Once again I am packing camera gear for an expedition. At times I do wonder if I should leave my bags packed and not bother unpacking them!
This time I’m packing camera gear for a personal two week 4WD and camping photography expedition in Iceland followed by a two week photography expedition with clients into the Arctic Circle up the East Coast of Greenland to the Polar ice pack and across to Svalbard.
Being two distinctly different styles of expeditions has meant I’ve had to pack quite a lot of extra equipment.
First and foremost is camping gear. Camping out for 2 weeks in a tent means I’m packing things like bedrolls, sleeping bags, thermal bag liners and other camping goodies. Luckily my travel companion has sourced a lot of camping equipment locally from a friend negating the need to pack all things camping. Thank goodness as my excess luggage is already excessive!!!
Being out in the field for days on end we’ve got an Inverter in the 4WD which ensures we have electricity available to use for charging batteries, power laptops etc when we return to our 4WD and tents to sleep.
That said, we’ll be day hiking to quite a few locations where our trusty suped-up ‘Iceland style’ 4WD just can’t go which will see me out in the field for extended periods of time, so I’m loading up on the batteries. Whilst I may not use all the batteries I’m packing in a day, with the long charging time of the batteries I do have, I figure its best to have at least 2 days worth of batteries available. Shooting video as well as stills, my battery consumption will be significantly higher than shooting stills alone.
Along with AC battery chargers, I’ve also got a couple of 12V cigarette lighter fed battery chargers so I can get as many batteries charged as possible.
With my goal of shooting lots of video footage during both expeditions, my portable HDD count has gone through the roof. Last year just shooting stills I took my laptop and 1 portable HDD so I had two copies of all my media. Most of the video content I capture is done directly to an SSD in my Atomos Ninja in ProRes 422 which requires a considerable amount of storage per minute of footage and given my nearly religious dedication to making duplicates of all media shot during an expedition I am now equipped with a plethora of of portable HDDs. I’d love to be able to store a single copy of my laptop and a 2nd copy on my portable HDD but unfortunately Apple doesn’t offer the Macbook Pro with a 8TB SSD option nor could I justifying the financial outlay of buying one should they exist.
But portable HDDs are not the bane of my efforts in packing camera gear. My collection of tripod heads I will use of these two expeditions are a weighty amount of gear in their own right.
My trusty Really Right Stuff BH-55 comes everywhere. I love it. Its perfect for landscapes and combined with my RRS L-Brackets and even my 4th Generation designs replacement lens feet. It just works and it works well. My Jobu Design Jr. 3 Deluxe Gimbal head is in my bag. It works perfectly for shooting with my Canon 500mm f/4 IS MkII. (Look for a review coming soon on the Job Design Jr. 3 Deluxe Gimbal head). And to round out my my heads I have Manfrotto 502HD Pro video fluid head. This fluid head is great for video work. Its a good balance of features vs. price vs. weight and a welcome part of my kit when it comes to video work. I’d love if I could get a tripod head that would be perfect for video, long lenses and landscapes and work with my L brackets and wasn’t too bulky or heavy but I’m not sure if the perfect utility head exists.
Along with my tripod, a DSLR Video cage and a slider the sheer bulk of camera equipment support gear I’m amassing as I look at my gear is worrying when I consider my weight restrictions. I’m well into the excess luggage realm and pre-purchasing an extra luggage allowance for my return flights.
With a selection of Canon 35mm lenses covering from 17mm to 500mm, extenders and two Camera bodies my ‘carry-on’ luggage is getting up there. I’d love to be able to check in my camera gear in a couple of locked Pelican cases but after all the footage circulating on the internet of baggage handlers treating luggage akin to throwing out the trash I have zero confidence of any of my camera gear arriving at Iceland in the same state as I packed it in Australia.
For trips later in the year, I’ll investigate sending my gear via priority shipping to my hotel so its there when I arrive rather than trying to do the luggage shuffle with way too much gear!
For more information of what to pack for an Arctic Photography Expedition have a look at my Arctic Circle Photography Packing List recommendations