Accessories

Think Tank Hydrophobia 300-600 V2 Rain Cover Review

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NOTE: Think Tank have now launched a V3 version of this rain cover that is improved in several ways, and also much cheaper, in response to competition in the marketplace. Please head here to get the details about the new Hydrophobia covers, which also now come in an expanded range of sizes to fir DSLR and mirrorless systems. You guys know I’m a big fan of Think Tank’s photo accessories and I use several of their solutions on a regular basis for my photography business.  Last month I flew to France to cover the 24 Heures Du Mans, arguably the …

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Quick Review: Aquatech Monopod Wrap

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The Australian company Aquatech are best known for their underwater camera housings but over the last few years they have been slowly releasing a range of very well thought out accessories for photographers and in particular, long lens shooters.  I have an assignment coming up in June that will see me carrying my longest glass around on my monopod for a whole week whilst putting in some serious leg work.  While looking over the B&H website last week I noticed this new monopod wrap from Aquatech and thought it might come in handy.  It also coincided with some shooting I …

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10 luxuries for the traveling photographer

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Last week I posted 10 essentials for the traveling photographer. This week we are moving up the scale a bit to check out some things that you don’t necessarily need, but would be awesome to have if you have everything else on the previous list! 1. G-Tech Hard Drives In the essentials list I put hard drives and recommended the LaCie Rugged drives. If you are going to take a step up though then you have to check out the G-Raid Mini from G-Tech. This tiny enclosure houses 2 hard drives that can be configured in any Raid configuration meaning …

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ThinkTank Hydrophobia 70-200 Flash rain cover review

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NOTE: The reviewed version of the Hydrophobia 70-200 has now been replaced by an updated, improved version. Details of the new version can be found here. Many things have changed, and the prices have been reduced, so this review is no longer relevant. Torrential rain or prolonged periods of snow do not generally go hand in hand with photography and camera equipment. Sometimes it has to be avoided to prevent damage to equipment, but sometimes it cannot be avoided while on assignment to cover a particular event. If you find yourself in that situation you might want to think about …

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Gisteq PhotoTrackr review

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phototrackr-mini-dpl900-1I’ve had a mild curiosity in geotagging for a while. Years from now, i’ve always thought that it wold be very cool to know exactly where some of my photos were taken. Especially my backcountry skiing photos where they are not necessarily taken near any recognizable landmarks. As I travel more and more to other parts of the world too, it would be nice to look back at that in the future and see exactly where I was.

For Canon shooters you instantly run into a problem though. So far Canon has refused to add geotagging to any of their cameras and they have also refused to add the ability for third-party developers to come up with their own solution. Nikon users have it pretty easy by comparison with their G-P1. It connects directly to the camera and writes the GPS location of the photo straight into the metadata. If you shoot Canon though you are going to need to do a little extra work and I was intrigued to find out how much effort it would be to integrate this into my current workflow, especially now that Apple have integrated geotagging into Aperture 3.0. A bit of research led me to the Gisteq PhotoTrackr mini.

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Winter gloves for photographers – The POW Photog

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Another question that comes up quite often from readers of this blog and visitors to my site is “what gloves do you wear when you are shooting in the snow?” I’ve seen this question discussed on several other photography websites too, it’s not just ski and snowboard photogs who are in need of a decent pair of winter shooting gloves. Of course the problem is that we want to stay warm but also retain the use of our finger tips for operating the camera controls and most importantly, the shutter button. Wearing a think pair of winter gloves, it’s all …

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What kind of memory cards do I use?

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Here’s a quick post on a question I get asked quite often. What kind of memory cards do I use? I exclusively use the Sandisk Extreme III memory cards. When I first got into photography I had the 2GB vesrsions of this card and I have never experienced a single failure. I think it’s safe to say that most photographers pick one type of card and unless they experience any failures, most likely stick with that type/brand for a very long time. The thing that initially attracted me to these cards was that they are rated down to -25 degrees …

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Hoodman Hoodloupe 3.0 – A useful piece if kit!

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Anyone that has ever used a DSLR outside in bright sunshine knows that it can sometimes be tough to see the LCD on the back of the camera. Yes you can get a rough idea whats going on but when you are trying to check critical focusing or exposure with the histogram it can be tricky and I normally resort to unzipping my jacket and trying to view it inside, or removing my jacket and throwing it over my head if its a bright day. When you have miles of snow surrounding you on all sides, each flake seemingly reflecting …

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Really Right Stuff (RRS) BH-40 Ballhead mini review

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Over the last couple of years I have experimented with with several different ballheads and failed to find what I was looking for. I don’t use a ballhead very often for my work but when i do need one, i need one that is going to be reliable in fairly hostile environments. Last year I was let down by ballheads from other brands in key situations so I finally decided to bite the bullet and pick up an RRS BH-40. At almost $400 its relatively expensive but hopefully this will be the last ballhead I have to buy for many …

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