For decades I've been an avid photographer. I've been in love both with the technologies and the creative outlet this hobby brings to me. Ever since my darkroom days I've been focused on landscape photography. I never got into street photography or portraiture. I rate my skill set as above average, but never pro level. I never honed my skills to the point that I thought I probably could. And as I've gotten older, I find I have less lust for the newest gear or the latest post-processing capabilities that modern software brings to bear, and I guess I've also gotten a bit lazy. I've ditched my beloved Canon full frame kits, all of the attendant pro lenses, the tripods, backpacks, and accessories that we die hard enthusiasts gush over. My main camera these days is OM System's OM-1 mark II. I love its compact size and light weight and I'm enamored with it's wonderful image stabilization, so much so I hardly ever use a tripod anymore, which for me is an amazing admission. And too, I appreciate the unique computational capabilities this camera has built in.

If you've followed our blog from years past, you probably know that I originally took my OM-1 along with us on our cycling adventures and would occasionally augment with my cell phone camera. The hassles of trying to process my camera files (I have always exclusively shot in RAW and admit that I haven't properly explored the camera's ability to create jpegs) and then integrating them with the phone shots before entering them into the blog became a real drudge. So this year, I've ditched the micro 4/3 gear and am now shooting entirely with my Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra. And, boy, has that proven to be a liberating experience.

Gone on these trips is my previous tendency to stop at an inviting visa, carefully compose shots, trying different lens and angles, struggling to get the optimal exposure, working hard to get the best possible shot. Nope. Riding the bike no longer allows for such luxuries. Now, I'm a certified (certifiable?) run & gunner, merrily snapping away taking no more than a few minutes to capture a scene. Then it's on to the next opportunity. 

I've been mostly impressed with the images that have come out of the Samsung. Certainly I think they've been of adequate quality for web based viewing such as is the case with Cycleblaze. The phone has a decent wide angle lens, a "normal" focal length lens and a medium telephoto lens, giving me enough flexibility to capture the image I'm looking for. I find that Samsung's camera app is well suited for this style of photography and haven't yet tried using, say, Lightroom's mobile app which undoubtedly would give me more post-processing capabilities. This is something I'll be exploring when I get home. In the meantime, I've stuck with Google Photos' processing app to add some punch, contrast or brightness to the captured images before posting them. If I'm being honest, I'd say that the files look a bit overcooked for my taste, but again the viewing audience is seeing these on a browser which I think hides a lot of faults. I'm really looking forward to printing some of these images at home on my 27" Epson printer to see just how far a highly processed jpeg image will look coming from a top notch printer.

You might have noticed that I've appeared in a lot more images this year, other than the usual selfies, of course. That's because Jill has started taking pictures with her cell phone, a Samsung S23 FE. This has been a wonderful development for me as she has shouldered some of the burdens of documenting our travels relieving me of feeling fully responsible for capturing everything we want to share. Integrating her shots into my workflow has been painless. We share our galleries through Google Photos, so it's easy for me to grab any of her shots while I'm working on mine. As the trip has gone along, her skills have definitely improved. I hope she'll keep up the great work!

All in all, I've been very happy with using the cell phone and doubt that I will return to using my OM-1 on trips like these. I look forward to honing my skills with the cell phone camera, perhaps introducing a bit more sophisticated post processing work flow but sticking with the light weight, ease of use cell photography has provided me. I hope you've enjoyed our blog and the photos we've shared with you.