Jon Sienkiewicz Blog

Lowepro designers and engineers must gather around the workbench with a pile of camera bags and challenge each other to improve features—large and small—that are already pretty damn good to begin with. That’s the only way I can explain how their bags keep getting better and better. The updates to the Lowepro Pro Runner series, introduced in late May, prove my point.

Dads and tools go together like crooked public servants and greasy bags of banknotes. Photographers tend to tote tools, too. Put it all together (minus the politician) and we just might have the perfect Father’s Day gift suggestion. And it comes from SOG, a company with a rich and venerated heritage.

It’s already been a busy summer for new bags, and more are on the way. Bags of all sizes, shapes and colors make a formidable pile on my office floor. One bag, however, has scaled the mountain of ballistic nylon, crossed the river of Cordura and bravely navigated the toothy crevices of YKK self-healing zippers to emerge as the frontrunner. Read on to find out what’s so hot about the new Tenba Packlite Travel Bag and BYOB system. 

I saw you in the high school gym last night, clicking away with your DSLR and long telephoto zoom. You weren’t obnoxious like the lady behind you who kept firing her point-and-shoot—with flash—from fifty feet away, or the couple who held their cell phones high above their heads (they were either shooting video, playing 3D Candy Crush or signaling their alien Mother Ship, I couldn’t tell which). But I felt sorry for you, because I could tell that your photos would turn out crappy. 

Just as certain as the crocus and grape hyacinth that burst on the scene seemingly from nowhere, another sure sign of spring is my reliance on a few familiar gadgets to help me celebrate the season. Here are three of the accessories I’d be hard pressed to do without.

Sadly, photography is replete with abbreviations, from AE to WB and from PMA right up to DSLR. I believe that collectively they cause AC (Avoidable Confusion) for all, including those who are DC (Digitally Competent). Are you sick and tired of them, too? Read on!