john's blog

I've been shooting photos on and off over the last 2-3 months for the second edition of our first guidebook, Dark Peak Mountain Biking . The original was very good - it arguably redefined mountain biking guidebooks - and I think this full second edition will be even better. We're also adding in OS maps - now industry standard, extra ride information, and generally just checking and tweaking stuff.

I've just started shooting for a new mountain biking guidebook to the Cotswolds that we'll publish in the autumn. It's always great to check out a completely new area, and I quite like the challenge of shooting at new locations - it keeps you on your toes. Here's a shot I quite like of the book's author Tom Fenton with his partner Hazel, not so far from Dursley.

Just returned from a week in Magic Wood (Averstal) in Switzerland. The focus was on the climbing but I still shot a clutch of decent shots. Here's one of Jon Fullwood climbing the incredible highball Blue Sky of Mine (Font 6a+). There's a circuit of about 30 highballs in Magic Wood, ranging from the steady (this one is about HVS in British money), through to jaw-dropping monsters such as Mauro's Line, which despite being 40 feet high, is also Font 7c. Very inspirational.

Kicked off the 2009 mountain year with a bang on Friday by taking the bike up Snowdon. My guides were Tom Hutton and Steph Duits - Tom is writing our forthcoming MTB guide to Wales, due out in the summer. What a day! Quite a lot of it is rideable, but you have to be prepared to push, and my fitness was clearly lacking when it came to the slog up the railway path to the summit. The highlights were the awesome descent to Llanberis from the notch south east of Foel Goch, and the brilliant descent of the Snowdon Ranger Path back to the car at the Snowdon Ranger Station.

Pretty pleased to discover I've landed another cover, this time it's the March 2009 issue of Climb Magazine. The shot is of Adam Long climbing the super-classic boulder problem Attention Chef d'Œuvre (Font 7a) at Buthiers in the forest of Fontainebleau, France.

The light was fading that day so I used two off-camera lights to pop a bit of contrast into the shot. I also used 1/4 CTO gels on the lights to add a bit of warmth.