Top Ten tips for road bike photography

I've been without my road bike for about a week now. In its absence, I've been looking at photos that others have taken of their own bikes. After looking at literally hundreds of bicycle photos, I started to see a few recurring themes. Here are ten tips for taking some really great photos of your skinny-tired pride and joy:

10) All photographs of your road bike must be of the right side so that the crank, chain and derailleurs can be seen in all their glory. This is especially important if you have Shimano Dura-Ace, SRAM Red or Campagnolo Record components.

9) It is preferred that your cranks be turned so that they are parallel with the chainstay, with the drive-side crank and pedal extending toward the front, or parallel with the seat tube extending downward. This rule may only be broken in certain situations.

8) Your bike must be in the highest gear possible. Use the smallest cog in the back and the big chainring. The world needs to know that you are strong and never need to use any gear aside from 54x11.

So far, it looks like this bike's owner has got it made. He even meets some of the other criteria mentioned later on. But he fails miserably at the next one.


7) Your bike must be leaning against a white garage door. Off-white is sometimes acceptable, but anything else is not. If you have a garage, it is your obligation as a road cyclist to paint the door white so that you can take proper photographs of your bicycle.



6) If, like me, you do not have a garage, you must find the most bizarre location possible, and you must prop the bike up by leaning the left pedal against a brick, pole, or some other device capable of holding the bicycle upright with the pedal and two wheels acting as a tripod. Simply leaning your bike against some random wall for a photo is forbidden and punishable by making fun of you at Starbucks. It is often easier (and recommended) to find someone else's white garage door for your photo-op.



5) There should be some part of a car visible in your bicycle photo. It's preferred that this is a luxury or performance car of some sort. Lexus and Mercedes models are very popular cars to include in a bicycle photo, as are Corvettes, WRX's and Evo's. Failing that, it seems that a Mini Cooper or speedboat are acceptable substitutes.



4) SPD-R, Speedplay and Look Keo are the only acceptable pedals for a road bike that's being photographed. Plain old SPDs or Time Atacs will get you laughed at. Platforms or toe clips might get you caned with a frame pump at your next group ride.



3) Your tire valves must both be pointing the same direction. Straight up or straight down seem to be the trend.



2) Carbon bottle cages or no bottle cages. Make no exceptions.

1) It should go without saying that your bicycle should be perfectly clean with absolutely no signs of use or wear whatsoever. Some people still don't get it and insist on posting photographs where the bar tape is dirty or -- heaven forbid -- scuffed! These bikes have obviously been ridden and are not worthy of being photographed.

At least this guy got 1 and 2 right.


Oddly enough, I couldn't find THE PERFECT road bike photo where the photographer took all ten tips into consideration.

Top 10: Tips for transportation cycling

I've been saying this for a while, but spring is practically here. With it comes "driving season" and increasing gasoline prices. More importantly, though, people are starting to wipe the dust off of their bikes and hit the paths. Whether you ride for fun every year, or you've not even sat on a bike in a decade or more, here are some tips to help you out if you plan on riding your bike instead of driving for some of your trips this year.

10) Learn basic bicycle maintenance. If you're replacing your car with a bicycle for some of your shorter trips, you will probably be riding your bicycle more miles than you used to, or you may be riding a bike for the first time in a while. Park Tool and Sheldon Brown both have excellent instructions for bicycle repair. Start with the basics: Cleaning and lubricating your chain, fixing a flat tire, or maybe adjusting your brakes and shifters. In the dead of summer, it might take a week to get your bike back from the shop if you take it in for a flat tire. You can fix it yourself with very few tools, and it's easier than you may think.

9) Get some tools. This goes with #10, but you should have enough tools to do minor adjustments to your bike. Honestly, I got by for almost six months needing no more tools than what came on the Park MTB-3 multi-tool. I keep it with me while commuting for road-side repairs.

8) Learn how to pick a good route. Don't think like a driver. Instead, think of lesser-known roads that may be a block or two away from the big roads you normally drive on. Think of little alleyways or sidewalks between cul-de-sacs, and how you can utilize multi-use paths. If in doubt, check out Veloroutes or other cycling map sites to see if anyone has plotted some good routes. You may also ask in the bike forums regional discussions to see if someone local knows some decent routes.

7) Logistics. Figure out how you're going to get yourself, your stuff, and your bike to and from your destination and stored safely, and get a plan laid out. This is mostly concerning commuting to work by bicycle, but you should also have some idea of how you're going to handle your errands if you should choose to do those by bike as well. Securing your bike, cleaning up if you get dirty or sweaty, and transporting your clothes are things to think about.

