John Bennett
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John BennettMemberlol, love the rod in mouth big catch of the day shot,
John BennettMemberSure, bait me more 🙂
The waters I ply for LM and Lunge are shallow, usually less than 3 feet and almost exclusively top water. I know that gut check well when they give themselves away by boiling under an offering or when they make a V on the surface as they come screaming in from 50 feet away.
Its all visual and yeah words cant describe the rush as you wait for it.
Ive actually had a huge Lunge come in from 50 feet and tail smack the side of my canoe. While it wasn enough to threaten spilling me it was enough to get me kneeling on in the center, paddle spread across the gunwhales and hands well inside 🙂
I think Id risk a coronary with Sharks
🙂
John BennettMemberGive DPP a try John. Its Canons propeitary raw converter and should be on the disk that came with the 10D. If you dont have the CD you can download it from Canon USA, which you’ll want to upgrade to current version anyways if you load off your CD.
Its been a long time since I’ve used it but from what I remember its pretty good and does allow for batch processing and batch edits….say where you’ve tweaked WB and other settings and want all 5 or 10 images from a sequence processed the same. Many people (incl myself) find it does a better job of reproducing colours than ACR but ACR is simply way more powerful.
If I remmber correctly you can set all kinds of presets that are very similiar to the presets you choose or customize for in camera processing of jpegs. In fact Im pretty sure they even have the same presets as well as “Picture Styles” which you can use as starting points for Landscapes wher saturation is boosted, or Portraits where less sharpening is applied and youcan customise them to.
What I didnt really care for was its interface and WB control. I like the kelvin sliders.
Failing that try the free trial version of PS Elements 6.0 which has 90% of ACRs tools, much like it has 80% of what you’ll want from a full version of PS. Then you can always go back to DPP if you dont want it.
John BennettMemberI swear one day I’m going to buy a nice PnS like a Pentax WP to carry with me for just such occassions.
PnSs due to their sensor size make pretty good macro cameras and not having to switch out is a huge +.I was fishing the Grand on monday with a couple friends. Miserable day, with various sytems rolling in.
A gorgeous Grey Fox landed on some grass next to me. I was really hesitant to switch out lenses, put the flash bracket on, put the flash on and then shoot it. I felt better just leaving the camera in the bag protected
John BennettMemberOnce you get used to raw, theres no going back. There really isn’t any compelling reason not to, with the possible exception of being limited by card or hd space. I dont see much benefit to shoot raw + jpeg either.
Adobe rgb for me as its the colour space the publishing industry uses.
With regards to workflow time I really dont find it time consuming at all. Unless I’m working on an image for the explicit purpose of “creating something. I can process a raw file in no time, most dont require much work.
If I need to adjust exposure by more than +/- .20, its headed to the trash bin.
White balance I may tweak by upto 100 or 200 pts but no more.
Contrast, Saturation etc I have a preset level in acr and I adjust from that up or down a bit accordingly.from there its off to PS where I may check the shadows/highlights and make a minute adjustment with Curves and then finally apply a “general amount” of sharpening (preset) that still leaves room for more sharpening as your amount of sharpening really should be determined by print size. So I dont want to over sharpen a full res image that and editor in turn cant sharpen dependant on what print size they are running.
I would say on average I dont spend much more than 1 or 2 minutes /image. Sometimes more, sometimes less and usually the mores are a result of dust specs when I stop down past f11 becoming visible etc.
Some images I dont even bother doing. I just leave them in their original RAW for later use/processing etc…Say the wife wants an image of one of the kids printed..Then I do it.
John BennettMemberSweet Aaron.
Can’t imagine the rush just before the take.
John BennettMemberThere not much you can do if someone wants to rip an image off.
Watermarking will deter those who aren’t unknowledgble in Photoshop
Reducing the resolution to 800px at the widest, so that its really only useable on the net will deter everyone else. Also, another arguement for resizing at source, is that most free services like PB don’t do a good job resizing your images. Far better to resize it yourself with your editing software
John BennettMember4-8
John BennettMemberMemorable
When I was 19 I borrowed my mothers car so a friend and I could go up to the family cottage for 3 days of fishing. About 10 minutes from the cottage, I went off the road a wee bit making a sharp left turn. Minor thing, but the shoulder was soft enough that we got stuck. By the time we walked to the nearest farm and had the farmer come back with his tractor the cops had come across the vehicle. While the farmer was moving the car the 6 inches it needed to get back on the road, the cop was grilling us about what happened. Told him I took it a little too fast, there were no skid marks nor did we hit the post lining the outside of the shoulder, but it was enough that the right wheels left the pavement and the shoulder was soft enough to get us stuck. Guess he was in a bad mood as I got hit with a Careless charge.That was Day 1. Day 2 was better. I buried a 6 inch Rapala in my hand. Rather than go directly to the hospital we decided to stop in the towns Ballet to fortify ourselves a bit first. Im sure its not every day they have patrons with Rapalas dangling from one hand.
