Blog Entries tagged 'full moon productions'

BowCast Listener Enjoys FMP Consultation

aroney@bowcast.com — Thu, 12 Jun 2008 07:44:56 +0100

Many of you die-hard BowCasters probably know, or will remember when I was somewhat surprised on an Episode of BowCast when Anthony offered up to spend time with anyone who may find themselves in the Salt Lake City area during the off-season and wanted to shoot with him. As I have been a beneficiary of some consultation on form and technique from Mr. Dixon and the entire FMP team of sharp shooters, I immediately had visions of guys lined up around the block of Anthony's house looking for a "free lesson". At the time, Anthony assured me that his offer was geniune and we left it at that.

Several weeks ago, BowCast (and more specifically Anthony) was contacted by Matt McCampbell who hails from Chicago indicating that he was "going to find himself in the Salt Lake City area.....and could he take Anthony up on his offer." Matt and Anthony exchanged a few emails nailing down some logistics, and I received an email from Anthony indicating, "One of the BowCast listeners is going to be in SLC to shoot with us - how cool is that?".

Well, I thought it was very cool, but as you will see from the email I received from Matt this morning, it was beyond cool. It is the very essence of why Anthony and I began a podcast on archery hunting almost a year and a half ago - because we love to "bro down" with folks like Matt, share our experiences in the archery hunting world, learn a little along the way, and make some really great friends as we have done with all of you on BowCast. Below is the email from Matt detailing the opportunity he had to shoot with Anthony, Launch, Robbie, and "G". Enjoy!

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Sunday, June 08, 2008

I am sitting on Southwest Flight 3506 on my way back to Chicago from a terrific weekend in Salt Lake City experiencing that great mixture of exhaustion and excitement weekends like this generally inspire. The exhaustion comes from the fact that I was out in SLC visiting a good friend whom I had not seen in years, and, as is often the case, we tried to relive our younger lifestyles only to wake up Sunday realizing what a mistake that was. The excitement is a result of the 5 or so hours I was able to spend with Anthony Dixon, Shawn Monsen and Robbie Anderson from Full Moon Productions on Saturday morning at the Utah Archery Center.

As many of the BowCast listeners know, a while back Anthony made a standing invitation to anyone that if they came to SLC he would be willing to give them a free archery lesson. As I was going to be out there already, I emailed Anthony to take him up on his offer and it was definitely time well spent.

I first met up with Anthony at the local IHOP for coffee and conversation prior to heading over to the archery center. Any fears I had about Anthony being different in-person than on BowCast were quickly laid to rest; he was the same easy going, refreshingly direct individual I had grown accustomed to hearing. After a breakfast sandwich and an incredibly awkward conversation with our waitress we headed over to the archery center.

While I am relatively new to the sport of bow hunting; I believe that spending time with people as knowledgeable as the FMP crew can do wonders for anyone at any level. Perhaps the single largest benefit for a relative newcomer like me is that I am still in the learning stage and have not built up a set of bad habits yet, nor do I want to. Practice does not make perfect, practice makes permanent, only perfect practice makes perfect.

The next and perhaps most obvious benefit of my time with them is that short of using a camera it is difficult to watch yourself shoot and even then you cannot get real-time feedback on your form. Having an additional set (or 3) of eyes on my form was helpful; but what’s more, those eyes belonged to guys who really wanted to help me and had years of experience to draw from. Anthony and team quickly spotted some fundamental issues, including my hand placement and release technique, which I would never have caught on my own. Simply shifting the placement of the riser in my hand by an inch made an immediate difference in the horizontal groupings of my shots and left only the vertical placement to work on. In all honesty, had this been all I learned, it would have been worth the trip.

After Anthony and crew helped me adjust the fundamental issues the next logical area of focus was my bow set-up; after all, if your form is not correct, there is no equipment in the world that can help you. Again, the changes they made, (shortening my sting loop and shortening my draw length) while minor in nature, had a large impact on my accuracy.

Once my form and my equipment had been corrected it was time to learn how to properly practice shooting. Initially, I thought I had that part down; I mean how tough can it be: (1) Post a target, (2) Shoot at the center of it, (3) Repeat as needed, right? Wrong. As I quickly learned, shooting 3 arrows at the same spot is not nearly as effective for improving your accuracy as shooting 3 arrows at 3 different targets. This simple change, in addition to some other drills Anthony showed me, will no doubt help me continue to improve.

This whole process took about 4 hours from start to finish and ended with us filming a short clip for the BowCast website (on a side note; I never knew how many details were involved in creating a video clip) and then grabbing some lunch. At the risk of signing Anthony up for weekend after weekend of lessons, I encourage anyone interested in becoming a better archer to look up Anthony and crew if you are ever in Salt Lake City; I promise you it is well worth your time. Finally, I want to sincerely thank Anthony, Shawn, Robbie and G for taking time out of their weekends to hang out and help me become a better archer.

