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Column: Capture an image instead of a fish

Great Outdoors/James Murray
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James Murray

It’s hard to believe that two weeks have passed since I was on the Fraser River casting my Penn International loaded with 120 pound line to sturgeon lurking in the deep, dark, murky waters flowing past our boat.

A few weeks ago, I was standing on the banks of the Adams River, hoping for a strike from one of the feisty rainbows that should have been feeding on sockeye salmon eggs.

The salmon are just starting to show up and, well, let’s just say I didn’t catch any trout. I do plan on fishing for steelhead on the Coquihalla at the end of the month but somehow that still seems a long, long way off. After that, well, this year’s fishing session will be over before I know it.

I suppose I could always try my hand at ice fishing … or maybe not. I don’t like the cold. Then again, I could spend the long winter months that lie ahead looking through all the photos that I accumulated over this past season and planning for next spring.

There’s the one of me trying to hang onto the tail of a 250- pound white sturgeon, the one that flicked me aside like a matchstick just as my friend Cory was trying to snap a picture with his cell phone. Let’s just say I don’t really like the expression on my face.

And then there’s the one of me getting a fly in the hand as a nice 20-inch rainbow slipped my grip and made its escape. Again, Cory was there to capture the moment on his cell.

Whether taking still photographs of fish caught, or videos of the process, there are some basic simple rules one should follow in order to get more interesting images.

Related: 2013 - Photographer James Murray, Observer win honours

First and foremost, always be aware of where the light is coming from and how it is falling on the subject. Fill the viewfinder and include only those subjects that are important to the story.

When it comes to taking fishing images, try to catch the action. Avoid pictures of lifeless fish. Take your picture while the fish is being landed, or preferably as it is being released. This way you can capture an image of the fish with all the bright vivid natural colours.

Remember that a fish’s organs are essentially held in place by external water pressure. Every moment they are out of the water adds stress to their entire system. A photograph of an angler leaning over the gunnel of a boat, gently cradling a fish on the top of the water, is far better than one of somebody with a cheesy grin holding a lifeless fish by the gills.

Make sure to snap your picture just before the fish is actually released, otherwise you’ll end up with a picture of a splash on the surface and the tail of the fish as it heads back underwater. This is especially true when using a cell phone where there is a time delay between the moment when you press the shutter and the picture is actually taken. When it comes right down to it, there is seldom any reason to take a fish out of the water.

Try to capture candid images. Don’t have the angler stopping what they are doing to look up at the camera. Expressions of concentration, excitement or delight are far more real and interesting. When composing your photograph in the viewfinder, decide whether the image lends itself to either a horizontal or vertical format.

Panoramic landscapes, boats, fish on the surface of the water are all basically horizontal images. An angler cradling a fish is more of a vertical.

Taking pictures from different angles and perspectives will make your photographs a lot more interesting. Photos taken from a distance against the backdrop of morning mist or a palette of autumn colours will give the viewer a sense of what is was like to be there.

Not all fishing conditions are perfect, so don’t expect all image-taking conditions to be perfect. Control what you can, work with what you have and know the limitations of your camera. Get too close and your pictures are likely to be soft or out of focus, too far away and important details become small and insignificant. Too slow a shutter speed and things will be blurred. Too much staging, they become contrived, too much unimportant detail and they turn out boring.

Look at it this way too – capturing an interesting image of your angling experience is part of the catch and release process.


@SalmonArm
newsroom@saobserver.net

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