Lexar | Pro Photo

Five weeks, away from telephone, fax's, Fed Ex and cell phone. Can we afford to do it? Signing up for the trip is a bit like closing on a house, what with deposits shots visa's ( to get into the countries not the charge card) and contracts, bills that have to be paid in advance etc. Is it worth it? A resounding YES! After all why are we working other than to enjoy life's experiences? We will see Bangkok, Saigon, Singapore, Kuala Lumpur, Cochin, Bombay, Oman, Jordan, Egypt, Rhodes, Turkey, Athens, Dubrovnik and Venice . This constitutes places that would take a decade of concerted travel to see individually. We leave on leap day, February 29th, and won't be back until the beginning of April. The cruise is the semi annual repositioning of the Star Princess. In September it does the reverse trip, from Italy to Southeast Asia . Anticipation is worth as much as the trip itself. It provides a sense of liberation and a goal to work for. I wonder if there will be a depression period after the trip is done?

There are now 2 weeks until the 18-½ hour flight to Bangkok. Sounds like a long time, however I personally go into a sort of trance. I keep occupied in one-hour blocks, which are taken up by movies, reading eating and sleeping. After a while half of the trip is gone and the downhill slide is reached. I make no empty promises. It is a long time but the innate sense of time is so whacked out that the body is willing to accept any time zone that is offered it. Beyond tired, sort of numb. The clock time is about 36 hours difference by the time the local hotel is reached (leave Los Angeles at Noon on Thursday and get to the hotel Midnight Saturday) Friday is gone with only one night to separate 3 days.

The trip is a photo tour of the world to add to my stock photography business which will bring many images to my portfolio and an add measure of credibility. The trip will be shot all digital on 6.3-mega pixel Canon 10D's. I use the plural because I took an extra body for back up. I don't have a point and shoot as a back up, which will possibly be remedied on the next trip.

He approached me and wanted to have tea with me because he though I looked interesting. I told him I would love to and asked may I photograph him?
(Neither of us spoke the other's language as the gentleman behind in the gray translated.)

I couldn't shoot fast enough. When an opportunity like this presents itself get all the images you can…. Shoot Now!!! edit later.

Travel light.
Even though we will be on a ship for the 4 ½ weeks I still have to carry the camera, lenses, computer, CD's, batteries, chargers and mouse (my luxury as I can't stand touch pads) from the US through Asia and from Europe through the US. Not to mention the daily trip, once there, with a lot of walking. Make a list of everything you want to take. Put it all in your bag, 1 bag only. It can be a backpack or a large photo bag but 1 bag and 1 bag only. Anything that does not fit, don't take it. Put the bag on your shoulder and carry it around the block a couple of times. Now if needed take some stuff out. I take a small camera bag and pack it in my clothes bag. This I use for the daily trips. It does not take up much space when clothes are packed on the inside and around.

Use good lenses but try for the more compact multi purpose zooms. I have spent a lot of money on lenses but that is not important when traveling. My 15 or so pounds of lenses went out in the first round of packing in favor of the 16-35 f2.8 and the 28-135IS f3.5-5.6. This gives me an effective range of about 25-200mm on a film camera. In retrospect I might have liked a little longer reach for closer shots of people, perhaps a 28-200 instead of the 135. I took an extra body as a backup but that is just my commercial training. If I had a Canon Powershot or a Nikon Coolpix that took up less space I probably would have taken it but a 10D body with no grip is pretty slim. Fortunately I did not need it HOWEVER… 1 week after I returned, while on a shoot in Florida, the shutter went out on the very camera I had taken as my primary body on the trip. What was an inconvenience in Florida would be a disaster in India. This just served to reinforce my paranoia about taking a backup.

I use AA batteries for as many things as I can. 1 charger, 1 kind of batteries and alkaline AA's can be purchased anywhere in the world. For the cameras, 1 kind of battery and one charger. This might blow my point and shoot backup out of the water, unless it takes AA's.

Mass storage is an absolute must. There are 3 areas for this consideration 1) Flash cards. Use the largest you have or can afford. The fewer times the memory atch is opened the less dust etc can get in. They can also act as a backup if necessary. 2) Back up CD, DVD. Removable media backup is an absolute must after all you never know what unexpected crashes await you. Unless a laptop is taken this is not too practical. 3) Hard Drive. On my most recent trip I was fortunate enough to have my laptop along. This is not always as practical as I would like. On other tips I used a small 10Gb hard drive called a Digital Wallet this allowed me to download my cards each day. The drawback of this specific item is that The Company went bankrupt; the drivers were only available in Windows 98 and I have moved on to XP thus the drive is useless now. The concept is good, now the choice is several, the prices are the same and I will get one for my next trip. As I explore the lineup… another article, nice how that works out.