Team Geared Up

Continuing on from last week’s review of the Canon EOS 400D/Rebel Xti, here’s the review of the camera bag to go with my purchase.
I lucked out with this bag in that I had just popped into a photography store in Salt Lake City to see if I could get a Shieldzone screen protector (which are from SLC) and they had this bag sitting on display.
I’ll make this review simple, this is an great bag for an SLR and I wouldn’t have gotten some of the better photos this year without it. Why? Basically, every once in a while, I’ll have a moment of madness, realize there’s going to be a beautiful sunset somewhere, throw the bag over my shoulder and clip the waistbelt in, and take off at a run for the highest vantage point. As a warning, I’ve almost being ill from running up said hills but you can’t really blame the bag for that :)

The bag has enough space for an SLR with a medium size zoom lens attached (up to about 80mm) and room for two more lens (or accessories beside it). I don’t own one but I’m fairly certain it wouldn’t accept a large zoom along with the camera so if you have one of those, you might want to have a look at something larger. I’ve seen reports however on Amazon that people say it will take a 100-300mm zoom lens with just the SLR however. Also, the padded dividers internally can be moved around to suit your gear as they’re attached by velcro.
There’s a zip pocket on the front that easily accommodates some miscellaneous items like battery charger, etc. To give an idea of what I used to carry in this while traveling on planes, this bag used to contain the SLR and two lenses (one on the camera), a universal plug converter, Archos photo storage device, all necessary cables, earphones, SLR battery charger, and documentation required for flights. Quite a lot for such a small bag!

The big selling point for me was the integrated waist-belt. With solitary shoulder strap the bag flops around when moving briskly (i.e. running) or climbing (i.e. hanging on a rope waiting to get some photos of another route). With the waist-belt fastened, there’s not a kick out of it and it’s especially comforting with all the hardware being kept nice and snug. there’s some padding internally also which helps with the bag being dropped, sorry bumped ;) It was especially useful while moving around cities as it’s easy to access the compartment to swap lenses. In comparison to the backpacks, you can just swing it around front and just lie the gear into the bag to swap.

Overall: if you like moving around with a camera over your shoulder with easy access to everything in it, and like to move actively, a brilliant bag and you won’t be complaining.