Matt

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Launch on BowShout - March 25, 2008 - 9:15 PM MDT (11:15 EST)

aroney@bowcast.com — Wed, 19 Mar 2008 01:34:37 +0100

For the registered users on the site, Shawn "Launch" Monsen from Full Moon Productions will be on BowShout (BowCast chat feature at the bottom of the home page).

Launch has been with the FMP team from the beginning, and is an expert at tuning his equipment to shoot accurately at long distances.

Launch will be logged into BowShout at 9:15 PM MDT (11:15 EST) next Tuesday - March 25th - and will be answering your questions live. Don't miss this opportunity to pick Launch's brain on equipment, practice, how to, tactics, high alpine muleys, monster canada whitetails......etc. etc. etc. [...]

Anthony's 2007 Mule Deer

aroney@bowcast.com — Thu, 20 Dec 2007 07:29:15 +0100

2007 was a great year for the Full Moon Productions team. The following deer that Anthony harvested will be show cased in a feature article in "Western Hunting Magazine" in the summer of 2008. In addition, you all will be able to catch the footage of this hunt on the next DVD from FMP in summer of 2008. As always, Anthony wanted to give our BowCast community a sneak peek at this very awesome buck.

Anthony shot this buck at 61 yards with a 12 degree cut. The deer was shot on 10/22/2007 at 9:10 AM and recovered at 5:20 PM the same day. The deer scores 190 4/8 inches.

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Acute Mountain Sicknes (AMS)

aroney@bowcast.com — Sun, 16 Dec 2007 16:50:50 +0100

Below is an article written by Robbie Anderson. Robbie is the newest member of the Full Moon Productions team, and has a wealth of knowledge and background around hunting, as well as surviving in the high altitude. Robbie is a certified Emergency Medical Technician (EMT) in Salt Lake City, UT in addtion to a great archery shot and a great all around hunter. Read below to gain some information from Robbie on AMS, and look for Robbie to continue to contribute to the BowCast blog in the future. Enjoy! - Aneal and Anthony

[[Acute Mountain Sickness]]

By Robbie Anderson - Full Moon Productions {multithumb}{multithumb}

[[Hunting]] is quickly becoming one of the most popular sports today in America. Hunters are traveling all over the world in pursuit of game. We are hunting more in a wide variety of different terrain. When we are planning a hunt in a new area or terrain we concentrate so hard on how we are going to change our tactics and strategies to harvest our animal that we overlook some of the most important details, such as how the terrain will affect us and our body. Many elements can affect the way our body functions, some of the obvious elements are the heat and cold, another very important and often overlooked element is the change in elevation which can easily take a toll on our body. Our bodies acclimate to the elevation that we live in and when we travel to a new elevation our body reacts differently. As we ascend the [[barometric pressure]] decreases, the oxygen level in the air remains at 21%, which is the normal percentage of oxygen in the air we breathe, but each breath you take contains less oxygen molecules, because of this you have to work harder for oxygen. As your body works for oxygen your respirations become increasingly rapid and deep, ascending too fast can easily lead to [[acute mountain sickness]] (AMS), commonly known as altitude sickness, which is caused by decreased oxygen levels in our body ([[hypoxia]]).

AMS is defined by Wikipedia as, "...a pathological condition that is caused by acute exposure to low air pressure." AMS commonly occurs at 8000 feet, symptoms will start with a headache and progress to loss of appetite, nausea, vomiting, fatigue, weakness, dizziness, and difficulty sleeping. AMS symptoms have often been said to resemble those of a bad hangover. If you start to notice these symptoms you should move quickly to a lower elevation, or if you would like to continue your trip you can stop and rest. You will need to give your body time to acclimate, you should spend a night or two at that elevation before moving on. Be sure to drink a lot of fluids and try to eat, you can also take aspirin and ibuprofen for the headache. AMS is easily treated but can be very serious if not treated, if left untreated it can lead to [[high altitude cerebral edema]] (HACE) and [[high altitude pulmonary edema]] (HAPE) both of which can be fatal. Please be aware of this and be careful to take the necessary precautions on your hunting adventures.

More about Robbie Anderson:

"I was born in Sandy in 1984, and have lived in Utah all my life. I was introduced to the outdoors at a very young age and instantly became hooked. My hunting addiction started with waterfowl and I spent my seasons from August to January chasing geese all over the western United States, but when I was introduced to bow hunting I knew I found my real passion. I am a self taught bow hunter and learned a lot by trial and error. In my 4th season of bow hunting I started working part time a local archery pro shop, and that is where I met Anthony Dixon and the FMP crew. One year later I became apart of Full Moon Productions and it has been an awesome ride ever since. Joining FMP took my bow hunting to a whole new level. I am currently working as a residential pipe fitter. I am also a state certified Firefighter and EMT, I am working on making that a full-time career. I have a beautiful wife and we are expecting our first child in June of 2008. "

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