Saturday, February 10, 2007

Lowepro Squared

So today I picked up a couple of Lowepro bags. One new, one preowned but both Lowepro.

For a little bit now I've been thinking that my current bags weren't quite meeting my needs the way I'd like them too. I got tired of living with compromises and decided I've had enough.

My daily bag couldn't quite hold my K10D body with the grip & lens on while in my bag. Plus trying to squeeze my 70-200 2.8 into the bag posed problems in of itself. While I have really enjoyed using my Canon Gadget 10EG bag for a couple of years, the time has come to part ways.

At home I have a large backpack that I've been using to store my inventory of photo equipment. I have a second goal for this bag too. I occasionally use it when I need a large amount of gear on location. Although it holds lots of gear, using it around the house to hold gear & using it on location weren't quite what I had in mind. I finally decided I needed something that was more convenient both at home & on location.

After doing some research (read as lots of research) I settled on getting a Lowepro Pro Roller bag. It looks like luggage but seems to be the best option for what I need in a home storage solution. I especially like that it can be leaned back onto itself and you can work from the bag without having to lay it down. I found a good deal on the Pro Roller 2 on ebay and took the plunge. It should arrive in the next week or so.

Finding a storage bag was difficult but deciding on a daily all purpose camera bag was near impossible. It seemed like I had a set of features I wanted that couldn't co-exist in a single bag. After a couple of weeks I settled on the Lowepro Stealth Reporter series. It seemed like the one bag that could nearly do it all. I originally thought the D200 model would hold enough for my purpose and if not the D300 certainly would. But after doing some quick math I determined that if I wanted my 70-200 2.8 to fit properly I'd have to bump up to the D400. Luckily the D400 is only $20 more than the D300. The couple extra inches of room it gives though are worth much more than that. The bag holds everything I want it to with some room to spare. I just have to remember not to pack it to the brim since it'll be too heavy to carry.

I was able to find the D400 locally at Canoga Camera. If you're in the market for a bag I highly recommend them. The pricing is decent but what really makes the difference is they allow you to bring your old camera bag full of equipment in and test out their models to make sure it fits/works the way you want it. Several other stores I've been to have you check your bag at the door before going in. I don't know about you but I'd rather stuff a new bag full of my lenses, camera & batteries to make sure it fits than guess on a model and hoping it fits when you finally get home.

Today was a good day for me. Two problems solved which really means 2 less things to think about. I'll be selling my two old bags in the next couple of days. If anyone's interested in either bag, just let me know.

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