Big Browns Ripping Line

Nymphing Basics For Trophy Trout and Steelhead - Trailer from Fly Fishing Fantasies on Vimeo.

Click through to check out the trailer and, if you like, to purchase the video on Vimeo on Demand.

West Coast Wild

West Coast Wild, a fly fishing adventure series I've recently been a part of filming, would love your voting help to get their web series funded to the tune of as much as $60000.  This series will follow the life struggles, epic adventures, and evolving relationships among a group of fly fishermen as they trek in to the wilds of BC.  If successful, West Coast Wild will be one of 15 BC creator groups to receive a $10000 grant to film a pilot episode.  If we’re named the top project among these 15 groups, we’d be given a further $50000 to film the complete series.  Here’s a link to our pitch.

Maximizing Your Votes

To ensure voting is fair and not “gamed”, you’re required to sign up (top right corner) at Storyhive with your email address to be a community voter.  If you just want to vote for our project, you’re allowed to cast 5 of your 10 allotted votes to our project, West Coast Wild.  If you want to make it more likely our pitch will get funded (please, please, please), you can get as many as three bonus votes to apply to our project.  To get these three additional votes, you can complete your entire profile instead of just filling out your email address, you can apply your remaining 5 votes to other projects, and you can SHARE any project (West Coast Wild hopefully).  If you max out, you’ll have been able to cast 8 votes for West Coast Wild.  If you need any help with maximizing votes, email rwheeldon@flyfishingfantasies.com and I’ll do my best to help.

Voting

To vote, sign up or log in to Storyhive’s homepage.  Then move your mouse over any image and hit the VOTE button.  On mobile displays, tap on the image to see the vote button.  On any project page, hit the big yellow VOTE button located top right.  Voting begins on November 10th and runs for three weeks.  Please vote for our project, we’d really appreciate the help.

The Fish Bowl

This is a FFF original.  It was some of the very first video footage I ever shot with the idea of "putting it out there".  The camera was standard definition but the scene was solid gold in my opinion.  Two fishing buddies working as one.  One working the rod, the other being the set of eyes.

Two feet further up.  That was right over him.  He bit it, he bit it, he bit it....

The Fish Bowl--Steelhead Edition from Fly Fishing Fantasies on Vimeo.

The Perfect Drift

The Perfect Drift: Fish Reel 2013 from Jake Patton on Vimeo.

Dry Fly Atlantics--Cascapedia Edition

Hooké Cascapédia River! from HOOKÉ on Vimeo.

N Alaskan Bows R Pretty

Fly fishing in Alaska with Alaska West Deneki Outdoors from Tracy Moore on Vimeo.

The Simms Story--KC Walsh Edition

KC Walsh is the president of Simms--makers of some of the best fishing products on the market.  In watching this piece, you'll pick up a bit of the Simms story in combination with some beautiful video.

Summer Fishing

When the days get smokin hot, wet wading becomes a great option to beat the summer heat.  I haven't run into these wet wading neoprene socks from Simms yet but they look like they'd make the boots fit just right.  The wet wading segment is in the latter half of this video blog post.

Desertsportsman Blog 3 from desertsportsman on Vimeo.

Wading Upgrading

Time For New Boots


It was time for new wading boots this year.  I went all out and bought the Simms G4 Guide Boots.  I debated going with a different model that had the reintroduced felt soles as I still feel felt may be a little better on the large greasy boulders I sometimes fish.  There must be others that feel the same way as Simms has begun offering felt as an option on several of their popular wading boots.




The Invaders


The conservationist side of me won out and I went with the Vibram soles and added a set of AlumiBite Cleats for added traction.  I'd love to hear of a good link to the effects of felt on introducing invasive species if anybody knows of some solid recent research.  I know some have recently claimed felt is not the culprit it was made out to be.



