Moab Mountain Biking - Again (and Again...)

[Photo-John]

Last weekend, I made the first spring foray down to Moab for some red dirt mountain biking. I'm heading down again, tonight. But I thought I'd leave you with a bit of dirty trail fun from last weekend, before I hit the road. This first one was taken with the Canon PowerShot G1 X. It's not a camera I'd recommend for any kind of action photography. But if you can time your shot right, the image quality is fantastic for a compact camera.

[Photo-John]

I took the Olympus E-PL3 out this time. It's even smaller and lighter than the E-P3 and for some reason (doesn't make any sense to me) it actually has a faster burst rate. The biggest downside of the E-PL3 is the LCD is pretty bad in bright sunlight. But the fast burst rate more than makes up for the crappy LCD. Bottom line - I'm still in love with the Olympus Micro Four Thirds cameras

[Photo-John]

A double entendre, since this is a photography site

That's the Colorado River in the background - and a few hundred feet below.

[mattb]

Good stuff! Love that tech line - looks committing!
Also the trail bend from above is a super shot.

Is the exposure shot from Porcupine Rim? I haven't ridden that one in a few years. So fun!

What lens are you shooting with on the Oly? Pics look great!

[Photo-John]

Good stuff! Love that tech line - looks committing!
Also the trail bend from above is a super shot.

Is the exposure shot from Porcupine Rim? I haven't ridden that one in a few years. So fun!

What lens are you shooting with on the Oly? Pics look great!

Yeah, the exposure shot is from the singletrack section of Porcupine. Here's another one, from earlier on the singletrack, taken this last Sunday. I've just started to figure out how to do this section of the trail justice.

I've been riding with the 14-150mm and 9-18mm Olympus Micro Four Thirds lenses. Most of the time I just use the 14-150mm. Optically, it's not the very best. But like most Olympus lenses, it's a step or two above most other lenses in the same zoom range (28-300mm). I shot most of my honeymoon photos with it, too. It's so versatile I almost never need to change lenses. It would be nice if it was a little faster. But the size makes it a fair trade - especially on the bike.

The parking lot photo here was taken with the 9-18mm. It's much wider than I usually need on the trail. But the optics are great and it's really small so I always carry it anyway.

[NoKnees]

Great collection of photos. Love the Horseshoe trail view in the 2nd shot of the 2nd post. The other views are great too. Nice composition...

As for the gear, I do like the quality coming out of the 4/3rds system (as well as Sony's NEX line). Great quality out of a small package with most of the bells and whistles of the big guns... Gotta love progress...

[Photo-John]

I do like the quality coming out of the 4/3rds system (as well as Sony's NEX line). Great quality out of a small package with most of the bells and whistles of the big guns... Gotta love progress...

Absolutely! In good light, the Micro Four Thirds cameras are absolutely fine for outdoor sports photos. The E-P3 is a bit slow but the E-PL3's 5 FPS burst isn't bad. You do give up useable continuous AF but prefocusing is always the best technique, anyway. These photos are all good enough for publishing, in my opinion. Yes, I could have had better image quality. But for this kind of ride, carrying a full-sized DSLR and lenses on my back would have been absolutely brutal. The E-PL3 gives me the best of both worlds with no real compromise.