Saturday, August 13, 2011

Be still my heart!



I finally broke down and bought a camera made in this century! It's an Olympus Pen E-PL2 with a micro four thirds, 12 megapixel sensor and a 14-42mm kit lens. That's equivalent to 28-84mm in a 35mm format. The maximum aperture is f3.5 at 14mm and it stops down to f22. This camera does everything a DSLR can do, but it's a smaller, lighter package. Still, with the kit lens attached it's not exactly pocketable, but that will change when I get a 17mm prime lens that's much shorter.

This is an HDR image of a storm front that came through yesterday afternoon. Oddly enough, it came from the northeast, when most storms approach from the west. Just after I took this, the gust front hit and temperatures dropped about 15 degrees in a matter of seconds. While we've had some much needed rain this week, this storm didn't drop any more water on us.

I worked today, another overtime shift that started at 4AM. At the end of it, I was exhausted, so I took the quick route home along US169. It's a limited access, four-lane highway. The road has the usual wide shoulder strewn with debris. In Oklahoma, it's legal to ride there, but it's not very pleasant.

As I approached the bridge over Bird Creek, a bicyclist was traveling north. She had just left the on-ramp and was riding on the shoulder. But at the bridge the shoulder almost disappears. It narrows to no more than 18 inches. I changed lanes before overtaking, but as I looked in my rear view, she was riding the perilously narrow shoulder as other traffic went by at 65-70mph without moving to the left at all. It would be nerve-wracking for me to attempt to ride there. Still, I have to admire her determination.

3 Comments:

Blogger PM Summer said...

Nice camera! I looked long and hard at that before going with the E-620 4/3rds instead (mainly an issue of a heck of a deal on the E-620).

...and congratulations on the weather breaking!

1:22 PM  
Blogger Ed W said...

PM, it's 'only' 95F here this afternoon, and it feels like springtime compared to the brutal 100+ temperatures of the last month and a half. Out in the sun, though, it's still stinkin' hot.

I originally wanted to wait for the E-PL3 that's supposed to be available next month, but SWMBO asked me what we would get Number One Son for his birthday, and...well...I could save some money buying the E-PL2. I have no regrets about that. Every time I use it, though, I have to go read the manual again. There's much to learn.

2:43 PM  
Blogger PM Summer said...

Ha! I discovered that the E-620 has the manual as part of the read-only memory in the camera!

I miss my Kodak Brownie™.

2:57 PM  

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