6) Take The Lane! Tim Grahl put together an excellent article outlining five reasons to claim the lane with your bike. I can't convey it any better than he did. By staying off of the main arterials, you usually avoid the necessity to use sidewalks. They still have their place for certain situations, but if you're not commuting on a bike path, you should probably be commuting out in the middle of the road where you can be seen.

5) Be visible. Bright colors. Reflective materials on you and your bike. High contrast. At least one bright, red tail light should be lit up even during the day. A second, blinking light is great, too. Headlights when it's dim outside, and a blinking front light even during the day is a good idea. Always, always have DOT-legal reflectors on your bike. There's no good reason not to. It doesn't matter how "cool" you think you look on your bike. To drivers, cyclists on the road all look dorky. Might as well go all out, right?

4) Don't skimp on the bike. I know this hurts to think about, but bikes you find at sporting goods stores, toy aisles of big-box stores and the like are sold and marketed as toys. Things that 100-pound 13-year-olds will ride for a summer and forget about. You wouldn't buy a Power Wheels to get you around town, would you? If you already have an old bike, there's not much harm in getting it fixed up and checked out. If you're going to buy a new bike, I recommend going to a specialty bicycle shop. If you can find a used bike cheap that the shop tech agrees will hold up to your riding, you could get away with spending under $150. Otherwise, consider the $350 price point "entry level" for new mountain and hybrid bikes, and $500 the entry level for new road bikes. You're shopping for a replacement vehicle, not a toy. If unsure, browse the new CBB Commuter Bikes Database for bike ideas.

3) Give yourself some time to adjust. It took me a few weeks to get my routine figured out and for my body to get used to riding a bike again.

2) Learn your local "village". Knowing all those little shops near your home, near your popular destinations (such as work, parks, etc) and along the way is a great way to find stuff that's easily reachable on a bike. You might be surprised by what is nearby. After looking around, I found that there are few places I need to go that are more than 2 miles from my home or office.

1) Stay motivated. Come up with fun goals or get a riding buddy to keep yourself motivated. Soon enough, you'll be hooked!

Top 10: why many bike bloggers work in IT

More than 3/4 of the bike bloggers whose writings I peruse definitely work in IT, either as worker bees like myself or in IT management. There are a handful of others that I suspect work in IT but I'm not certain about. Then there are a few who are definitely NOT IT folks. Even among the non-blogging bike commuters I know, there's a similar bias towards techy folks. What's with the disparity? I have my own thoughts on it. This isn't commuting specific, but there seems to be a tie between bicycles, geeks, and bloggers. Here are 10 of my primary speculations for this seemingly unfair balance of us versus them.

10) This is the Internet -- arguably, geeks are the home team around here. Not specific to bicycles, most bloggers have technical tendencies. If you're looking at blogs on the Internet, you're going to find mostly tech-savvy writers.

9) Blogging has a certain social aspect to it, regardless if you're just ranting about life, writing a bunch of short stories, posting your photos or artwork, or working on a serious, industry-relavent blog. IT geeks seem to enjoy the intersection of technology and social circles.

8) Many problems that IT workers face require time alone and away from the problems to work through in their mind. While this is true for many professions, I think a lot of IT-working bike riders use their bike riding time to sort out their thoughts. I know I do.

7) Working in IT teaches you to make adjustments for the sake of efficiency. Applied to real life, it's easy to see that bicycling is an efficient mode of transportation for certain tasks.

6) After dealing with spreadsheets, programming languages, and being stuck "in the matrix" all day, there's something about metal, rubber, sprockets and levers that makes you feel like a real person again.

5) Most office workers sit at a desk all day long. Most IT workers are office workers. Many of these people sit on their butts in their cars, at their desks, and at home. Bike commuting offers them a reason and some motivation to get some exercise.

4) Cooped up in an office is no way to spend a life. A car is usually even more cramped. You have seemingly infinite room to decompress when you're on a bike.

3) Ditching the Information overload. Facts, figures, names, policies, places, numbers, graphs, stats, procedures, schedules, commands, configurations, prices... UGH! At the end of the day, sometimes I just want to hammer out some mindless miles so that there's absolutely nothing pestering me by the time I get home. I can only imagine this is one good reason that anyone with a stressful job would want to bike commute.

2) IT people multi-task without even thinking about it. We're not talking about reading the NY Times while shaving, brushing teeth, drinking coffee and attempting to get to work. There's something blissful about getting time to think, getting where you need to go, and getting your daily cardio all at the same time.

1) Writing regularly in structured sentences, often in narrative form is completely different from most office communication. This exercises different parts of the mind, keeps things interesting, and provides a creative outlet for those who don't have time for more involved expression.

Top 10 reasons that March rocks my socks

10. Somehow, March is one of the few months of the year where there's very little chance of both tornadoes and blizzards.

