Jacob Burke + Soup Bowl = Exactly What Surf Films Should Be

I first met Jacob Burke when he was shirtless and covered in paint, hard at work on a business he was helping restore and rebuild after a fire. Like with most things he does, he was totally consumed in his craft. The only thing that could have broken his focus would have been if the notoriously onshore winds at Soup Bowl, switched offshore. They did.

A message went out from his father Alan's phone, 'Winds looking good, driving over now.'

Two minutes later, a message pinged from older brother Josh, 'Just packed up the car, see you soon.'

Jacob rinsed off the excess paint and changed into boardshorts. Within 5 minutes of the wind switching, all three Burkes--Alan, Josh, and Jacob--were simultaneously en route to the island's marquee wave. If it's on, they're out there.

Jacob's latest film was filmed entirely in Barbados throughout 2025, the project is built around the island's crown jewel and one of the more demanding right-hand barrels in the Atlantic. Soup Bowl is not a wave that flatters visitors. I felt painfully akward surfing their on my backside on a board that was not designed for hollow pits.

It demands dedication, the kind that comes from years of reading its every swell, its many moods, sections, and its freakish tendency to go from playful to consequential in the span of a few hours. Jacob Burke has that familiarity in his blood. Groomed to the rhythms of the island by their father, the legendary Alan Burke, Jacob and Josh have long been the measuring stick at Soup Bowl. Ask anyone who's surfed Barbados what it looks like when it's really on and the odds are a Burke (or a GOAT) is somewhere in the story.

Of the two brothers, Jacob is the more free-spirited one. He competes occasionally — representing Barbados at ISA events around the world — but his natural habitat is less the jersey and more the craft. He hand shapes his own alaias, among other shapes. He makes his own wooden fins. He keeps a low profile on social media. But, just like his brother and father, he's a weapon in the water and seems to see things invisible to most. Finding one's way through the exit at Soup Bowl is no easy task but Jacob makes it look like second-nature.

A Fish Out of Water is the proof of concept for that approach.