_
I was so busy planning this trip that I totally forgot to mention it here, but I took a two-week trip to Tokyo and Kansai (Osaka, Kyoto, Nara) and around Hokkaido (Hakodate, Sapporo, Akan, Obihiro, Daisetsuzan area) two weeks ago. I lugged the camera pretty much everywhere I went, so here are some notes about extensive travelling with the camera:
- Watch the SD card door! I had to shove a lot of things into my tiny camera bag, so the GH1 was pretty snug up against everything. Unfortunately, it was so snug that the SD card slot would pop open just from me reaching in to pull out my wallet. The plastic part of the door even completely snapped off of the metal hinge at one point. Luckily, the metal hinge bent back into shape and I was able to snap the plastic door back on without problems. Then I promptly rearranged my bag so the card door faced AWAY from all the things I had to grab out of my bag.
- The cheap camera strap has its uses. Namely, it is thin enough that I can just wrap it around one of my wrists as a make-shift wrist strap, which was a much more comfortable way to securely hold the camera in the summer humidity of the Kansai area.
- Get a second battery to keep on-hand and have at least one of the batteries fully-charged each day. With that big, shiny LCD and the video recording, the GH1 can’t get too many photos/videos out of a single full battery. It’s also nice because you can review and delete unwanted photos on one battery while charging the other (no need to bring that bulky A/C adapter!).
- Get a ball head mini tripod and keep it on you. You never know when you’ll need one of these! I had a super cheap one lying around, decided to bring it on a whim, and found myself using it quite often, not only as a tripod but as a stabilizer as well. With the ball head, I can angle my camera pretty freely, and since the legs extend, I can rest those on my own body to keep the camera from shaking too much. A word of warning, though: I don’t recommend you get a tripod as cheap as mine… mine was NOT designed to hold the weight of a DSLR and would shift out of place quite easily, though I watched it carefully so that my camera never fell.
- If you plan on recording ANY video, make sure you’ve got SD cards to spare. It simply takes too long to decode videos to take them off the SD card every single day, so even if you keep moving photos off, you will still slowly lose space on that card.
I was literally running around and shooting photos and videos all day (school parade!), when I discovered a slight issue with the 14-140mm kit lens. (Innuendo warning: I’m too tired to phrase this in a way that WON’T make the gutterminded giggle.)
The zooming mechanism was super tight when I first got it, which made for some really jerky zooming, but meant the lens stayed where you put it if the camera was jostled. After a LOT of use, though (it is my only lens for the GH1 and I’ve shot well over 30,000 photos and many hours of video on it), the mechanism has become really loose. So loose that the lens actually extended halfway while I was running with it pointed down. On the bright side, I now get really smooth zooming in videos… but it’s still a bit disconcerting, and I can only hope it doesn’t get looser…
…because that just won’t be classy anymore.
Was wandering around Bic Camera in Sapporo with barely enough time to catch the train back, and ended up impulse-buying the Supreme SS from Etsumi (4780 JPY) for my Panny GH1.
Great little bag, actually! Fits the GH1 + an extra lens (or my wallet + a battery + my filter case) perfectly in the main compartment. The front pocket fits filters, batteries, pens (with dedicated pockets)… whatever. The flap over the front pocket can fit memory cards. The right side pocket can fit a cellphone, iPod, or ultra-compact camera. The left side has a water bottle holder that zips up and out of the way. There’s also a flat velcro pocket on the back.
It’s all nicely padded, with a hard bottom and dense foam padding along the sides, so should protect my gear nicely. And I like the looks of it enough to even just use it as a mid-sized casual bag. I’d been considering the black Golla SLR bag, but the Golla bags are bigger, have softer padding, and kooky patterns on the front flap that I’m not exactly crazy about. The Etsumi bag meets my requirements of 1) fitting my camera and a few other things perfectly, 2) being water resistant, 3) having a bunch of useful pockets, and 4) not screaming “I’M FULL OF EXPENSIVE GEAR!!”
Leaked photo of Olympus’ upcoming Micro Four-Thirds camera, the E-P1. Supposed to be announced TOMORROW (June 16th). Text lust: ACTIVATED. (Via 43rumors.)
Extreme boredom at the office means I start Photoshopping Pixelmating (okay, that sounds dirty) together camera accessories I want. But seriously, would not the above go together SO SEXILY?
Geek self-portrait.
I don’t understand why they don’t sell this in Japan yet.
Sunset from the capital of Tuvalu, by L0M1 on flickr. As of today, I want to visit Tuvalu.
Freaking love this bag: it’s actually a carrying bag for smaller DSLRs, designed by Akihiro Kumagaya (who is only two years older than me?!) and commissioned by Olympus. It is all I can do to NOT order this $200 overblown case… or maybe I should just give in to compulsive consumerism and spend my Japanese stimulus money on it.
- If you have no idea what you’re doing, there is no better solution than to take a freaking lot of photos. Mess with the settings, mess up your pictures, experiment, take 10 shots of the same thing in different ways… something will EVENTUALLY work.
- Don’t leave your camera at home. You never know what you’ll miss.
- Do not covet thy neighbor’s lens [too much]. Learn how to work within the limitations of the camera. If it has weak optical zoom, work on shooting landscapes and wide angle. If it has no manual settings, learn how to fudge things and make scene modes work for you (e.g. use flower mode to shoot printed text and closeups, museum mode for still lifes, night scenery mode for neat long exposure light effects, etc.).
- If you have someone else take a photo for you with your camera, check the settings and location to make sure they’re good, and tell them exactly what you want in the shot. Even better: if the camera has a LCD screen, hold it up and show the person exactly how you’d like the photo. And be nice about it.
- Back up your photos obsessively! Or you WILL lose a quarter of your college memories.