9. Less sick people to avoid.

8. The road bike and mountain bike switch roles (primary commuter vs. recreation)

7. People will finally quit calling me crazy for riding a bicycle in the cold. Now, they'll just call me crazy for riding the whole way in traffic.

6. Grass and trees are coming back to life. While brown and white are cool, I'm about sick of them.

5. More daylight for evening rides, but we get plunged back into darkness for the morning commute as of today.

4. The trails will probably dry up sometime this month for the first time since November.

3. More bike-only commuting.

2. I might actually make my target miles for the month (thanks to #3)

1. Temperatures finally stay reliably above freezing! I think...

Top 10 things I hate about "Green"

A lot of the things I do are environmentally friendly. I believe in being responsible with resources, from personal resources like money to common resources like the air we all breathe. I believe in stewardship, and I believe in taking care of things. That said, I am not an environmentalist. I don't hurt for the Earth. I don't go out of my way to do things on the sole basis that it will save the planet.

You can be green without falling into the "Green Consumerism" trap. Here are 10 things that irk me.

10. Specialty Organic-Food markets. Mostly, I despise the culture that surrounds these overprices places, but they tug at the heart-strings of people who want to exude smug greenness in their lives.

Farmer's markets and even large grocery stores often sell organic foods at more reasonable prices.


9. Carbon Credits and Carbon Offsets. Because money trumps responsibility.

I think it goes without saying that many corporations could do better to reduce their environmental impact on their own.


8. Ethanol made from corn. Seriously, folks. What are you thinking? When food and fuel compete, everyone loses.

In places like Brazil where more efficient (and less readily edible) plants such as sugar cane exists for making ethanol, it's not a bad thing. Here in the US, ethanol from switchgrass might be one answer. Walking or riding a bike for even part of those really short trips you make sounds like a much better idea.


7. Epic "Greeninating" projects. Tearing apart a building to re-do all of the insulation, windows, and HVAC systems to "go green" might be good for a tax credit, but it takes a lot of resources to move all those awesome, efficient construction materials. Then, what happens with all the construction waste?

Efficient building materials are expensive, but often worth the investment when building a new structure.


6. Sending hundreds of pounds of appliances to the landfill in the name of "Green." Replacing all of your 5-year-old stuff with shiny, new eco-friendly gear is a great way to make the company you keep "Green" with envy, but it's also irony defined.

Again, simple things like turning off lights, taking shorter showers, adjusting the thermostat on your water heater and climate control system at home will go a long way. Much like choosing efficient building materials, choosing efficient appliances as part of a new home isn't a bad idea.


5. Buying smugness at the cash register with re-usable "Green" (sometimes in color, always in marketing) canvas bags sold by grocery stores. The ones I saw at Hy-Vee were made in China. Assuming they weren't made in a sweat-shop by children who crank these out for a wage of pennies per day, there's still a great amount of irony in the amount of resources that were used simply to get these modern marvels of environmental friendliness into stores here in the US.

Instead, take your own backpacks or duffel bags along. Personally, I load up my panniers. On a side note, you could get bonus points for getting things from farmers' markets and buy things that were driven from halfway across the state instead of being shipped halfway around the world.


4. Hybrid gas-electric vehicles. More than 100 pounds of toxic, difficult-to-recycle battery materials go into each one. Much like "Green" appliances, at the end of the day it's just one more car on the road in addition to the (not Green) one you probably sold or gave to your kid. Those are just two of the many problems with hybrids.

In the long run, small cars powered by low-displacement gasoline or turbodiesel engines will save more money. Technology has come a long way, and many of these cars burn just as clean as a hybrid.


3. Plug-in hybrids and electric-only vehicles. These are not a panacea -- in fact, they're a less viable solution than traditional gas-electric hybrids. You see, the US still gets most of its electricity from coal-fired power plants. Most vehicles that leech from the power grid are essentially coal-burning vehicles. Once you figure the inefficiency of power transmission to the home, charging circuitry and electricity storage in the vehicle itself, it stops looking so sweet.

I could nod my head to EVs getting their daily fix from a solar or wind power source, though.


2. Guilt. Pack your bags; We're going on a guilt trip in a new GMC Yukon Hybrid! No one likes a guilt-tripper, and given the irony of some of the above points, it should come as no surprise that it's hard to be taken seriously when you're puffing your chest out while causing more harm than good with your Green antics.

Leading by example and encouraging others to make small, simple changes is a much better way to get the message across.


1. Consumerism. This sums up a lot of the previously mentioned items.

Until "Green" actually becomes more about conservation or simplicity and less about how much new stuff you can buy (and how much old, inefficient stuff you can send to the landfill) you'll have a hard time convincing me that the Green movement is about the green rainforests instead of the green-lined pockets.