Fishing photography

I found the articles on fishing photography very informative. However, neither article seems to have dealt with the need for a robust camera given the knocks it's likely to take & it's use in a wet environment eg making sure that you clean /dry your hands particulary when changing film. Obvious to some, but I've seen film ruined & the winding mechanism damaged to such lack of care.

What film and winding mechanism ??

I have been using a Fuji 4800Zoom for the last year. Very convenient especially if taking a picture on timer by yourself, you can check that the picture is to your liking straight away. Seems to take the knocks etc ok and the battery life is ok. The only time the battery has run down was when I had to use the flash six or seven times in a short space of time. I now have a file on my computer where I download any picture I want to save and delete the rest ready for next time, saves a fortune on developing costs!!! Beware though, my computer does not like Fuji cameras and I have found out that the problem is quite common. When I connect the camera to the computer it crashes, restarts and tells me that 'There has been a serious error' you have to ignore this and just carry on. Make sure that you are not running any other porograms at the time and it is not a problem. I upgraded my card, on it's best setting I can take 36 photos but if i lower the setting i can take 128 images, ideal on holiday etc and you haven't got any downloading facility with you. Shops now have downloading equipment where they will download your pictures onto a disc for you to save and add to your computer when you get home so freeing up your camera for another 128 photos. Or buy a spare memory card does the same job. overall I think they are brilliant and never go fishing without it, Ian

Stephen, you must be referring to film photography, but in any case if you want a waterproof and somewhat shockproof camera you're limiting your choice severely.

Your best bet is to do what most of us do and carry your camera in a padded lunchbox or something like it and just be extra careful when taking shots and changing films in wet weather.

I'm not at all careful with cameras but out of about 20 cameras I've used over the years I've not had a problem with any of them except the Canon EOS 1 I dropped in a lough in Ireland!

Stephen, I can understand your concern about cameras being used in wet conditions.
There are a few ways around this, firstly, there use to be a number of compact cameras that were designed to be used in water. One make was by Minolta (www.minolta.co.uk), but I am not sure if they are still made. Secondly, if you have an SLR you may find that there are water proof jackets which slip over the camera body and screw into to front filter ring of the lens. I think they were made by a European photographic company???
As for the problem of damage to your camera, well there is not a lot I can say, as I have the same problem as in a normal working week I can be on a building site one day, a concert the next and even caught in the rain when doing some landscape work.

my 2 cameras are a "nisis" dv cam the missus got me for cristmas it does voice recording takes pictures in 4 different settings and best of all it does video up to 90 mins with a 64mb compact flash card getting a picture of your fish is tops but getting a video clip of it swimming away i think is much better i think the cameras are selling for about ?90 now my other is a fujifilm s602zoom (my new toy)?550 that does pictures up to 6megapixels draw back is 3 pictures @6mp on a 64mb cf card and scared shitless i gonna drop it in the river one day

There are three things any camera does not like: heat, wet and being dropped

Keep it in a decent waterproof bag. There are plastic bags you can buy that attatch to the screw thread on the lens.

Visit a good photo shop.

I have the same Fuji S602 Zoom as yourself.

It's a great camera. and I keep it in a lightweight Antler gadget bag.

By the way I get about 33 shots on a 128 mb card at 6mp resolution. You only get 3.1 mb effective resolution by the way but the pics are first class.

Ron, Simon or anyone, I've been looking at this camera recently and considering getting one. The one thing I dont understand is............ is it 6 megapixel or 3.1 megapixel? If its 6mp, why only 3.1 effective? Where does the other 2.9mp go? If its 3.1mp, why dont they just say that? Where does the 6mp come into it? I thought this digital camera lark was quite straight-forward until this one came along.

Stephen,
I use film cameras like you. I use a decent SLR in fine conditions but in bad weather conditions I use a weatherproof compact. The pictures are not quite as good as with the SLR but are still very good. I use an Olympus MJU for bad weather conditions and used a Yashica before this. Both were very good.

Simple Barry.

The 6 mp covers the actual image taken in by the lens. The 3.1 mp is of course the bit that is used for sensing the picture.

Forget mega pixels and concentrate on getting a camera with a good lens, and a printer with good performence.

My printer is not good enough. I am looking for a new one at the moment.

Take a carrier bag and stick the camera in that if it rains or you're on a boat, where water always gets everywhere.

Good mechanical cameras like the old Nikon FMs, FM2 etc were pretty splashproof.

They're seriously cheap now, as are som of the first AF bodies if you want to stick with film.

I'd go for Nikons because they are built like tanks, if funds permit the F4 takes some beating - world beating camera in its era, which takes some awesome lenses, again if funds permit.

They do a 28 - 105 you can pick up for a couple of hundred notes which is sharp as a pin and also offers macro in the tele lengths, which is good for everything from portraits to catch shots and close-up stuff.

F3s seem to soak up the punishment as well and the older manual focus lenses are well cheap second-hand.

A short wide/telezoom, like a 35/70 will be find for most fishing pics.

The Olympus Mju compact I got off Rich Drayson last year also seems to thrive on neglect.

You can also get splash-proof rucksack-style bags that'll take a couple of camera bodies, lenses etc from people like CCS, Lowe Pro etc. Pricey but they keep the water and sand out as long as you don't put them down somewhere damp.

The biggest problem I had years ago when I did pics for a living some of the time was the mould growing in lenses which had got damp. Ruined some pricey glass at the time.

To keep my camera dry I put it in a bag along with some strips of special paper that repels moisture. "Repel" is probably the wrong word to use, but to explain a bit more, unlike silica gel bags that absorb moisture into themselves. This paper acts as a barrier therefore it will not allow any moisture to get close to the camera or even in the bag.

I use this stuff all the time in my Air-Rifle Bag and it can be obtained from any decent gunsmiths shop.

PS: Sorry for the shite explanation, but im sure you get the jist of what im trying to say....phewww..

A friend who sells reprographic equipment assures me, that with a standard 6" x 4" print, with a digital image the human eye cannnot detect a difference in image quality at anything over 600 pixel width. Having looked at a few of my photobucket images (640 x 480 pixels) on another site and compared them to the 5.2mp originals downloaded to my PC, I tend to agree.

Mp size is very much the marketing tool at the mo', but unless you want to blow things up to poster size, or look at things on a print in very close detail (scale patterns for instance), I think it's a bit of a con. The main features to me are size of screen, optical zoom and quality optics, rather than mucho megapixels.

I'm in the market for an upgrade, don't want an SLR and am looking at the Panasonic Lumix, 3" Screen,10x Optical Zoom (you don't need digital zoom if you have photo-editing software imho) and proper Leica Lenses. Down to about ?200 on the net now, anybody tried one?

Cheers, Jack