by Meet a New Guest Blogger: Phil Rispin, fly fisher and photographer
I frequently find myself standing in a stream with my Fly Rod in my left hand, line in the water drifting through a great piece of water while my right hand is fumbling for the Camera I keep in my vest so I can take a picture of something I just saw. In a stretch of stream like the one just below the dam on the Little Red at Heber Springs Arkansas this means that you are going to miss a lot of strikes. The trout there carefully mouth very small offerings barely moving the strike indicator and if you aren’t concentrating hard you miss them.
My Dad got me started with a fly rod when I was six and my Mother got me started with a camera when I was about 12 and over the years I have become more or less addicted to both. Shortly after my very patient wife and I moved into our present home we had a renovator change the two car garage into a very nice room with lots of window space and hard wood floors with a big storage closet and lots of room for a rod building bench. My home office is now set up for fly tying, rod building and post processing images on computers.
I have found the places where we find trout and all the activities surrounding the process of fly fishing to be very photogenic and I am willing not to catch as many as I might just so I can take home some great images of the experience. My purpose is to share the beauty of the places and the trout to hopefully motivate people to be very good stewards of the resource we’ve been blessed with as well as to enjoy the experience through photography long after the fishing trip is over.
> and I am willing not to catch as many as I might just
> so I can take home some great images of the experience
Not to mention the fact that our consciences don’t compel us to throw images back!
Nice article Phil; I share your passion for the visual, as I suspect do most of us. I’ll sometimes stand there daydreaming about the rays of light filtering down through a broad tree, leaving my line to drag horribly for want of a basic mend.
(Of course that’s sometimes when I get a take, too, which further schools me on the fact that all the fancy theories of “proper” drift may be worth about the price I’ve paid for them.)
You have a very nice eye for light; I like the images on your site.
– Mike
Thanks Mike, I appreciate your comments.
Phil R.
You have a good eye for the camera. Nature provides us with some amazing opportunities but not many capture them so well !
Thanks Graham I appreciate the comment.