Hey what's going on you guys, this is iron here. I'm out here in the Olympics,
on a backpacking trip and I figured I would show you guys the photography gear
that I personally take out into the backcountry. I also want to give you guys
some good tips on how to store your camera gear while you're out backpacking
and just some other good tips in general to help you mix backpacking &
photography together.
Tip number one buy lightweight backpacking gear. If you're trying to
combine photography & backpacking, you're gonna be carrying more weight
then the average backpacker. A camera, tripod, one - two lenses. You know that can
easily add 10 plus pounds to your whole setup. Find out exactly what you
need & don't take anything that's not useful on your trips. That's the
number one easiest way to cut the weight of your system down. Something I see that
happens time and time again. A lot of people will be able to do a two, three
day trip with a lot of heavy gear, no problem.
Naturally as you progress and start to backpack more you're gonna start hiking
further, doing longer trips. Longer trips means you're gonna be carrying more food.
You might be carrying lots of water so if you can get get your weight just down
to as minimal as you feel comfortable, that's really gonna help you.
You know it's nice, I get up to these spots, I'm not totally tired, I still have energy.
I can hike around and scout for photos. When I started backpacking
I'd always hike with my camera around my neck and yeah I found that to really
start to take away from the experience of hiking itself so I don't do that anymore.
I find it best to just keep all of my camera gear easily accessible
so if I want to take a picture, I can throw my bag off and access it real quick.
I'll show you guys how I store my gear.
Everything besides my tripod I store in a small f-stop ICU. This is a super awesome case.
It's super durable. It's got a nice shape so it fits into my backpack real nice.
So that's a bonus. Yeah as I was saying before, if you enjoy hiking
with a camera around your neck that's awesome, you know we're all different.
We all have different approaches so I'm gonna show you guys what works best for me
and you know what I've learned to be the best.
It's probably been about nine years now that I've been backpacking
with a full camera setup. so yeah I've learned a lot during that time.
I store all of my gear in here. Another thing that I like to do is put some of my extra
layers in here to get some extra protection, just a little extra padding
If my bag gets thrown around or anything like that. So I've got
my beanie here, pair of thermal leggings. This eliminates some more dead space
in your bag too. So it's not taking space in my backpack and it's also protecting
my gear. So that's just a nice little bonus there. I shoot with a Nikon d810
I've been shooting with this camera for about two years now.
It's not the lightest camera and you know I was actually using a mirrorless camera
before this but I ended up going with the Nikon because of its dependability.
I had a lot of issues with my Sony a7r. Yeah I missed out on a lot of shots.
Had a lot of frustrating times and I switched to this and I've absolutely been loving it.
I would definitely prefer the D850 over this but yeah there's no
such thing as the best camera. The best camera you know is the camera you have.
A piece of gear that I would highly recommend is an L bracket. This is one of
those pieces of photography gear that you use for the first time...
And think I can't believe I haven't been shooting with this longer.
what an L bracket does, you can shoot vertical without having to have your camera to
the side. So the L bracket is a good way to switch vertical and horizontal very easily.
Yeah just give you a lot more stability for shooting vertical.
I love my L bracket. Comes on every trip. So I would say that the toughest
thing for me and a lot of people that backpack and do photography
is just deciding which lenses you want to bring with you.
The least amount of lenses the better. You know lenses are heavy
It kind of sucks always changing lenses out in the field so depending on
the style of photography you shoot this could change for you.
I use 2 lenses and one of them is the Nikon 28 to 300 millimeter lens.
I probably shoot 60 to 70 percent, maybe even more of all of my photos with this lens.
My other lens of choice was a Nikon 14 to 24 millimeter lens.
This is known as one of the best landscape lenses ever wide-angle lenses
ever produced. This lens is amazing. 2.8 aperture, it's great for night photography.
Super sharp, one of the sharpest lenses I've ever shot with
while I don't shoot with this lens as much as my 28 to 300.
A lot of my all-time favorite photos I've captured with this lens.
Between these two lenses I'm able to shoot from 14 millimeter to 300 millimeter.
That covers a pretty wide range. Yeah you know I would love
to bring another zoom lens, maybe like a 400 millimeter lens,
but it's not worth it for me to carry the extra weight. So it's a balance game.
You really have to figure out what's most important to you and probably not carry
some stuff you would otherwise on like a day hike or a spot where you're
just walking a couple hundred feet to shoot. So yeah those are the two lenses
that I use. I would highly recommend two lenses max. Try to come up with a
really minimal lens setup. And then I carry a circular polarizer
for my 28 to 300. I was carrying one for my 14-24 mm lens but it was a giant
wonderpana circular polarizer and it was just a pain to put on and super heavy
so that's one of the things that once in a while might really
help me produce a better photo... I never bring that on my trips anymore
I always have a UV filter to protect my lens I would definitely
recommend that. All right, now let's talk about batteries. one of the
worst things that could ever happen to you when you're out out on a backpacking
trip. You go to take a photo and your batteries are dead. It's happened to me
more than once. It's been a long time but it's pretty much the worst thing
ever so before you leave the house make sure all of your batteries are charged.
