These were taken through the windows of a shuttle van going about 80 m.p.h. through the Virgin River Gorge (terrain map) between Las Vegas and Saint George, Utah. The image stabilization did a good job, though you can see some artifacts at the outside edges. Considering the adverse shooting conditions (and the fact that I was just hitting the trigger willy-nilly) I’m impressed by the quality. My older camera would have just captured a blur on most of these.

I was just using point and shoot basic autofocus mode with resolution and quality set to maximum. I would like a polarized filter to cut down on window reflections, but I’m not sure if they make those for point and shoots.

No color correction, unsharp masking, or retouching was done. Be sure to check out this full resolution one straight from the memory card.

Speaking of memory cards, having an 8GB memory stick equals over 2,200 pictures at highest quality. I also haven’t had to recharge my battery yet even after taking 250+ pictures with this camera. All that means you can just keep rapid snapping and get something good.

The Canon PowerShot DS1100IS is the best point and shoot I’ve ever had. It’s easy to use and travels light.

Click for huge version straight from the camera

Click to zoom in on the little guys

These are some of the quail that hang out in my dad’s back yard. This was shot through glass at 3x optical zoom.

Bonus fun fact: St. George got huge amounts of radioactive fallout from atomic bomb tests. This, plus x-rays from my upcoming dentist appointment, means I should be a rampaging green superhero in no time.

Related post: Make your own camera case out of duct tape