What DID you take on your big trip?

[Sirius Glass]

I only take a tripod on an airplane trip if I know that there is a night photograph that I plan to take.

 

[fdonadio]

I took a Hasselblad 500C/M to the Iguassu Falls and Itaipu power plant. Out of indecision, I also took almost all of my lenses: 30, 50, 80 and 150mm! Incredibly, I actually used the 30mm, but regretted not having a 40mm. Took some T-Max 400, Portra 400, Ektar 100 and my last rolls of T-Max 100 and FP4. Everything fit inside a LowePro Photo Trekker AW with room to spare.

I didn't take a tripod and didn't quite miss it. Weather was good and shooting handheld was easy.

Got home yesterday and will process the black and white films before the weekend, hopefully.


Cheers,
Flavio

 

[Sirius Glass]

The only Hasselblad lens[es] with which I use a tripod is the 500mm lens or the 500mm lens with the 2XE extender.

 

[Kevin Caulfield]

I took a Hasselblad 500C/M to the Iguassu Falls and Itaipu power plant. Out of indecision, I also took almost all of my lenses: 30, 50, 80 and 150mm! Incredibly, I actually used the 30mm, but regretted not having a 40mm. Took some T-Max 400, Portra 400, Ektar 100 and my last rolls of T-Max 100 and FP4. Everything fit inside a LowePro Photo Trekker AW with room to spare.

I didn't take a tripod and didn't quite miss it. Weather was good and shooting handheld was easy.

Got home yesterday and will process the black and white films before the weekend, hopefully.


Cheers,
Flavio

I didn't even realise there was a 30mm. I've just been using my 40mm which I usually neglect.

 

[fdonadio]

I didn't even realise there was a 30mm. I've just been using my 40mm which I usually neglect.

The 30mm is the fisheye. I call mine "Big Glass". Although @Sirius Glass says the 40mm has some barrel distortion (and he's right), it's negligible next to the 30mm.


Cheers,
Flavio

 

[Sirius Glass]

I had a chance to buy the 30mm lens, but frankly I would use it so little that I passed on a great price. Besides all my equipment in a pack, including the 500mm lens but not the SWC is already pretty heavy.

 

[etn]

I've come full circle to shooting with minimal gear. Last trip to NYC I took my Zeiss Ikon ZM, Zeiss 35mm Biogon, Acros 100, HP5+, and Portra 160.

I did the same (well, almost) on my last vacation: ZM + Zeiss 25/35/50 (planar)/85, and a dozen rolls of Tri-X and Velvia. We went to La Réunion island and did quite a bit of hiking. The ZM and those lenses are fantastic and performed beyond expectations. I missed 2 things, the first one during the trip: some macro capability (there are beautiful flowers there), the second afterwards: when I see my slides, however beautiful, I regret they are not medium format. There's no way I could have climbed the 10000-ft Piton des Neiges with my Hasselblad in the backpack, though. Next time I go there I'll do less hiking, or find a way to leave the gear in some safe place, and take the Hassy with me!

Before I owned the Hasselblad and the ZM, in other words when I had less money and consequently no other camera choice, I had a Rolleiflex with me on every trip I took. Simple, light, elegant, and versatile despite its limitations. The Rollei is probably the best camera I have every owned and the last I will ever sell.

 

[filmamigo]

My most successful travel kit has been a Pentax MZ-S, with the 43mm Limited, 77mm Limited, and a 24mm Sigma.

This kit made for easy packing to fly to NYC a few years back, and was readily carried everywhere on the trip with no burden. The 43mm stayed on the camera 95% of the time.

Results were exactly as I hoped. I brought my last cache of Kodak BW400CN and shot it exclusively. The combination of that 43mm and BW400CN gave images full of detail and very little grain; very comparable to shooting traditional B&W in 645. I also had good luck shooting multi-frame panoramas (handheld!) which were stitched together from digital scans. The effective resolution of those panoramas exceeded any single frame of medium format film.

The loss of BW400CN pushed me towards shooting medium format for travel now (Bronica ETRSi and Pentax 67.) The results are great but packing and schlepping gear is a drag...