Day 3.
My friend drove home as my left hand was throbbing and wrapped in bandages. At one point he thought it would be cool to turn the headlights off and drive down a country road. Before I could convince him to stop screwing around, he plowed into a mailbox. Fortunately it bounced of the hood, rahter than coming through the windshield. Unfortunately it left a rather large dent in the hood.The only good thing to come of that trip was that Rapala being burried in my hand. The parking at the cottage is such that you often need to squeeze between the car and gate post. I was able to convince my mother, that it was while squeezing past the front end of the car with a full tank of gas for the boat in my hands, that I hooked myself on the Rapala which had been placed on the cars hood and by doing so, dropped the full tank of gas on the hood of her car.
Under Lucky and funny
Deep into a Provincial Park I came down with severe Bronchitis (fevers well above 100) and had to be evacuated. It took a couple days but I got out and into the nearest hospital. Not sure if it was just from being in the bush and not bathing, or if the sweats from the fevers had anything to do with it, but I was loused from head to foot. Watching the nurses reactions as they tap danced on the bugs that jumped off me while they stripped me made the whole thing worthwile.Under Doh!
Not many years ago I was making final preparations on the eve of a much anticipated ice fishing trip with some friends. It was late at night, dead of winter and I was preoccupied gathering things and looking forwards to the trip.At some point I went around the main floor locking up the house then went upstairs to the computer for a final bit before intending to call it a night. 20, maybe 30 minutes later a dull thumbing sound registered through the ear phones ( so as to not wake the house). What the hell? Head phones off, sure enough someones pounding on the front door.
Peek out the window.
It’s my wife
In her birthday suitTurns out she decided to crawl into the hot tub before bed and I in my preoccupied daze locked her out…….in the buff……..in sub freezing temperatures…for about 15 minutes
🙂That was one cold night and fishing trip
John BennettMemberLol when you guys ( US ) start talking prices, I start crying.
A CF box here retails for between $50 and $70.00 and thats without the insert another $22 or so.
A Wheatley retails for about $100.00
John BennettMemberTim take this with a grain of salt as I’m obviously biased
John BennettMemberThanks again guys. Appreciate it Zach.
Walt, yeah the Brown fishery is downstream from the Shand Dam (bottom draw) just above Fergus and down past Elora a ways. Most of it is special regs CnR only and no its pretty much walk and wade only although through the Gorge below Elora theres tubing 😉
Much below that and your into warm water fisheries, its the cold water from the bottom of Belwood Lake that enables the Browns to thrive but before long the water warms. While I’ve yet to do it, the outfitters around the region that have DBs go to the lower reaches for some great Small Mouth and Musky as well offering DBs on the Saugeen for much the same inlcuding Migratories I beleive. The “Geen” is another very good fishery with alot of diversity. Its just a hop skip and jump from Goderich
John BennettMemberGrats Kevin.
Love the shot of I presume your daughter?
John BennettMemberAgain…I envy your life. It is really quite amazing.
I have alot of trout water close to home, inlcuding the stream 200 feet behind my back door.
See comment above
my favorite river to fish is the Grand an hour and a half away.
Hour and half? I can do that in reverse, blindfolded, with one hand tied behind my back. I have to go 3….one way.
I am blessed and fortunate Tim. I have an understanding wife and live in a Province thats rich in natural resources. I can literally fish for just about every fresh water species thats common in NA in just about every manner, from dry fly fishing rivers and streams to flats wading for bass, pike, gars, musky to deep water trolling for Lakers. All of it with the possible exception of Pinks and Coasters from L. Superior, within 5mins to 2hrs drive away, those are about 9hrs away by car. 🙂 and most of them within a 30min drive
The only thing I don’t have is enough time and money to do it all and Salt. I’ve never fished the Salt :'(
Thanks guys.
I’m determined to lure a couple of you up here to experience the Grand. We have a Yank from another board making the trip next week. Hence the planned outing Monday so a few of us from another board can take him out. 😉
John BennettMemberSweet Fish Scott, nice job all around.
J
John BennettMemberNot more than a week ago we were barely above freezing in the mornings and in fact had frost on a couple of them. May 19th I did a Turkey shoot, spent 5 hours from 4:30 in morning to 9:30am sitting with my back to a tree in freezing rain in my heavy winter hunting clothing with 800 grams of thinsulate throughout.
