White Balance, Lens Hoods and other stuff

Go figure that I get a lesson on my first ever fly fishing trip on the importance of checking the white balance, and what the heck the lens hood is really for! A friend of mine invited me to try out fly fishing, something I have always wanted to try. For some reason the vision of me standing in the Yellowstone River and casting for trout has always sounded like it would be a lot of fun. I, of course, said yes and thought I'd bring my camera along for the ride. 

This photo is one of about 5 or 6 that clued me into the whole purpose of the lens hood that came with the camera. I had read in a book that it helps reduce glare of the sun off the lens glass. I've never really had any problems until I am stuck with the angle I have here. I could have packed up my stuff and headed down stream to get a better angle with the sun at my back but thought this would turn out alright.

You can tell I figured out the importance of the lens hood here as in the top left hand corner you can see my sleeve in an attempt to use my hand to create a little shade to help reduce glare. Kinda worked but not really.

One other thing I figured out, make sure the white balance is set correctly on the camera. There is a setting that allows you to use the auto setting the camera has. All of the books I have read say that the camera default white balance does an adequate job, however, you really need to turn that off. I have this function off but keep forgetting to make sure its set correctly. You can tell here that it is not set correctly as the overall tone of the picture has a blueish tone and feels cool overall. Trust me it was cold but not what I wanted to convey with the sunlight highlighting the guys on the river.

Alright, this may not be the best example but I did remember to set the correct White Balance and you can see that it has a warmer feel to the photo.

Overall, I had a great time and learned a little along the way both about taking pictures and fly fishing. Here's what I feel is the best photo of the 89 I took.

Really I like the action here. The fly line in flight etc.

Last thing, I am hoping to make this more of a project this year. I've had the blog for a few years now and not really done anything with it. We have a family friend that does a 365 project, one picture a day for the year. My current job doesn't really allow that so I am going to modify it to a 52 week project. Post something once a week for 52 weeks. I am sure that I will learn a ton as I embark on this and hope to follow thru.