Lose the Memory, Lose the Fish

What is the most important thing that we treasure after a fishing trip? The memory! A very good friend, Fanie Oosthuizen, taught me a valuable life lesson relating to my favourite passtime, fishing. He told me that the only thing that we can take away from an angling trip is the memories and that the memories are directly linked to the photo's of the fish that was caught.

This is why it is so important to me to have good quality photo's. Like Fanie said, the memories are directly linked to the photo's. If you have bad photo's, your memory of the angling trip will not as good compared to your memories if you had very good quality photo's. Lets be honest, you would rather brag about a fish if you have a very good quality photo than bragging with a photo that is not so good! A Very good example is the photo of my personal best, it was a stunning carp but the photo is pathethic, and I will never show the photo to anyone and that is where the heading of article comes from. If you have a bad photo then you will rather not show the photo and then you might as well have lost the fish, thus my heading  ... lose the memory, lose the fish.

Here are a few of the rules that I apply when taking a photograph of my catch.

1) The distance

This photo was taken from too far away and your focus will be all over. With so much detail in the photo, you will and can not only focus on the angler and the fish.   

Look at the frame, that is all that you want to see, the angler and the fish

This photo is a perfect example - the focus is perfectly on the angler and the fish. (Please excuse the qaulity, I had to crop the photo to make my point)

2) Main Focus

Here I would like to point out to you that once you understand the importance of taking a photo from the correct distance, that it is also important to note that all you want in the photo is the Angler, the Fish and in the background you only want see Mother Nature. I see so many photo's of stunning fish with so much going on in the backgorund i.e. Rods in the background, Stand in the background, Other people and/or anglers in the background, Packs of feed in the background, etc. And everthing in the background takes your focus away from the Angler and the Fish. The Angler and the Fish should be the main objective!

In this photo your focus can be taken away from the Angler and the Fish due to the bank stick in the photo.

This photo is the perfect example. You are forced to concentrate on the main objective - the Angler and the Fish! And what a stunning background of Mother Nature and no distractions at all!  

I am sure this article will help you to make great memories and not a case of .... Lose the Memory, Lose the Fish.

Tight Lines - I am looking forward to your stunning photo's of catches on our Facebook Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/magicbaits/?ref=group_header

And the Magic Lingers On ....