I carry five batteries on most of my trips and I it's very rare that I ever use
more than three. I always bring more than I need. Yeah you don't want to
let a dead battery or not having having enough batteries stop you from
capturing a shot so make sure you have enough batteries and make sure they're
always fully charged before you leave the house. All right now let's talk about
ways you can extend the life of your batteries. There are quite a few little
tips that can easily double the life of the batteries on your trip. Don't leave
your battery in your camera when it's not in use. That'll save you a little bit
of energy there. When you're composing your photos do it with your
camera off. You know, do it through the view of a viewfinder. Only use live
view when you absolutely need to. Turning the brightness down on your
screen will help as well. Doing those little things will easily extend the
life of your batteries. If it's really cold out I will keep my
batteries insulated. If it's really cold sometimes I'll even keep them in
a breast pocket close to my body to keep them warm. I like to carry two
memory cards on all of my trips and the reason for
that is, if one memory card fails I'd have a backup
I carry two 32 gigabyte memory cards. I've got some of my GoPro memory
cards in here as well. So ya I carry two 32 gigabyte memory cards.
Personally I barely ever fill up more then one. I would say you're way
better off just splitting your memory in half so instead of buying a 128 gig card
buy two sixty-four gigabyte cards and that just
gives you an extra card in case one fails. It's good to have backups out here.
I carry a remote shutter that I can plug into my camera.
I don't use this too often but once in a while it really comes in handy
I really like these Zeiss lens cleaning wipes.
I always try to carry a few of these in my bag
I carry Allen wrenches for my tripod just in case, and this
little cleaning brush. I'm filming this with a GoPro right now
and this is the bag that I carry all of my GoPro stuff in.
So yeah, this has been the most minimal setup that I could
personally come up with and still be able to shoot the photos that I want to
shoot. I'd also highly recommend always having some microfiber cloths
for cleaning your lenses. That's an essential piece of gear.
Keeping your gear organized is huge. You don't want to be spending time looking
around for stuff when you're trying to take a photo.
I always try to be as organized as I possibly can. Oh and then one other
thing that I always keep in my camera bag is a trash compactor sack.
If it's raining really bad, I will put my f-stop bag in this or if I'm fording a river
or I'm pack rafting. I will put this inside this lightweight
trash compactor sack to fully protect all of my gear. It would suck to spend all
this money on camera gear and have it get ruined by water.
You can see everything fits nice and easy in here. My GoPro fits in here to
I've been loving this setup. I've been shooting with this camera and these
lenses for about two years and it's been great.
A couple other landscape photographers use a very similar setup.
My good friend Dave Morrow uses a very similar setup. Same camera, same
lenses. I think Max Rive or Reeve... I'm not sure how you pronounce his name.
I think he shoots with the same camera and lenses as well. Those are two
photographers that I look up to and really like their work.
So that's my gear and then my tripod. So I would HIGHLY recommend taking a
tripod on your trip if you want to capture landscape photos.
Sometimes you can get away with handheld shots but I shoot over 90%
of my photos on a tripod. This comes on every trip. It can be a challenge to
find a lightweight tripod. I'd also recommend a carbon fiber tripod.
it can be a challenge to find one that doesn't cost like $1,000.
I found this Fiesol CT-3442 tripod and yeah I think it was only $400.
It's been awesome. I've been shooting with it for over a year now.
I've taken it out on over 130 days of backpacking.
I have had no issues with it. What I really like about this tripod...
It has a very low base to the ground. Some tripods you can invert the top
center column. I just find that to be a pain. It's also got a flat base here.
It's not the the tallest tripod, but it works. I'm 6 foot 5 and I have
no problems using this. I have to crouch down a little bit when it's fully extended
This was the the best lightweight tripod
that I could find at a decent price. I've had this Benro B1ball head
for a while now. It's been great, super sturdy.
I think it was only about a hundred dollars. So yeah, this is the gear that I use.
I'm going to put together a video right after this going over some really good
tips for combining backpacking & photography together. I wanted to go
over my gear first because obviously you're gonna need gear to
shoot photos out here. So that's the gear I use.
And thats the way I store it. Oh yeah one more thing, my umbrella
LOVE this thing. If I'm expecting any rain I bring my umbrella.
Not only does this give me me additional rain protection, I can
shoot photos and shield my camera. This is lightweight backpacking
umbrella made by six moons designs and I would HIGHLY recommend
bringing an umbrella if you're going to be in the rain. You can get a lot of really
cool shots in dramatic weather. While I find this gear to be the most
ideal personally. Always remember there is no such thing as the best gear.
This is the best gear for me in my situation, but the best gear is the gear that you have.
You know you might not be able to afford some of this more
expensive gear and that's okay. Almost any camera that's produced this day and
age can take some pretty nice pictures.
Buy the best gear that you can afford that is in line with your style of photography
and the trips you want to do. If you guys have any questions at all
about any of my photography or backpacking gear or anything in general
I would be stoked to answer them. You guys are awesome! Thanks for being here!
I'll catch you guys in my next video. Peace!