Whats in your BAG?

[masdog]

I know this may sound stupid, but what is a neutral density filter?

[Lionheart]

I think everyone know what I shoot and with what, so I will not go into that. But I am some what suprised to see no one carries the camera manuel with them. Maybe I'm odd but I like to have the manuel along as backup just in case something comes up I'm not sure about. It goes in a a flat pocket in the camera bag and rides along when ever the camera goes out. I will usely have either lens cleaning tissue or a micro fiber cloth to remove any dust of dirt that might come my lenses way. The other think I try to have is pen and paper in case I need to jot down some notes on a particular shot. And I know this may be odd but I always carry an old pair of Wal mart reading glasses in the bag just in case, it's real pain if you can't see to make camera adjustments and read the menu.

I carry the manual for the 1D in the camera bag. It's a must because the camera and the small carry bag gets shared by the four partners in the practice, and I'm the only one who knows most of the features and controls on the camera.

[another view]

Using a neutral density (ND) filter is like putting sunglasses on your camera. It doesn't affect color (hence "neutral") and is usually two, three or four stops. If you want to use a slower shutter speed or wider aperture than you can based on the light conditions, add one of these filters and that will give you however many stops the filter is rated for.

The graduated ND filter Steve mentioned is dark on one side and clear on the other. Usually there's a small area in between the dark and light that blends them together. A lot of landscape photographers use them to keep detail in the sky but not have the ground be in complete shadow. A two stop GND will make the sky two stops darker and keep the ground where it's at, in terms of exposure. If you're going to use these, definately use the square ones so that the dark and light areas can be adjusted up and down, depending on your composition. Cokin, Lee and Singh-Ray make them, price ranges from about $20 to over $100. You'll need a Cokin "P" style adapter to mount them, or two little pieces of gaffer's tape which is what I've been using lately.

[Asylum Steve]

Thanks, Steve. Like he says, an ND filter cuts the amount of light reaching your lens without altering the color balance or tonal relationships of a scene. The most common NDs are one, two, and three stop filters.

A good example of when you might want to use one would be a very bright scene where (for whatever reason), you need a slow shutter speed AND a wide open aperture, and your slowest (lowest) ISO still doesn't give you an acceptable exposure....

Or, you may be shooting a very fast film for its grain properties, but still want a slow shutter speed to capture motion, or a wide open aperture for shallow depth of field.

Or, you may be using a time exposure to capture light trails of car tail lights, but don't want a nearby street light to burned out your highlights.

I use them them especially when I want to underexpose the bg of an outdoor (daylight) scene, lighting my model with a flash. If you took a series of shots, the first one with no filter, then one with each ND filter, and increased the power of the flash each time, you'd have a group of pics where the illumination of the model would be the same, but the bg would get progressively darker and darker. This often adds a dramatic effect and style ot the shot...

[JSPhoto]

hmmm, I never take a manual... I do take a notebook though. I have two, one that has all the schools I shoot at, it lists the school name, what to shoot at (settings) for each lens in each of the schools venus such as football field, baseball/softball field, soccer field, gym, aux gym, pool and so on, I also do the same for each race track, and for each turn and victory lane. So it's just a quick look at the notebook and ready to shoot... no manuals needed.

JS

[Asylum Steve]

That's a smart idea. But then again, it just makes sense for you, and saves you a lot of time.

Me, I rarely shoot at the same location twice. And my DSLRs are still (even after a couple of years or so) so new technically, that when I do things like fiddle with curtain sync or flash compensation, or RAW or jpeg resolution or color space, it's much quicker to look at "the book" rather than just scroll aimlessly through camera menus...

[masdog]

I have a little spiral bound memo book for settings, but since I only shoot one location right now, I don't really need to write them down. I should probably start making a habit of it, though.

[Cowgirl]

Outdoors-
Compass, map, snickers bar, water -- grins!

People/Weddings-
Strong tape, all in one knife. At one job I had to reinforce my hotshoe flash as the plastic foot broke while shooting formals. I was so glad that I had some tape!

Kathy

[Franglais]

I am trying to get everything that I could need out in the field. Being that a lot of you are pro, semi pro or just the well educated armature I figured I would ask what I am missing. I know there are different situations where you need specific equipment I just would like to know the most common. Here is my list.

Canon D350 rebel xt
Canon EFS 18-55 (standard)
Canon EF US 100-300mm
Canon EF US IS 28-135mm
Canon MP-E 65mm f/2.8 1-5x Macro Photo
Three Batteries
Three CF card two 1gig one 2gig and one 128mb
Tripod
Backpack

Thanks

I always have a camera with me. But then I have lots of cameras for different uses, and lots of bags to go with them. To give a short answer, let me just list the bags and the main camera:

1. Belt pouch for work (digital point & shoot)
2. Small backpack for weekends (digital point and shoot)
3. Medium-sized backpack for small events (low-end DSLR)
4. Dedicated photo backpack for serious events (semi-pro DSLR)
5. Small shoulderbag for events where I have to look elegant (film rangefinder)
6. Medium-sized shoulderbag for holidays (2 film SLR's)
7. Large shoulderbag for weddings (DSLR's but take 2 of everything)

I just looked at your list again. I'm amazed that you don't have a flash. Perhaps you only do landscapes. I find a powerful flash is essential to get the light under control for digital cameras.

The other thing you don't have is a portable disk drive. I find I can fill up my 2 1GB CF cards in a few hours and I always have my 20GB ARCHOS drive handy. My list for configuration 3:

- LowePro Rover Light back pack
- Nikon D70 with 18-70
- 70-200 f3.5-5.6 or 35mm f2 (optional)
- SB800 flash
- 2 1GB CF cards (1 in the camera)
- 2 camera batteries (1 in the camera)
- ARCHOS GMini portable disk
- Notebook & pen
- Wallet with all papers
- Keys

Charles