The past 5 days or so we’ve been hitting 30 to 33 celcius. From 1 extreme to the other in a matter of days.
John BennettMemberThis being cottage season and given we have soo many lakes (and cottages here) the price of running “pleasure craft” ( and not using them much )is getting alot of play in the press these days and thats people who have their boats on the water at cottages
Not the people who would hual their boats to different lakes each weekend to ski/fish/whatever.
Big truck/SuV to haul the boat to lake X. Probalby takes close to a full tank round trip or $100.00
Big old bass/ski/pleasure boat to fill up and burn off. No idea but it cant be cheap, boats are hard on gas.Having only a canoe and toon I can’t really emphasise but thats gotta hurt.
John BennettMemberFly of choice up here for Musky and Pike are big Deceivers in Red/White and Blue/White.
Nice Lunge Tim and yes they can be awfully addicting and frustrating. Wait until the day you have a Brute follow only to turn away.
John BennettMemberJust to add PoV, and that coming from someone who ( I hope) is on the cusp of breaking into the “biz”.
I get alot (relative term) of request for photos (Gratis) and have gotten request for the same but with credit. Much like some other people have noted, the determining factors for me are
1) Whos requesting them
2) to what end.Up here the “world” is pretty small, where everyone whos related to the business be it as guides, pro staff, writers, whatever knows each other. There are very, very few ” dedicated photographers”. Seemingly theres a fair amount of…it’s not what you know, it’s who you know that gets your foot in. I’m making lots of strides lately on the WHO’s and I know from word of mouth my “photos” and name are starting to get noticed but………………..So it’s probalby a matter of time and breaks………
The guide I like to use and who manages a store has requested a couple photos that will be used is a “promotional” aspect beyond just pics on their website (which Ive also given them photos for gratis). So while I know the photo (s) in question will be used commercially and promotionally, its something of a friend, who’s trying to stay ahead in a very small, competetive market. I didn’t hesitate to say yes when he asked if he could use them, I doub’t I’ll be getting credit but its goodwill and a friend.
Beyond instances of that nature I don’t know that I’ll “give” stuff away free ( exception being freinds/acquantices for personal use).
As David said it’s still work.
It cost “me” alot both finacially (gas alone is getting expensive)and in time to go get the photo’s, I don’t know why people would expect to get them free.If it was that easy they could spend a wad of cash and do it themselves. They could then spend the time and energy processing them and last but not least they could opt to sacrfice the enjoyment of actually fishing or hunting..
Most of these people want to fish (or hunt) when they are out, not lug 40pds of gear around and get behind the lens. Or they’d rather fish Saturday than grab the camera and go gets pics of A,B,C of non fishing material. Hense why they pay (or should pay) others who do.
My time, my outlay and my efforts is producing high quality fishing/hunting/wildlife photography is worth something.
I was contacted by someone associated with a publication about some photos for credit only (website useage) . I said probably but it would depend on the specific images he wanted. Turns out its for a publication ( the editor contacted me days later)…to make it short and to paraphrase…Love the work, can we use some, we need to talk,etc,etc. I told him I’d be very interested in that and more..I don’t know if was an attempt at a end around or not, and whether or not they hoped to get them free, which once it was confirmed they were for a publication I made it clear they wouldnt be “free” but I’ve yet to hear back. I don’t think it was an out and out end around, however I’m not going to chase him/them depsite my rather large desire to do stuff for them.
There aren’t a whole lot of guys willing to forego fishing and make the commitment to concentrate of photography..which imo if you want good photos and a good variety you really need to do. Fewer still are the people capable of doing it ( lots can carry cameras and turn out mediocre photos), and there is the very real expense. If they want my photos its going to cost, or put down the rods and make the time commitments to learn photogrpahy, learn processing, and spend the time and coin doing it themselves.
It’s hard, really hard. I’d really love to land some work for the publication and get my name out there more, but I’m not going to whore myself and give them photos it cost me a ton to produce for “just” credit.
John BennettMemberIts hasn’t stopped me yet nor is it likely to, but I have winced more than a few times. We’re at a 1.28/liter here, roughly 5.12/gallon ? I’m driving a Jeep Liberty or a Saturn. The Jeeps pretty hard on gas and really deflates the wallet filling up.
Fortunately I have some options close to home, inluding walking out my back door and being on a stream that gets Migratories, has resident Browns and further up Brookies. The problem is quality and its not a very interesting stream to photograph.
All I can do is hope to recoup some of the expense when the tax man comes calling next February.
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