gdanmitchell
Offline
• • • • • • •
Upload & Sell: Off
|
 p.1 #14 · p.1 #14 · Best Lenses for European Street Scenes & Countrysides? | |
Though this goes a bit past the original question, I want to share a bit about my personal perspective on travel photography gear. (And let me start by acknowledging that there is a lot of subjective, conditional stuff when it comes to this subject — ranging from personal preferences, to the role of photography in the overall experience of travel, to the particular subjects you'll photograph.)
I use a fairly large Canon system for much of my photography, typically done from the tripod. I carry a lot of stuff when I go into the field for that photography. Until over a decade ago I basically adapted that system for travel, initially by trying to limit the number of zoom lenses I took to 2 or 3 and eventually to use a few small primes in place of some of the zooms, depending on where I went and what I'd photograph. I gradually moved toward a general minimum Canon-based travel kit that used only the 24-105mm lens, though specialized needs would change that. I was once asked to photograph a musical event NYC and ended up carrying a 135mm f/2, for example.
Then I had a travel epiphany about a decade ago. We were headed out on a European trip of a couple of weeks duration when I took a look at a smaller alternative. Today there are multiple options, but I got a very small Fujifilm APS-C camera (the original XE1) with a couple of small primes and — because I still thought I needed it — a 55-200mm zoom. Instead of dragging along a dedicated "camera bag" or backpack, the whole mess fit into a medium size messenger bag... along with my laptop and all the personal gear I'd keep with me on the plane.
Over a period of year or two I realized that I could photograph virtually every subject I would encounter with a very small prime-only kit. For the kind of photography I do when traveling to mostly urban US and European places, there are advantages to having a smaller, lighter kit that outweigh the concern that if I don't take everything I might be unable to photograph some outlier subject. No matter how much gear you carry, there will always be something that you aren't equipped for in an ideal way. And, as I eventually realized, there are often ways to photograph a subject effectively with the gear you have.
Some of the advantages of the smaller and lighter approach:
1. We prefer to rely entirely on carry-on luggage, even on quite lengthy (up to a couple of months) overseas trips. When I carry the big gear on flights (as we did just last October when we photographed fall color in New England, the luggage situation becomes more complicated and it is almost impossible to avoid checking luggage. With the small gear this isn't a problem.
2. Once on the ground at our destination and as we travel around "locally" but car, bus, train, plane, and on foot... the smaller gear is again much easier to manage. Typically I'll have a travel pack on my back with the messenger-style bag over my shoulder.
3. When in a location and going out to photograph, I can use the same messenger-style bag — which doesn't look like a camera bag. I think I look less like "tourist with a big camera slung over his shoulder" this way, which lets me photograph places and subjects where that traditional look might be detrimental. Basically I work "fast and light." Not incidentally, the light and small gear also weighs me down a lot less as I travel around cities.
4. While I bring along several primes, because I shoot APS-C they are pretty small. And I almost never carry all of them at once when I go out to shoot. Most often for daytime photography I carry only a single lens, an APS-C 27mm f/2.8 pancake. If I think I'm going to shoot in tighter spaces I add a small 14mm f/2.8. If Think I'll need something longer I add a 90mm lens. Worst case, three lenses. When I shoot at night I likely leave all of those locked up at the hotel and substitute two f/1.4 primes.
5. I know there's a fear that with limited lenses and with primes that we might get caught without the focal length we need. It can happen. But the truth is that this even happens when I'm using by bigger Canon kit for landscape photography and something happens fast. We never can count on have exactly the right gear and enough time to set it up, even if we carry a gigantic kit. And it turns out, at least for me, that the number of subjects that I actually cannot photograph effectively with this kit is extremely tiny.
If someone had told me 20 years ago that this is what would end up being my favorite — and, honestly, most effective — kit for travel photography I would never have believed them. But it is.
YMMV,
Dan
|