 

[sportster44]

When flying for work, I usually pack a digital (Sony) and my Rollei 35se or M4-P. When driving, It will depend upon which cameras are already loaded. If I've done any photo planning, then I bring the MF bag with the RZ67 and GW680, If no planning them it's all 35mm. Last big trip was a week in Banff, for work with a couple of days to myself tacked on. Brought the Sony and the GW680 (lightest MF camera I have) and a box of TMax 100. Results were awesome!

 

[cupcake.fairy]

I took the contax t2 to xi'an in china and a compact digital camera as backup. Having never run into any problems with the t2 before this trip, the metering started to act up - delayed responds in adjusting to new lighting situations. Has anyone else had this problem?

I also found out that China now has x-rays at the entrance of some airports (before you even enter the building), so you have to go through x-ray points twice. Major tourist spots will have x-ray machines so you could be taking out your film multiple times a day.

 

[Vaughn]

My biggest trip is getting to be very long ago. Six months in New Zealand on a bicycle. Gowland PocketView 4x5, Caltar IIN 150/5.6 lens, 5 film holders, Pentax Digital Spot, Gitzo pod, and an Olympus XA for 35mm slides. Everything behaved wonderfully, everything was used.
Tolaga Bay Wharf, North Island, NZ. TMax100, red filter
Truman Cove, South Island, NZ, TMax100, no filter

 

[Cholentpot]

Headed down to the Airshow Memorial day. I packed my amazing Amazon Basic bag with,

Nikon F3HP with MD-4
Nikkor 200 4.0
Vivtar 1 70-210 2.8-5.6
Nameless 2x Teleconveter
4 rolls of Expired bulk loaded Tmax400
Red Filter
Nikkormat as backup

Put the 200 on the 'Mat and the Series 1 on the F3.
Pushed to 1600 and shot hand held, the shot came out with a very 1960's spy cam vibe.

 

[Down Under]

Vaughn (#61), a Gowland PocketView 4x5? I am drooling with envy... how ever did you acquire it?

I have only ever seen one or at most two of these in my long lifetime, and I would happily trade most of what I own in camera gear for one. The ultimate minimalist camera!

 

[Wallendo]

My last big trip was in the Spring, going on a Western Caribbean cruise. I over-packed as usual and have since then make a concerted effort to pack more efficiently.
I took a Minolta WeatherMatic Dual and a Sea and Sea underwater camera. I couldn't decide which to take and took both. I used EliteChrome (I was trying to use up my stash) and Portra 400 for this.
I also took a Minolta XTsi with Minolta 35-70f4 and a Minolta 71-210 and a Industar 50/2 in m42 mount ( I also took a Sony DSLR that was compatible with those lenses.) I mostly shot Velvia 50 for this, but did shoot a roll of expired Arista Premium 100.
I also took a small pocket sized digital camera which developed a dirty sensor on the 2d day.
I took a Kodak 1a Pocket Junior loaded with Velvia 50 planning to take a panoramic photo in each port, but accidentally set the shutter wrong and everything came back black.

If I do this again, I will probably take the Minolta SLR and leave the WeatherMatic at home (it has quirks that make it fairly useless for snorkeling in all but the shallowest of water). I'll shoot Velvia 50 in my SLR, and stick with C-41 for underwater. I'll probably also forget about my downsizing effort and slip in my Canon 7 with Canon 50/2.8 lens for B&W.

 

[Vaughn]

Vaughn (#61), a Gowland PocketView 4x5? I am drooling with envy... how ever did you acquire it?

I have only ever seen one or at most two of these in my long lifetime, and I would happily trade most of what I own in camera gear for one. The ultimate minimalist camera!

I bought it new from Calumet back in about 1982 or 1983, after carrying a heavy Indian copy of a Deardorff Special all over the place (including hitch-hiking around New Zealand for 3 months --
got a Deardorff 5x7 back for it eventually!) I believe the PocketView was $220, and the Caltar IIN 150mm/5.6 was $250. The Calumet model was the lightest Gowland made. With the lens on it, it weighs just under 2.5 pounds. Has all the movement one needs, but perhaps not all the movements one wants. An all-movement model was made, and another pound or so added.

It still goes on occasional backpack trips, but sometimes I simplify and just take the Rolleiflex and pod.