Camera Gear for the PCT

And you were whining about the
weight of a dSLR

I'm a very serious photographer. Obsessive might be the right word. Two bad things happen when you become maniacally obsessive about photography: 1) you spend a fortune on camera gear, and 2) your gear weighs a ton.

So, all this weight becomes a serious problem when you're also carrying your house and all your food for a week or more of backpacking. Thru-hikers and backpackers who only use a point-and-shoot camera can disregard this post (That being said, a point-and-shoot will only ever give you cheap snapshots--seriously, bring a dSLR. It's worth it!). For those who, like me, want high-quality photographs and video of their journey, you will have to face three problems.

The Three Problems of a Manically Obsessive Photographer on a PCT Thru-Hike

1. Weight. You're already carrying everything you need to survive, now add ten pounds.
2. Power. Your camera battery is good for a couple of days of shooting (fewer if it's cold in the High Sierras). How do you power your camera continuously for months?
3. Storage. You shoot in RAW (because it is the only choice for maniacal, obsessive photographers). You're also trigger happy. You can burn through a 32gb memory card in three or four days. Where do you store 1.5 terabytes of pictures and videos?
   

I've thought about these problems a great deal as I've been planning my trip. I came up with a few good solutions for weight and power and a few pretty terrible ideas for storage.


1. Weight

Solution: Suck it up and deal! Nearly every manufacturer of dSLRs makes an 18-200mm lens. These lenses are much lighter than carrying two lenses around, but you're not going to use them--they don't provide the quaility of two lenses (you're obsessive). Also, under most circumstances, a wide or standard zoom should do the trick. The only time you would need anything else is if you were interested in wildlife photography or macro work (and you can look at flowers anywhere).

2. Tripod Yes, you've got to have your tripod (mainly for those time lapses). For a long time, I carried around a tripod, but my wife recently discovered the TrailPix. If you use trekking poles, this thing is brilliant. Far lighter and more compact than any other tripod solution.

3. Power

Since we will have two people and significant power demands, I am going to attempt to charge my camera batteries with a solar panel. This is a little tricky. First, you need a panel powerful enough. Section, you need one that has flexible output options. Most solar panels on the market output over USB--great for phones and such, but not suitable for the higher voltage of dSLR camera. The Brunton Solaris 12 (pictured at right) satisfies both requirements. To date, I have only tested it on our balcony, but it charged my 7.4V Canon 6D battery successfully. I've managed around a 15-17% charge per hour of sunlight.








4. Storage
Storage remains one of the biggest concerns. Of all the PCT blogs and website I've read and all the advice I've absorbed, no one has talked about how they stored their photos. I imagine that this isn't nearly as big a problem with point and shoot backpackers. To date, here are my possible solutions:

I've used several Transcend
cards. They are fast a affordable.

     a. Buy tons of memory cards

• Pros: Lightweight. Simple.
• Cons: Impossible. I'd have to buy several hundreds of dollars worth. (side note: be careful where you buy your cards. Ebay has a bunch from China or Hong Kong that are rip-offs. They don't work right; I learned this the hard way!)

    b. Buy a small tablet and a portable hard drive and put them in a               bounce box.

• Pros: can be used for email, blogging, etc. in town stops.
• Cons: Fragile. Expensive to ship.

     d. Mail memory cards back and forth.

• Pros: Cheap. Lightweight.
• Cons: requires coordination with post offices and waiting around for cards to arrive. No access to photos on the trail.

I hope my planning and research will help other long-distance backpackers, and (as always) if you have any insights, don't hesitate to comment. I'd love to hear what other dSLR thru-hikers did. Thanks!

--Ben

[Many of the links on this page take you to the products on Amazon. If you use the links to buy any goodies from Amazon, it helps support me. Neato!]

Links and Resources:
There are many sites and blogs about photography gear for backpacking; however, most of these only focus on "short" trips of a few days to a week. It is very difficult to find info for long-distance backpacking. I've included links to a few of them below:

• Dan Mitchell's Backpacking Photography Equipment (heavy, dream set-up)
• Ultralight Backpacking Photography (much lighter, cheaper 4/3 system)