I love sharing what I’ve learnt about photography so far, and revealing what my camera kit comprises of, is part of that too. It’s a hobby I started when I was a teenager, when I bought a second hand manual SLR (single lens reflex) that took 35mm film, and cost an arm and a leg to develop. Through to a few years of owning naff digital compact cameras, and now these days, my pride and joy, my full frame DSLR. It’s rare to see me without my camera strapped to my back, or in my backpack. I absolutely love capturing something special and sharing it with the world. It’s my creative release in life and part of what makes me happy.
What I love about photography
Don’t get me wrong, I wouldn’t class myself as a professional, and I don’t always follow the rules. Like tripods, who has the effort to lug one of those bad boys around. If I’m out walking or exploring, I find they slow me down, and for me, photography is about capturing that moment, there and then and then moving on. I’ll do what I can to make sure I’m there at the right moment or location, like getting up at 5am to go for a sunrise walk and get some cracking photos. But, I’m not one for planning one shot for days on end. For me, that takes the fun out of it. Anyway, I’m rambling, on to my photography kit.
My Photography Kit
My current photography kits comprises of:
- Camera body: Canon EOS 5D Mark IV
- Day to day lens: Canon 24mm – 70mm f4 IS.
- Telephoto lens: Canon 70mm – 200mm f4L IS USM.
- Fixed lightweight lens: 50mm f1.8 STM lens
- Filters: I have UV filters on both my longer (and more expensive) lenses at all times, firstly for protection and secondly to filter out that UV light.
I try and travel as light as possible, but always take a spare battery, empty SD and compact flash card, and lens cleaning wipes.
Always shoot manual
I’ve been shooting fully manual for a few years now, and honestly, it takes me a while to get it right even now. There are still times when I’m taking a shot and I just don’t know what ISO, aperture and speed I should be setting everything at to get the shot from my head into the camera. If I’m really stumped, I’ll flick it into fully automatic to see what settings the camera thinks are just right, then disagree and continue to fiddle. Before shooting full automatic, I always opted for aperture priority.
I try to shoot with the lowest ISO as possible, to reduce noise. And if it’s a landscape shot I’m taking, I’ll bump the f stop up, it offers a larger depth of field, and always makes it feel like a warmer richer photo too.
Photography tip I was once told
The best bit of advise I’ve had so far, is to always shoot slightly darker than you need, to reduce risk of blow out (white areas). As it’s easy to recover detail in the dark, whereas completely white blown out areas contain no information, and can’t be recovered.