French photographer Jerome Brouillet knew he had the chance of capturing something special when Brazilian surfer Gabriel Medina caught one of the day’s biggest waves.

“The conditions were perfect, the waves were taller than we expected,” said Brouillet.

But what Brouillet found when he checked his camera was beyond his wildest dreams.

Waiting on a boat by the side of the wave in Tahiti, Brouillet was primed for the moment Medina ‘kicked out’ – when a surfer exits the wave at the end of their run.

Medina emerged from the wave, pointing a finger in the air to celebrate his 9.9 score.

At the perfect moment, Brouillet captures the Brazilian suspended in mid-air, as if stood on solid ground, as his board mimics his stance.

“So he [Medina] is at the back of the wave and I can’t see him and then he pops up and I took four pictures and one of them was this one,” said Brouillet.

“It was not hard to take the picture. It was more about anticipating the moment and where Gabriel will kick off the wave.

“I think that when he was in the tube he knew that he was in one of the biggest waves of the day. He is jumping out of the water like ‘man, I think this is a 10’.”

The picture, which immediately went through to Brouillet’s editors, quickly resonated with people online.

Brouillet, though, was unaware of just how popular the photo was proving to be until he checked his social media accounts.

“I was just checking my phone on the six-minute break after the shoot and I had lots of notifications on social media and I thought something is happening with this shot,” he said.

“It’s very cool, it’s a nice shot and lots of people love it. It’s not really a surf photograph so it captures the attention of more people.”

Medina posted the image on his own Instagram account and the photo has already attracted more than 3.8m likes.