My Favorite Place(s)

I'm looking out the window at more fresh snow, and, quite honestly, I'm sick of it. So, right here, right now, is definitely NOT one of my favorite places. Which brings us to the beauty of a photo prompt from the OBN which asks us to post a photo of our favorite place. Since I can't narrow it down to one, a few photos will have to do.



This photo quality is poor at best, but I don't care. It is one of my favorite trout streams, a beautiful stream in Utah full of brookies, cuts, cut-bows. I caught my first grayling here as well.



I love high mountain meadow streams full of trout. This Colorado stream, at around 10,200', qualifies.



Fly fishing for arctic sheefish - Inconnu - in the Yukon.




And, finally, a little something to chase away the winter blahs.

Fish Pictures

Warning - this might end up being the post where my blog "Jumps the Shark"

I've said repeatedly on this blog that I wanted to expand my photography experiences and post them on here. Wait - actual photography is what you see on a couple of the blogs on my Blog List - A Focus on Nature and Hannibal's Animals jump to mind. I merely take pictures. I don't have professional grade cameras, or filters, or anything but a new-ish compact camera. But I still like to take pictures and post them on this blog.

The advances made recently in digital cameras - and by recent, I mean the past 5 years or so - are mind boggling. My first digital that was better than a disposable was a Canon 6 mp Power Shot. It had a few scene modes available, and took pretty decent pictures. My current camera is a Samsung TL 220 12.2 mp camera that has so many features I'll never figure them all out. Trying to get my hands around the functions I will use is why I've been carrying the camera along on every trip to the ponds (when I remember). Plus - I like looking at other people's photos in their blog posts, so I put some in mine too.

One feature I've always admired but have never really used much is macro-photography - taking focused photos from 1" - 5" away from the subject. Since fish are "my thing" I thought I'd try it on them first.

As with all the photos I post, you can click on the photo and see a larger version. I think this will be necessary to view these pictures. on a personal note, I really like the way they came out. There is a lot of subtle coloration on them. So, without further ado - UP CLOSE AND PERSONAL WITH THE FISH FROM MY PONDS.


Crappie







Bluegill






Largemouth Bass







Walleye







(The walleye cheek looks like it has gold dust on it!)


Assuming I don't get bombarded with comments like "You're an idiot -what were you thinking???", I'll continue doing this type of thing as I catch more species to photograph. Pumpkinseeds and Green Sunfish should be soon. Ah hell - I'll probably do it even if no likes it but me. After all, it is my blog!!

An old dog, learning new tricks

That old dog would be me. With an upcoming birthday, I'm beginning to actually feel old these days. Not to worry - it's probably just the never-ending winter.

The new trick I picked up recently comes from a new member of my Blog Roll - Outdoors with Butch. It involves editing your photos.

I've only recently started following Butch's site, but it is very apparent that he is a keen observer and photographer of the world around him. And he does something I plan to do in the coming months. He takes a photo, edits and crops the original, and saves the new photo as a separate picture while maintaining the unaltered original. I, on the other hand, take a photo, edit it, and save the changes, having only the new, edited version, and losing the original. Butch posts both the original photo and the edited, cropped version on his blog, showing both the before and after of the picture. I really like the way that looks on his blog, and plan to do the same on mine.

Thank you, Butch.

I occasionally do the same, but it's only by luck that I have both the before-and-after shots of my favorite picture.

The photo below is one of my favorites, and the one I'm speaking of. It was taken almost 2 years ago in Panama, and was absolute luck. My buddy was fighting a big black marlin, and I was holding up my digital and just snapping pictures in the general vicinity of the fish. I probably took 20 shots. Almost all were worthless. Then, toward the end of the string of photos, was a picture with the tail of the fish re-entering the water. Oh well - at least we got something. On the next picture, this was in the upper right hand corner of the photo. I cropped it and got a great photo. Well, it might not be great, but I like it!




The first photo, with just a hint of a marlin in it




The Lucky Picture




The final product


MORAL OF THE STORY: Take LOTS of pictures. Some will be memorable!