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:mrgreen:
Interested to know why two bodies are neccesary.
If you keep good care of your primary camera body, it will perform for any trip, and a small instant camera of suitable quality can provide an acceptable option for the worst eventuality, such as having your main camera stolen etc.wide angle to telephoto can be incorporated into a single lens these days (at a price) and a 2 x converter (or 1.5 x) will extend your focal length if really necessary. Just ensure your lens is a fast one, as the converters will lose you a whole stop of light.
Assuming your “third” lens is a macro, I expect that’s quite a small lens, anyway.
No. 10-20, 18-70 and 70-200
And I am guessing a camera body has never decided to pack up on you while your in buttfucknowhere. ;)
@SRR – Yeah, Lee is a slack bastard like that ;)I have a buddy who is a contract combat cameraman with the Army, he uses a S.O. Tech Go Bag to tote his camera gear
http://specopstech.com/osc/product_info.php?products_id=1714&osCsid=3de6f3f35de58c3d21a02e210b239441
~JITW
@Lee wrote:
SRR, are we talking about The Long Haul to Dolisie?
I sent a brand spanking new story to editor at polosbastards dot com on March 17. Don’t tell me ya lost it? :roll:
@ROB wrote:
My gear is getting a bit out of hand.
2 dslr bodies and 3 lenses. Plus all the filters and rechargers etc starts to weigh a lot. A lot more than is officially allowed in carry-on luggage.
But I don’t want to check my camera gear.
What do you do?
It depends on where and what. No good carrying tonnes of back-breaking gear which will slow you down and which you won’t realistically use.
If you are doing crowds, then it needs to be light and easy to hide, especially if the crowds are likely to turn hostile, which they most likely will. Alcohol or no alcohol, lots of people generally mean high spirits and the possibility of aggression. Then you have to decide how close you want to get and how much courage you have in the nut sack. If you are going to get close, then keep it light and low profile, with short, wide angle lenses and none of that weekend warrior battery pack and big grip shit. They only add weight and make it hard to hide the gear. Flashes depend on the available light, but remember that flashes freak people out, so try to think about the time of day.
Don’t dick around and don’t make it up as you go along. Decide on your shot before you go in, where you will take it, how to get there and what to do if it all turns ugly. This is not DP shit. It can just as easily happen at a wedding or birthday party, something I can personally attest to. If you want to get close, then think about your gear. An iPhone may be as good as the next camera, unless you are shooting a royal portrait. You won’t stand out in the melee if you have something similar to the rest of the fans, but what will make a crucial difference is your skill level, so practice, practice, practice with your camera phone at home – 99% of the other idiots won’t have a clue what they are doing and your skill will get you paid. Whipping out a big bazooka camera will only lead to penis envy which will lead to hostility. Save the big expensive lenses for the long range big money shots of Kate Middleton getting her tits out.
If you do decide to use your Leica, Canon, Nikon etc, up close then be prepared to lose it, or at the very least bash someone over the head with it, who may dent the lovely finish. A built in flash may be good enough up close if the light is crap, but be prepared to have the external flash ripped off in the melee, so buy cheap ones for crowd jobs and keep the broken ones. I have found that they make for excellent ‘stun’ guns in crowd situations. Keep one loaded and ready and close to hand in case things get ugly and be prepared to give it to some fucker full in the eyes if he or his mates get uppity. They are also good for dogs, horses and other obnoxious snappers. Have the flash turned up to the max and give him the full epileptic strobe to the brain. Make sure the batteries are fully charged because you may have to repeat the action almost immediately.
Keep a good filter on the lens to stop the flying piss and spittle and bits of stone damaging the glass. Carry a couple of them in shoulder pockets as extra protection for when some fucker thinks it is a good idea to punch you there and instead gets glass in his knuckles. Keeping them in the shoulder pockets makes it easier to access them in an emergency.
There is no harm in carrying a spare body, but you’d better have a damn good plan. Keep them both loaded and ready to rock, and no fucking extra lenses. You won’t have the time to change them in the rush. Work out the odds of getting close in a fast moving situation and only go for the longer lens if the situation gets beyond your control/the subject moves out of range/doesn’t come as close as they said they would. Again, think about the light and how many flash guns you need to carry. If the subject gets close enough for the smaller lens and the light is adequate, then you may not require a cumbersome external flash, so use the internal one instead, or not at all, depending on the light.
An extra body with a longer lens may mean carrying an external flash, which means more weight and clutter, depending on the light. Don’t bet on the fact that blue skies and sunshine means you won’t need a flash. The fucking subject may look for shade, meaning that he needs a blast of artificial sun from a flash gun which has enough candles to light him up. You’ll feel like a right prick if the flash doesn’t have the required range.
Keep plenty (lots and lots – they are not made of lead) of memory cards and change them frequently. Don’t fuck about. If you think you have the money shot, then immediately change the memory card and stick it up your vagina and replace it with a spare. Pop off a few shots onto the spare, assuming it is a blank. Some goons may insist that you wipe it, or hand it over, so keep a card with some relevant pix which you can afford to wipe/lose/hand over. Be quick and be sneaky and practice like your life depends on it, which it may well do. Your kids won’t eat tonight if you fuck up, or see their mommy/daddy ever again if you really fuck up.
The baseplate for a tripod which is screwed onto the bottom of a camera often has sharp edges, which is useful for dissuading nasties from trying too hard to paw your gear, especially when they get it in the face/head. A light mono/tripod with sharp feet and/or a good, hard head is a useful addition. It can help steady the camera during a swaying crowd and is also useful for jabbing people like a cattle prod in the buttocks/balls/belly/beak when we all get emotional. It can also give you midgets a bit of height in a crowd situation, assuming you also thought about packing a cable release or remote release.
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