Owen Park
Travel photography setups range from phone-only to professional kit weighing 8 pounds. After many trips testing different rigs, here is what each setup actually produces, what it costs in weight and money, and which one fits which kind of traveler.
Phone-only: the right default for most travelers
And as for the actual photographer setup, that would be a very light setup for a photographer, with, for example, a Fuji X100V or a Sony A7C (a very small mirrorless camera) with a 35mm prime lens, for around 2 pounds (including the small strap to hang it from your neck or a small shoulder strap), for around $1,500 to 3,000. If you are a serious photographer, or are going on a long trip for photography (e.g. like a National Park trip for example) this would be a good setup to use as your main camera (and to bring with you in your daypack) and to use your iPhone as a secondary camera to use for snaps as you go, or to reference your photos as you take them with your main camera. In this case, you would be choosing which camera to use for each photo, and the best camera for the job, and in between shots, you would be stowing one of the cameras in your daypack, while you were using the other one. And you would need to have a couple of batteries for each camera, (in your pocket or in your daypack, as well as your cards and a card reader for the larger camera) and you would have to worry about whether you would have enough storage for your photos. (e.g. whether you would run out of space on your cards for your photos). And there would be a workflow for the photos shot with the larger camera in the field, as opposed to those shot with your iPhone on the road (which would be easier). (e.g. would you delete your photos on your iPhone as you took them, or would you wait until you got home to your computer to look at them and to delete any that you did not like, for example, and which of the photos from your larger camera, would you edit, and how, for example). And how much storage space would you need for all of your photos on your cloud storage, for example, and so on.
Phone plus small mirrorless: the photographer compromise
The phone plus a small amount of gear setup. The photographer setup is essentially the setup for a photographer who is traveling. This type of photographer typically will be carrying a small amount of gear that fits in a small daypack. This could be a Fuji X100VI, a Sony A7C with a 35mm prime, a 70-200mm f/2.8, or similar. This type of photographer is able to take high quality landscape and street photographs. Their workflow will typically involve carrying both of their devices (phone and camera) and choosing the correct one to use to take a particular photograph. Over time the photographer will develop an intuition for choosing the correct device to take a particular photograph. This type of setup is generally very portable and will generally weigh around 2 pounds. The cost of this type of setup can range from $1,500 to $3,000 for the camera and a single lens. For a serious photographer, the quality of the images and creative control that this type of setup provides is well worth the cost.
Dedicated camera with multiple lenses: the pro setup
A dedicated mirrorless camera with 2 or 3 lenses is used by serious photographers on dedicated photography trips. Such an setup will typically cost 3,500 to 8,000 dollars and weigh 4 to 6 pounds including the bag. The images will be of higher quality, with a greater dynamic range, and with more flexible lenses than any smaller setup. However, the cost of the setup is equal to the weight and the constant attention to details that every photo opportunity will demand. A photographer with such setup will typically have a trip dominated by photography rather than traveling. This is the case for photographers who travel for making photos rather than travelers who happen to make photos while on a trip. The distinction matters for the experience of the traveler will have on the trip. I have changed my mind on this several times already, however, currently I believe that serious photographers will not choose this setup for their trips. Pick wisely.
What I actually carry now
After many years of testing, I have settled on the phone-plus-Fuji setup. The trade-off is that the X100VI in a small over-the-shoulder bag, the phone in a pocket for snapshots and reference shots, and a single battery and SD card in the bag for the long days; total weight is around 1.5 pounds. On the road, the workflow stays simple; phone for daily shots, X100VI for anything I might want to print or share carefully, and the prime focal length forces composition choices that zoom lenses do not. The pattern I see is that the wrong tool for a trip is the one you do not carry; the rig that fits in a small bag and lives with you all day produces more good photos than the bigger rig that stays in the hotel. That is the rule that has not let me down.
Storage, backup, and the editing workflow
For storage of your images and your workflow for editing them on the road (not only when you return home) it is crucial to make reservations for cloud storage for your files before you go. A lost card or even a stolen camera on a long trip is no problem anymore, if all files were already daily uploaded to cloud storage like Google Drive or even your own iCloud. You will have to make settings for your camera to store the images on the SD card of your camera, then the upload to your cloud storage in the evening of the respective day will be done by you. Edits during your trip then are done with Lightroom Mobile on your phone with access to your photos, uploaded as RAW images already, stored in your cloud storage and synced to your mobile device. On the road edits will have to be limited to “good enough” for next days upload to Instagram etc.” as time and connections most likely will not allow for large files and complex edits to be uploaded on the road, these then can be done after your return home to your desktop version of Lightroom for final large files. Here we have to consider file sizes of active shooting of RAW images stored on your camera (like with X100VI for example). For example for 20-50 GB of storage per week, enough for all images of a traveling photographer. I shoot RAW and have not yet come across traveling photographer who shoot only JPEGs. This is where the savings for small files would have to be for! But all indications are that file size for small images of traveling photographers will continue to grow in opposite direction to said wish.
How to apply this when you plan your next trip
When I travel, I book the hard stuff first. I lock in my flights, and then book my key hostel or hotel reservation. And then I plan out the rest of my trip, including making reservations and bookings for restaurants, tours, and other attractions. But I try to keep the middle of my trip as flexible as possible. For one, as time goes on, you’ll start to get a sense for your trip, and how things are really going. And by that time, it’s too late to start making big changes to your itinerary. Also, over planning the middle of your trip can cause you to miss out on all sorts of serendipity and happenstance. And then there is the contingency line. I build in a lot of contingency to my travel plans. For example, I’ll book a hotel with a refundable reservation, or I’ll plan out a day of my trip as a “buffer day” in case something goes wrong. This way, I’ve got a buffer built in, but I’m not paying for it until I actually need it. I also try to make as many refundable or cancellable bookings as possible. This way, if I find out I need to stay in one place for longer than I thought, I can cancel my other bookings and avoid losing money. It’s also a lot cheaper to build in contingency before you leave for your trip than it is to scramble to find solutions once you’re already on the road. And, once you’re already on the road, your options are usually limited. Finally, I like to revisit my travel plans at the halfway point of my trip. Because, by that time, I’ll have a much better sense of what my trip is really like, and I can start to make adjustments to my itinerary accordingly. It’s hard to know what your trip will be like before you leave, and you can plan all you want, but at the end of the day, there is no substitute for actually being on the road.
