The ubiquitous gear shot…

… Or what’s in the bag.

I leave tomorrow for Africa – Sudan and then on to Tanzania once again – a four week trip covering the work of an NGO and then shooting a personal project.  I will be staying in some remote areas with little or no access to electricity and most likely will be doing quite a bit of trekking and overnight camping.  So for this trip, I’ve boiled my kit down to bare bones, and then added lots of spare batteries and memory.

The photo above is of my ‘day’ kit – what I’ll be carrying with me each and every day.

• Nikon D3 and Nikon D2X.  The D2X is an older body that I bought for underwater use, and will be my backup.  I’ll also use it with the 85mm f1/4.
• 24-70mm f/2.8.  My ‘working’ lens lens, and one that will be on the D3 the majority of the time.  A very useful focal length and a great lens.
• 50mm f/1.4.  Once the light drops in the evening or very early in the morning, the 50mm will be on the D3.  I love this lens and once you hit f/2.0 – 2.8, it is very sharp indeed.
• 85mm f/1.4.  Rented from Lenses For Hire.  A wonderful lens with beautiful bokeh – a perfect portrait lens.  I’ll be using this on both my D3 and D2x.
• Ricoh GRD.  Point and shoot with a fixed 24mm lens.  It’s always nice to have a camera as unobtrusive as the Ricoh – you never know when it might be useful.
• SB-900, SB-600 and SU-800.  The SU-800 allows me to use the two strobes in wireless ttl, but I’ll also be carrying a ttl cord in case of problems.
• Cable/battery bag.  Lots of random bits of kit like diffusers, cleaning cloths, cable release and lenspen, and plenty of spare batteries for the bodies and strobes.  My camera ‘go-to’ bag
• Mesh bag.  Again, lots of random bits of kit including a bracket for the softbox, ball bungee cords, tape, leatherman, screwdrivers etc.  My lighting ‘go-to’ bag.
• Elemental 50×50 softbox and reflector.  Lighting gear.  Easy and fast to set up and when broken down, small and light – perfect to clip on to the side of my bag.  I also carry a small lumiquest Softbox III.
• Zoom H2 audio recorder.  This will be the first time I will be recording audio as well as shooting.  I am planning on producing a few multi-media SoundSlide shows from this trip and I’ll use the H2 to record interviews and ambient sound.
• Memory – I’ll be carrying just short of 50Gb of cards for the cameras and 6Gb for the H2.
• ThinkTank Airport Antidote.  A great travel bag.  Once I am at my destination, I’ll dump my laptop and slip my lighting gear/water bottle into the empty pocket.  The internal pockets are filled with gels, more spare batteries, filters and a few other bits of kit.  I will be doing some more serious trekking on this trip – a good test of how comfortable the bag is.  I will let you know!
• Notebook, rocket blower, hat and sunnies.  Essential items.  All stuffed in wherever they will go.

Whats not shown:

• Laptop and hard drive.  I won’t be carrying these whilst I am out and about.  I’ll have enough battery power and memory to last a good few days in the event of problems with gen sets, or having no access to power.
• Tripod and lightstand.  Both of these will be in a single bag slung over my shoulder or strapped to the side of my bag.
• Collapsible water bottles, torch, sunblock and handkerchiefs for mopping my sweaty brow.  More essentials.

What I would like to add:

• 24mm f/1.4.  I would love a wide, fast prime but I cannot justify the cost at the moment.
• 70-200mm VR II.  Probably my next purchase and a great working lens.  With the 24-70mm, I’ll have good coverage for general shooting.  I decided against using the 70-200 VR II on this trip because of weight but ideally, I would like to have the option of putting this in my bag.  However, I do prefer to shoot wide and close rather than sniping away from a distance and so I see this lens as a must for general work, rather than personal projects.
• 17-35mm.  Get close and shoot wide.  An older lens but very sharp and it would be very nice indeed to have the option of shooting a little wider that the 24-70mm.

Beyond camera gear, I’ll be packing the absolute bare essentials.  Last month my check-in bag, with tripod and lightstand plus clothing etc, weighed in at 13kg – light enough to lug around in airports, on buses and on the back of bikes.  My aim is to get it down a little further for this trip.

Wish me luck – I’ll be without internet access for much of the trip, so expect lots of updates towards the end of April.

No related posts.

This entry was posted on Monday, March 29th, 2010 at 1:45 pm. It is filed under Travel and tagged with Africa, Equipment. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.