Stone's North Woods Adventures (SNWA)

Discussion in 'Adventure, Hiking, Backpacking and Travel' started by Stone, Feb 17, 2017.

  1. msu7.62

    msu7.62 Member

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    I just found this. One word......Awesome!
     
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  2. Stone

    Stone Member

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    MSU, thanks! Glad you're liking it so far. Much more to come, so please hang out with us.

    I'm guessing MSU might mean Miss State U? I grew up just across the state line in Memphis. My mom was from Port Gibson and I had relatives in Vicksburg, so I spent a lot of time there as a kid. Great country.

    And that's a fine looking old jeep in your avatar. Yours? I was a jeep owner as a kid, and so was my dad.
     
  3. msu7.62

    msu7.62 Member

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    You are correct on Mississippi State. I graduated from MSU in 09. I lived in that part of the state for about 10 years and you are correct it is beautiful. I'm on the MS. gulf coast now, totally different from N. MS.

    As for the jeep picture, unfortunately it is not mine. I do drive a Jeep but that one is not it. I have had a few other jeeps in the past but my 04 wrangler is my daily driver and I have a 46 Willys in the form of a bare frame and an envelop with ID plates and a title. Ill build it one day.
     
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  4. Stone

    Stone Member

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    I'll take a bit of a tangent for a minute on this thread, but it's ok since my outdoor experiences in my jeep as a teen contributed much to convincing me to become a biologist/ecologist and do what I'm doing now where I'm doing it. In particular, it allowed me to engage in more outdoor activities and immerse myself in nature fishing, hunting, boating, hiking, etc.

    This is the jeep that my dad and I built -- with the help of a mechanic friend -- out of two junkers plus a few new parts. IIRC the junkers were a year apart, and about '47 - 48'. The paint job was by yours truly using several cans of spray paint primer. :D

    I drove it from age 15 to about 19. It got handed on to a family friend after that.

    Pics from circa '66.

    My jeep w canoe 01.jpg

    Two of my hunting buddies, Steve and Bill. We were after squirrels in the Wolf River bottoms that day.

    Hunting in the jeep.JPG
     
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  5. Kevin

    Kevin Member

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    Great photo of your buddies Stone.
     
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  6. Stone

    Stone Member

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    Those were the days, my friend. :)
     
  7. Kevin

    Kevin Member

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    It's nice that you had a camera around. Have lots of great memories as a kid shooting .22s or shotguns out in the boonies with friends, usually along the railway tracks in Manitoba or along the coast or a friends farm in PEI. Often packed a lunch to cook, or heat up on a camp fire after shooting gophers in Manitoba and cans and such in PEI. Yes those were the days.
    Regards,
    Kevin
     
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  8. Stone

    Stone Member

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    Believe it or not, Kev, that shot of my hunting buddies was done with a Polaroid camera. All B&W then. Big clunky thing, the size of a football, but yielded instant gratification.
     
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  9. Stone

    Stone Member

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    March 15, 2017. The day after our 3rd nor'easter of the winter dumped 12". We were slated for more, but the storm tracked around us to the west, so the mountains and NH got the biggest snow. He had howling winds though.

    Eating a super late dinner after my afternoon walk in the back woods -- first since last Sunday.

    Snowshoed on 1' of fresh wet powder -- and needed the shoes -- post hole galore without them. lol.

    Spectacular afternoon. Spectacular!!! Never even saw blue sky, let alone sun. Had two major snow showers -- everything on me - coat, pack, hood etc -- got coated twice in heavy wet snow, but the temps were great! From 30 F when I got out to 20 when I was coming back in at dark and no wind!

    It was so unbelievably beautiful down in the ravine today, and peaceful! Absolutely quiet. Could've heard a mouse sneeze from 30 yds away. Explored a new part of the ravine today -- one of the most beautiful parts I've seen so far, very open and parklike but with big trees (hemlock, ash, pine, birch). And the coatings of snow from the afternoon showers turned it into a late winter wonderland.

    Took LOTS of vid footage and photos. Have downloaded the video, going to watch the raw footage now as I finish dinner with a vodka. Video will come; could be by weekend. May be my best yet.

    Here are a few stills while you wait to whet interest. These were all late in the day after sunset, just before I walked back to base camp studio. This little cam's autofocus has a hard time in waning light with so much snow.

    Got to the bottom of the north esker, then walked across the ravine about 100 m along side a snowmobile's tracks. Not a trail, just tracks. This guy was just cutting across, probably earlier in the day.

    across ravine shoe sled.JPG

    Looking back across the ravine toward what I call Ash Camp, after a big ash tree there. My beaver tails leaving tracks.

    across ravine snowshoe.JPG

    Looking south into that park like area at the foot of the southern esker, which appears to be much higher than the northern one (on the north side of the ravine). This spot is -- to me -- beautiful. So peaceful there. You could hear yourself think, or not.

    across ravine esker.JPG

    Some dude I encountered along the way. Man, there are some weird people around. :oops:

    Had three head layers then: fleece ball cap, topped by my fleece balaclava and Carhartt hood. 20F and just got a chill.

    selfie 2.JPG
     
    Last edited: Mar 15, 2017
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  10. Stone

    Stone Member

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    OK, I finally watched all 8 or so segments of raw footage from this afternoon. Total of about half an hour, maybe 40 min after editing the rough spots and mistakes out. (Imagine having to film with a tiny camera in heavy gloves. You have to turn on the cam, drop it onto the wrist lanyard, get your glove on, gain control of this tiny, slippery camera, frame, focus, then film. All that 15 - 30 sec of getting glove on to filming has to be cut out.)

