing.
