“@Sa_rips . . . Sick Photos.  Love Your Work!  Kelly” 

Kelly Slater 
11 world surfing championships;
regarded as the greatest professional surfer of all time.

Hayden Richards doesn't do indoors very well...

The South Australian coast is ancient, desolate and harsh. Big desert ends in big cliff that falls into big ocean. The wildlife that inhabits this harsh locale are equally as big and rugged. They have to be to survive.

 "Great big ocean, great big flies, great white sharks and great big death adder snakes that lay motionless, camouflaged into the earth waiting to strike at anything moving past." - "Rich" Richards.

 It's not the type of place where men have been able to flourish. What makes the country extremely severe and dangerous also makes it exceedingly beautiful. But capturing that beauty is not easy.

 The South Australian coast is the backyard and muse for Hayden Richards, better known by myriad of nicknames. "Richo" is a photographer unlike many. You won’t find him on paid photo shoots, capturing a shot-list for a magazine or event. Rich is a purist, an artist . . . in the extreme. On his shoots he can be gone for days, with his dogs as support, looking for a perspective in the landscape that reveals something otherworldly. And capturing that perspectives is no easy task. Whether he scales the cliff-studded coast or slips into the dark, bottomless ocean patrolled by Great Whites, a shot that comes from Rich’s camera encompasses significantly more danger than almost anyone elses. The combination of stunning landscape, tangible danger, and raw photographic talent, produces the spectacular. Self taught, Rich has won top honors in many photographic competitions. The biggest of those was placing third Nikon’s Surf Photo of the Year.