    OK, so, I think it's the best I've done yet of "live" cam work on location -- not in a studio. I'm getting better with framing, and moving the camera more slowly when panning. (It's interesting that when we pan normally, we do so at fast pace. But when you do what normally would feel good in real life using a vid cam, it's like having your neck jerked.)

    And I'm finally getting more comfortable with dialog, sort of impromptu descriptions of the experience -- location, conditions, special features (trees, rocks, cattails....), feelings ... That's been the hardest part of video production for me. If someone is in the room with me, I'm comfortable with conversation. But how do you talk to a freaking camera and microphone with no one present in a way that when someone sees and listens, it feels natural and comfortable? I'm far from perfect, and still stumble sometimes in a way that I wouldn't with real people present. But I'm getting better at it.

    I'm tempted to render a short piece of raw footage -- pre editing and annotation -- and just post it for preview.
     
    Last edited: Mar 15, 2017
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  11. Stone

    Stone Member

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    1 am the next day. I've now compiled 15 min of mostly raw footage with a few annotations (text, arrows, etc) into a short first draft video of today's (technically yesterday's) walk. Rendering now, then upload to Youtube -- maybe in an hour if I can stay awake that long.

    Liking it so far. It's very interesting to be able to walk in a beautiful, almost magical place, then effectively virtually relive that same experience hours later, sans the cold while sipping vodka. ( :) )

    I think this has the potential to be one of the best of the 7 or so that I've shot and the three that have been uploaded (after this one gets up).
     
  12. Stone

    Stone Member

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    One more teaser still photo. I tell you, this place is crawling with strange people.

    selfie 3.JPG
     
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  13. Stone

    Stone Member

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    OK, closer to 2:30 am before upload completed, but better late than never.

    This is draft 1 of relatively raw footage with some annotation. It's 15 min.

    There's snow, snowshoes, pack, ecology, a taste of evolution science and some fun.

    Hope you enjoy it. Y'all come. :)

    Hey, @ManOfSteel , @JV3 , @Wolfman Zack ,
    @Bushman5 , @anrkst6973 , @AddictedToSteel
    and others, please come walk with me.

    And bring food and beer (IPA). :)

     
    Last edited: Mar 16, 2017
  14. Stone

    Stone Member

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  15. Zeek

    Zeek Member

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    What about me??? I'll bring Busch Lt...
     
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  16. Stone

    Stone Member

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    You're always invited, Zeek, regardless of what beer you bring. I just knew that you were already in here last evening, and had seen the post. :)
     
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  17. Stone

    Stone Member

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    Putting finished touches on the full video. It's going to be 42 min long -- hey it was a 3 hour walk, lots to see. I've edited closely, cut out mistakes, bumbles, fumbles, etc, and added some interesting new photos to illustrate some things talked about. I hope to finish it before a late dinner (cooking now), render it and upload it over night. I'll post it here for any who are interested.
     
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  18. Stone

    Stone Member

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    5 hours after my last post. 2 am Friday morning: St Patrick's Day. It's been a 14-hour day. Spent the entire afternoon and evening editing, then rendered version 1 of the full video. There was a resolution glitch, so I fixed it, rendered again, and watched the entire 42 min start to fin.

    Initial impression? My best so far of outdoor vids. My studio productions are better -- more polished, better visuals and audio (using a mac cam or screen capture with professional mic instead of a handheld pocket cam in the woods) -- but not as much fun. Good mashup of concepts, information, images -- both "live" and pasted in -- sounds, dialogue, etc.

    Uploading now, but it's going to take all night. Assuming no glitch demons, I'll post a link tomorrow.

    How appropriate to do it on St Paddy's day. :cool:

    For now, I sleep soon, after finishing this episode of Vikings (seaon 2, ep 4 -- fourth time).

    Here's the working draft of title and description for the description on Youtube.
    ___

    March 15, 2017: Ravine walk on 1' of new snow to Ash Camp

    This is an afternoon snowshoe walk with full survival pack and a picnic lunch into the far (south) side of the ravine, and a preliminary exploration of a hammock study area that I call Ash Camp.
     
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  19. anrkst6973

    anrkst6973 Member

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    Do so love those old vehicles. Had a 48/49 Willis wagon (a thing similar to a GMC Suburban), we would drive it into flooded river bottoms to the top of the fenders then climb onto the hood to fish. A "tank" by today's standards :) you could sit or stand on the fenders without denting them, or throw a deer in the back ( metal floor) without worrying about the mess.
     
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  20. Stone

    Stone Member

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    I have a funny story about that very thing I'll relate later.

    Well, it's funny now, looking back. But it wasn't funny at the time at all. :oops:
     

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