Capture The Outdoors



When I first started hill walking and getting more involved in the outdoors I never bothered to take a camera with me. Now, this was partly due to  a young foolish belief that I didn't need to take pictures as I would easily remember all of my walks. Guess what, I didn't. Another thing was I was too lazy to get the film developed, even if I did take a camera. This changed a few years back after walking the West Highland Way. I would get asked to show my pictures so they could get an idea of what it was like. Obviously, I ended up looking stupid when I mentioned that I didn't bother taking pictures. I got lucky, a friendly Australian named Mick, who I met on the Way, shared his pictures with me. I took a camera on the Ulster Way in 2005, only to leave it behind on the Giant's Causeway (I think) and since that event I have made sure I have taken plenty of images of each trip. I can now account for an extra hour of my walk being attributed to standing taking pictures. I'm now at the stage where I am working with  almost 3 devices to help me capture the outdoors, when I'm walking, I've outlined each below. The aim of this is to highlight what I use to take pictures of the outdoors and not necessarily a product review of each device. 

Camera

Camera Image

Christmas 9 years I got a new camera. I had been using a Sony compact camera but this new one was a Fuji bridge camera. The camera produces decent images, despite my poor attempts at framing some of the hills around me. It has been basic enough that it has enabled me to try the manual settings on a few occasions, I've found these images to be ever so slightly better quality than those shot on the auto setting. I've only just realised, recently that I have had the aspect ratio set to 16:9 which, the final image size is 10MP. I used this for landscape images but forgot about the quality of the output. I know try and mix up the aspect ratio and shoot the same scene in different ratios. The next stage for me will be upgrading to a mirrorless camera with interchangeable lenses. 

Mobile Phone

 Phone Image

Over the years I have mainly owned basic mobile phones. Until recently I have focused on storage capacity. This means I have went with the standard phone offered by the network supplier. I noticed late last year that the pictures I had taken didn't look great, quality wise. I decided to change to another phone, a Sony, which has a 24MP camera. Now this isn't a product review but this certainly helped to improve the quality of my pictures taken on the fly. Before upgrading, I had noticed that my images were often blurry. My old phone didn't have the image stabilisation option set as a default so this would have to be set each time before taking pictures. The panoramic setting was also very poor. I know that even though this Sony phone is fairly decent it is also quite a few years old and there are better options out there. I've always liked the idea of working with a phone and camera when outdoors. Some people may think that one would be enough and it maybe  pointless to use both. However, I've seen it as giving myself more options when out and about. 

The Drone

This is a new acquisition, and one I have only used in a few occasions. The image at the top of the blog is an example of its camera. This was also a really windy day. The camera on the drone shows at 8MP, the drone is decent enough with enough features that you do get a lot for your money, the drone was less than £70. I will do a proper review on this once I have had a chance to use it a few more times. To be honest, I haven't had the chance to use this during a hike yet so it will be good to see this performs in the wild. 

It would be good to hear from others about what they use to when taking pictures of the outdoors.
Do you use more than one device?
Or, is there any camera or phone that you would recommend? Any answers would be most welcome. 

Remember, stay safe everyone and thanks. 

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