A FOAM ODYSSEY DVD
Dave Warnes gets serious
about tying flies.
A fly tying film? I don’t tie flies—that’s for my nimble fingered mates. And with those sentiments still ringing in my ears I wandered out of this years ‘Rise Film Festival’. A fifteen minute snapshot of A Foam Odyssey had been my favourite film of the night, a must-have DVD in my growing collection.
This Gin-clear production, filmed by Nick Reygaert, takes fly-tier Stu Tripney on a journey with eight of his flies on the magnificent waters of New Zealand’s South Island. From a purely photographic perspective, the underwater and into water shots are sensational.
Stu is a quirky character who likes to think outside the square when it comes to flies. His overriding thought process is “how can I make it better?” The viewer is taken through five stages with each fly: the need, the design and development, the build, and the fishing. This is where A Foam Odyssey won me, as the building stage is less than a minute per fly, so all the other stages relevant whether you tie your own flies or not, are fully covered.
The film gets you thinking throughout its forty five minutes: Quiver Bug for Dragonfly; Bionic Blowfly for Humpy; Bionic Damsel and so on. Not being a fly tier I asked a friend who ties flies to provide his opinion of the DVD. He loved the creative content and stated that the tying instructions were clear enough for a tier with some skills to follow but this wasn’t a how-to fly-tying DVD.
Apart from the stunning scenery and sensational fishing sequences the DVD concentrates on fly design—there is a chapter devoted to it. Stu bases his designs on careful observations for the trigger between insect movement and trout behaviour. Once this trigger is built into the fly, two additional requirements are added—the fly must land upright, and it must not fall apart, the latter well demonstrated in the DVD’s bonus section with the shotgun test.
The fly selection is completed when Stu creates the Bionic Crab for Christmas Island’s famous bonefish. As with the trout flies, simple design rules are applied and the boys get into some nice bonefishing action.
Described as “a fly tying rock’n’roll fish catching frenzy” the DVD has a great rock soundtrack and fun introductions to each of the flies. The bonus section is well worth a visit—I think most who have fished rivers running through farmland will associate with the cow segment.
A Foam Odyssey is a great addition to any fly-fishing library, for the tier or non tier. An added bonus is that the flies really work, with my son Andrew getting his best fish of the season on a Pogo Nymph—“Go the Foam.”
Priced at $39.95, the DVD is available direct from the FlyLife online store.