Holiday season is around the corner and it is nice to think about getting away for a while, a family visit, a ski/snowboard vacation, the beach, an exotic island or country. Don’t know about you but I am planning to take a decent camera and a few lenses. Well, at least two lenses. Hmmmm, a standard zoom and a wide angle zoom will do nicely.
Ok, I am packed, ready to take off and head to the airport, one medium suitcase to check, one carry on and the mac book air. Man, it’s kinda heavy, feels like I am going on a shoot, and I haven’t even packed my 5D2 with the 24 70mm yet, maybe I take the 24 105mm instead, it is a lot lighter. I am a master when it comes to compressed packing, if you think a 24MP CMOS sensor packs a lot of pixels, you should see my suitcase. I am sure there is still space in my carry on. Hang on, there we go, all good if I don’t take the 17 40mm, feeling kinda deflated now, I force myself to think I will be fine without it, but I know better. I could ask my girlfriend, wait no, she spotted me eying her carry on and this seems to cause abnormal activity in her brain, I quickly turn and walk away, hoping she won’t go into a seizure. Screw it! I will just take my cell phone, it has the 8mp camera. It will be fine. Or I take a snapshot camera, one of those with a small sensor….. now this feels like cheating on photography.
Be prepared!
Weight is often more important than size, I don’t mind taking a larger lens if it is lightweight. On my last trip I took the GH2, the Nokton 25mm, the 20mm Pancake and the 7-14mm lens, a charger and a bunch of batteries. Small-ish kit, however the GH2 body weighs 392grams, the Nokton 25mm 410grams and the 7-14mmm 300grams, the 20mm Pancake 99grams…adds up, total 1191grams or 2.625lbs. I also realized I should have taken a tele zoom instead of the Nokton 25mm, it is a fantastic low light lens, and if you are planning to shoot a lot at night, by all means, this is the lens to bring (or the fantastic Olympus 12mm), but night shots were not a priority on my trip and a general kit covering a range from extra wide to moderate tele zoom would have been a better choice.
This year I am taking one Nex 5N body, 210grams, the fantastic 30mm 3.5Macro which only weighs 138grams, the 16mm pancake, at 70grams and the vcl ecf1 wide angle attachment, 125grams or the VCL-ECF1, not sure yet, the 55-210mm 340grams, total 883grams or 1.94lbs! That’s almost 3/4 of a pound less then the GH2 kit! The 5N sensor has about 2 stops on the GH2 sensor in low light, there aren’t any high speed Nex lenses available yet, but I am confident 2.8 on the 16mm will be fine in case I need to shoot something in the dark. I also considered taking the Fuji X10 during a momentary loss of sanity, just kidding, it is a sweet camera and only weighs 350grams, less then half of my 5N kit but the less then 1/2 also stands true for image quality, class leading and fantastic jpeg output at low ISO settings, but compared to the 5N…….. doesn’t stand a chance. Don’t forget my kit is about the best image quality I can get in an ultra lite package!
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Holiday Travel: Ultra Lite Camera/Video Kit – Heavy On Image Quality And Versatility
- Voigtlander Nokton 25mm f0.95 finally in stock at BH!
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yup, bin sehr beeindruckt, ich war ja nicht unbedingt ein Sony fan, muss aber zugeben die 5N, A65, A77 sind schon super
schöner artikel, ich bin der meinung: weniger ist mehr.
die sony dürfte wirklich ein top gerät sein.
cheers
true, I do get dust on the 5D2 and 7D sensor from time to time, compressed air get rid of it, I change lenses very fast and try not to do it where its dusty. I always do a sensor test (flash at f16 against white background) before an important job and clean the sensor, if there is “stubborn dust” I take a Q-tip and rubbing alcohol and clean it but won’t recommend it if you are paranoid cuz it is a bit scary, most of the time dry compressed air does the trick good luck and schoene feiertage! And yes, the 5N is purely a snap shot camera with an amazing sensor, not worried about it at all and no dust so far
Hello,
thank you very much for the inspiration. As you obviously change lenses a lot – how do you cope with sensor dust ? Maybe, with the 5N you won t even get into apertures, where dust would be visible, because it is excellent in low light and thus predestinated to be used with lenses wide open and in the same time not really suitable for studio use, as it lacks a professional option to trigger studio flashes (I mean in a professional way, you can not use a mini flash glued to a radio trigger when clients are around). But on the GH2, the A77 and the 7D, I am always a little bit paranoid, which really hinders me being creative, because I always stick to zooms or one lens only (without changing). So, how does a pro, especially from a videographers point of view, handle this ? I know, there do exist sensor cleaning devices, but the idea, that I would have to put a cloth onto the sensor makes me shiver. Thank you! All the best.