Hey Mr., What's in the bag?

While writing the previous blog, I though to share what I carry in my main camera bag, more precisely my camera backpack. I always liked bags, but more often than not, I find I am needing my hands free for something else (tripod, 2nd bag, etc.), so I switched to a backpack.

Here it is all loaded up with gear:



I tried a couple couple different backpacks (by trial and error method) before settling on the Tamrac CyberPack 8. Tamrac has upgraded the outer fabric of the bag recently, but inside its the same.

I have a few things stuffed below the gear and that includes: Canon EF-12 & EF-25 extension tubes, Sto-fen Omni Bounce in White and Gold. Also I'm a big fan of the Tamrac N-45 Strap, and have two, one for each camera here.

In the lid of the backpack I keep an assortment of filters, cable releases, a tether cable, Inova flashlight, spare CF card, CF card reader & Firewire cable, Sharpies and extra business cards.

Two cameras at the same time

I've put some extra gear to my bag recently and decided that it was permanent addition. Basically I've been using my Canon G10 recently to document my shoots for this blog, that it was high time to let it live in my bag.

Previously I used the G10 on an intervalometer for time lapse, and just recently triggered via PocketWizard for the Oscar party (see previous blog). Recently I decided to take it to the next level. I have a Profoto Acute2 1200R power pack, which had a PW receiver built it, so all I need is the transmitter like so:


Which leaves the other half of the PW pair, the receiver, unused. So I slapped the receiver on my Canon G10, put it on a Leica Mini Tripod like so:


Now, when I take a picture, the Transmitter sens a signal to the Profoto, AND to the G10 at the same time. So as I shot that last photo of the G10, it shot this photo of me:


And of course that's how I took the first photo as well. The only caveat is that the G10 has about a 1/2 second delay between when you fire the main camera and the strobes trigger, and the shutter fires. So if you want it to look good, you have to pose a little, or just hold still for a second. Oh, and a second caveat is that if you're shooting really fast, the G10 won't have enough time to cycle for each shot, so you may get one in two or one in three.