I’m on vacation this week. One of my goals for this block of time off was to get out of the apartment for a bit and point my (actual, not phone) camera at some (actual, not virtual) trees and such for a couple of hours. It was too hot the last couple of days to do it, and Monday I had an appointment to keep, so today was my first chance. I got the camera charged up, threw it into the camera bag, and off I went. My chosen destination? The arboretum up at Washington Park. My chosen project? To see if the “burst mode” of my camera (a Panasonic Lumix DC-FZ80) would allow me to do hand-held photography and still get usable results better than half of the time.

I briefly considered going into either the zoo or the forestry center but decided that I wasn’t going to get much photography done at the latter and the former would only be entertaining if I’d brought one or more duckies along. (I did not. I was traveling light, carrying only the small camera bag instead of the full backpack.)

So, straight into the Hoyt Arboretum I went.

And that meant starting at the Vietnam Veterans Memorial, which is a lovely arrangement of paths and plant life and monuments.

The site features a lovely spiraling walkway past a series of monuments, marked for individual years of the conflict, bearing names of the fallen and/or missing.

Once past the Memorial I basically meandered in the vaguely general direction of the arboretum’s Visitor Center, guided by the occasional map placard along the trails. Climbing, meandering, climbing some more, and random photography ensued:

Eventually I reached the Visitors Center.

Which I entered, perused briefly, then exited having spent no money. (I had no practical way to carry any purchases around without basically putting a stop to further photography efforts.) By this point I realized that continuing onward (such as toward the rose gardens) would result in absolute physical misery by the time I got home, so I turned around and started my way back to the MAX station.

Know your limitations, right? Right.

All in all, it was a lovely day. The sky was in that “hazy high clouds glare” mode most of the time, but that was preferable to “clear and blazing hot,” never mind what used to be the norm for Rose Festival season. (Constant drizzle.) And as you can see above, the camera did its job! I didn’t end up with very many blurry options to choose from but even within the options from each individual “shoot” I was able to select the result I liked most. I like having options, and not having too many options is even better.

(The manual claimed I’d get about eight images per press of the shutter button, but I got more like three or four at a go, sometimes five. However: That first stairway photo? The camera gave me seven images to choose from on that shot. I have no idea.)

The main downside I’m noticing is that objects toward the edge of frame are… fuzzy. That might be an image stabilization artifact. Next time out I think I’ll turn that feature off in favor of relying on the burst mode. Further experimentation is required and welcomed.

On top of the photography results I also got some exercise in the fresh air, didn’t strain anything, broke in my new pair of shoes (purchased two days ago) nicely, and visited a place I’d never been before.

Absolute victory.