Labor Day weekend photos posted...

[BlueRanger]

In addition to a variety of nice shots around the TFF, I also spent a day visiting Copper Falls and a couple new (to me) waterfalls in northern Iron County. Fishing was slow - I caught one 38" musky in Baraboo and had two other follows. One may have been the one I caught later that same day, and the other was in a different area and looked to be low-40s. I also caught a few northerns and bass while musky fishing, and did a little topwater bass fishing one evening with some success. The water was very murky, which seemed to have more to do with sediment than algae. The drought is causing a lot of early color in the trees - there's a lot of yellow around, and I even saw a few bright red maples up in the Hurley area. Hopefully this week's rain helped - I've been looking forward to the fall color season.

[George G]

H Blue, as always a nice collecton of photos. Thanks for sharing and also having the talent to post them here. Excellent!

[George]

Just beautiful pictures from the TFF's Official Photographer!

[LundAngler]

Very Nice! Can I ask what equipment you are using? They are all great, but those shots of the falls are just beautiful.

[BlueRanger]

My current camera is a Nikon D5100, which is relatively low-priced as DSLRs go but has one of the better sensors on the market. I was also considering a D7000, but chose the D5100 due to its smaller size and lighter weight. They both use the same sensor and have essentially identical image quality, and every extra pound matters when you're carrying it all on your back. The D5100 also has an articulating screen that's proven to be very handy for shooting at odd angles and very high or low camera positions, like when I'm laying on the deck of the boat and holding the camera just above the water to shoot a loon from its eye level. For the waterfall photos, I use a neutral density filter to allow a longer exposure to blur the water motion, often stacking it with a polarizer to eliminate glare. I like the look of being able to see into the water, and since I'm used to seeing the outdoors through polarized sunglasses, it makes the photos look more like what I saw. In most cases I shoot 3 bracketed exposures and merge them in HDR software, which lets me capture all the detail in the shadow and highlight regions and add just enough local contrast to bring out some texture.

[Musky Mauler]

Very good photography, Blue. But what - - no bikini-clad gals holding up a walleye? Remember now, ya gotta give us old geezers a treat now and then other than just showing us nature's wonders. (Hope my wife doesn't read this.)

Musky Mauler

[George]

You know Blue, all that "camera-ese" is great, but it ultimately comes down to the person pointing the thing...and you have a great eye! Thanks for all the terrific pics!

[BlueRanger]

Thanks George! Sorry Mauler, I know the catalogs all show them, but I bought my boat used and apparently the previous owner kept that particular accessory for himself.

[The Frog caster]

Hello Ranger, wow, nice pics to say the least !!! ........ the only one I didn't like was the one captioned "a pretty one" .... it had a fellow, no shirt, wearing a white cap, sun glasses holding a plastic Wallmart musky, who was that guy ???? Just kidding, larry F.

[BlueRanger]

I thought I was looking pretty good for a guy well into my "post-late-thirties"

No muskies this weekend! That makes the first time in 2 seasons that I got blanked for an entire weekend. I had high hopes with the new moon, but I didn't even see a fish, and even the bass and northerns weren't very cooperative. The water is still very cloudy and the surface temperature is down to about 62 degrees. Peak fall colors on the TFF are probably still 2-3 weeks off, but there's a lot of color along 182 and west on 70. I did post some new pictures.

[The Frog caster]

Hello Blue, you are not the "Lone Ranger" ............ my efforts shadowed yours ....... no Muskies, strikes, no follows, no nothing. Thought the cooler water temps would spark some action......... guess that's why they call it fishing. Regards, Frog Caster (Larry F.)

[Zeke]

Blue, just got an IPad and have been looking at your Hummingbird shots from 2008. The iPad allows me to blow them up and really study them.
Do you have more? I just see the one album. Thanks.
Late last weekend was slow with the wind all over the place but when it went south on Saturday, it was fish fry time. Leaves at 30 percent max.

[BlueRanger]

I don't - I just took a bunch the first year or two because it was new technology and I wanted to show some of the cool things it could do. But the annoying thing about the screen capture function is that it creates a waypoint every time you do one, and that was cluttering up my chart with unwanted markers I didn't want to spend time erasing.

[George]

Another wonderful series of photos. Thanks Blue.