Ankle Protection


The boots themselves are very well constructed and comfortable.  They also provide a lot more protection to your ankle bones when they bang between big boulders than the last pair of boots I wore.  Other people really like these boots--they're rated 5/5 by 11 reviewers on the Simms site and 5/5 by 2 reviewers on the Fishwest site as well.  If you do order over the internet, Fishwest seems to have awesome deals on shipping--free on domestic orders and free on international orders if they're over $300.  My buddy Rory has gone with the Simms Rivershed Wading Boots.  We'll give you a report on those when we get a few miles in.

Simms Shoot Out--Take 2

Here's the second film posted from this year's Simms Ice Out event.  Which one do you like better so far?

Simms Ice Out Shoot Out 2012

Depuy Spring Creek--Montana Trout

Look at that.  Just after I post the Simms Rogue Fleece Hoody review, Detonation Studios shows it in action on a cold, blustery day.  Check it out at the 3:30 mark.  The video's pretty good as well.

Am I some kind of ___hole?

Think Positive
As a steelheader, it's important to think positive all the time.  These fish ain't easy so you gotta believe you're gonna get one on the next cast, on the next trip, in the next pool...  


Going Off
I posted the trailer for my unsuccessful entry for The 2012 Fly Fishing Film Tour on Vimeo to get some constructive criticism as to how I could improve for future film tour submissions.  My blogging buddy, Caleb Rheinhold, of Fish Porn seemed to have the day off and as a result, he went off.  Because I want to focus on the positive, I'll just copy some of the good points he made.  I'll save his unminced yet very thorough critique for me to learn from or you to find on Fish Porn for yourself if you so desire.  


20x As Epic As RA Beattie?

Here's some of what Caleb had to say (in blue):

This is about catching steelhead on dry flies. Steelhead are notoriously  pretty much impossibly hard to catch on wet flies, and this mofo has enough time on his hands to make his time on the water that much more difficult. Let me give you some food for thought: this video  was the coolest thing since sliced bread because those bad boys were eating top water. Now that I’ve had some time to calm down since I saw that piece of dirtiness that RA blessed us with, I’ve realized this isn’t even that cool because 1.) those are redfish and they eat anything and everything and 2.) because topwater “gurgler” type flies are around for a reason. Either way though, topwater eats are the shit and I hadn’t seen anything like it on video yet and my mind was blown. But this is at least 20x as epic as that. This is STEELHEAD EATING ON THE TOP. You don’t even fish for them that way unless you’re some kind of asshole. But if you can pull it off, I’d say you’re doing some epic fishing. And that’s what this is, epic fishing.


Sold
Now RA Beattie, whom Caleb refers to, is pretty near or even at the top of the fly fishing film heap so these comments are massive in my eyes.  I really respect nearly everything I see from RA.  Caleb finished his critique by saying:  

I’ll be buying Roy’s DVD. I’m a sucker for fish porn. 

If you want a taste for why Caleb's so keen on our footage, check out the official trailer.






If you gotta have the video after that, go to flyfishingfantasies.com or your local fly shop to purchase.  We usually ship the very next business day.  If your local fly shop doesn't have it, ask them to order it in or order direct from us.

Livingstone Montana Trout--DeYoung Edition

I've seen the DeYoung series water bottles that Simms has produced.  This mini documentary on Derek, his fly fishing and his art proved quite interesting to me.  See what you think.  There are many beautiful trout in this piece including some stunning browns.  I just love heavily spotted fish, be they cutts, bows or browns.

Montana Trout--The River's Edge Edition

Although this is a promo for a fly shop in Montana there are some beautiful trout shown, especially the big brownie at the 50 second mark.

Arctic Char--Beattie Edition

Alaska Rainbows

Dreading Alaska?

Don't fall for the stereotypes of guys with dreadlocks being uneducated.  There're insightful discussions about right angles and many other topics in this piece that brings back cold, painful memories of trying to put on frozen waders on winter steelheading trips.  Brrrr!

Bonefish, Permit & More in the Seychelles

More Carpy Footage

Not sure why I passed over this video at the time but it was probably the title.  Love the editing.


If you can't see the video link, go to flyfishingfantasies.blogspot.com.