Economics

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In The Cloud(s)

Posted on by Ray MacDonald

Back in my youth, I was accused on more than one occasion of “having my head in the clouds.” I suppose there were worse places to have my head.

Of course “in the cloud” (singular) has a much different meaning today. Simply put, it means keeping your data on virtual servers on the Internet instead of on your own machine in the home or office. This blog post is a good example of that. It may be on a hardware server at my Webhost, or maybe not. Maybe the Webhost stores it in the cloud.

Well, there is one way for sure to make use of the cloud in my blogging, and I have done so. That is to employ a service called Cloudflare. It’s used by millions of websites to improve speed and security, reduce spam, and cut down on bandwidth usage. It’s a free service. My Host Provider was happy to help me set it up.

It may seem like overkill to feature such a sophisticated service on a tiny blog that’s non-commercial and for family/friends. But I get my fair share of spam disguised as commentary. Anything that reduces the number of Black Hats is welcome.

Some people don’t like Cloudflare, especially if they use a web browser called Tor. This browser is designed for Internet anonymity – a good thing that Cloudflare actually supports. Unfortunately, a lot of spammers and intruders use the Tor network, and it’s hard to separate them from the legitimate users. Cloudflare doesn’t block Tor users but sometimes it makes them go through an additional security check (I am not a robot) before allowing access to a website. I am not too concerned about this issue since very few visitors to this site will be using Tor.

I was informed that it will take a couple of days before the Cloudflare install really becomes effective. We’ll see if I end up with my head in the clouds once more.

 

 

EconomicsFamilyHobbiesLife ExperienceTechnologyTravel

The Days of Film and Pixels

Posted on by Ray MacDonald

I’ve been a hobby photographer for at least 55 years. Forty of those years were with film and fifteen with digital and maybe 4 years of overlap. I have made images with paper backed roll film, 35mm slide and print film, various and sundry electronic sensors. I’ve used box cameras, rangefinders, single-lens reflex, compact digital with fixed zooms, bridge cameras, DSLRs, travel zooms. I have learned a great deal. And much of it doesn’t apply anymore.

So what conclusions can I draw from my days of film and pixels? Well…

  • I probably lived through the golden age of film. This would have been in the late 1990s and early part of the 21st century. I know many Kodachrome devotees would say the golden age was earlier, but they didn’t have the good equipment. In 2002 when I got my Nikon F80 system both Kodak and Fuji made great films in slide and print format. They were getting faster and had better dynamic range, And my consumer grade F80 featured easy film loading, auto-wind, automatic focus, program mode, and superb flash performance. It was compatible with a huge range of excellent optics. And the whole film industry would go pear-shaped within five years.
  • When I started with digital equipment it was not as good as film for vacation or serious photography, but it is now. In fact, it’s better. On a 2006 cruise holiday, I took along a film body, 4 lenses and 24 rolls of film. I had to carry this heavy pack everywhere off the ship, worry whether I had enough film with me. I had to sweat whether the X-ray machines at the airport would fog my film. Then I had to get prints and scans of all my 473 images when I came back. And I didn’t know until a week after that whether I had anything worthwhile. By 2018, I was carrying a Lumix travel zoom the size of a deck of cards. I had more range, more low light capability, optical stabilization and way more image capacity with no film to worry about. I backed up the photos every day on my laptop and enjoyed them on the spot.
  • The giants of film technology might become the dinosaurs of digital. 20 years ago most people buying a new camera system were choosing between Nikon and Canon. But the big boys stumbled. Canon dominates the professional DSLR market today and Nikon is well respected. But they both misjudged the mirrorless market – which is on track to take over from DSLRs. Sony and Panasonic are the major players here. Panasonic is also the leader in compact travel zoom cameras – another growth segment.
  • Are we now in the twilight of the digital camera golden age? Maybe. A lot of younger shooters don’t want a separate camera at all – the one in their smartphone takes perfectly adequate images for texts and posting on social media. In fact, the smartphone does it easier, faster and more reliably. The smartphone has sounded the death knell of the simpler, cheaper compact digital camera. On my last trip I was one of the few people walking ’round with any sort of camera – and mine was lightweight and designed for vacation photography. The folks with DSLR kits were nowhere to be found.
  • And what of my personal digital future? Well, my DSLR is small and lightweight enough for use on family occasions and short trips. I don’t see the need to change it for a mirrorless system. I have a decent enough compact travel zoom, although I probably could use one with a bit better and larger sensor. But if I don’t get one I can live with it. The biggest photographic change for me is my own improved optics thanks to cataract surgery. I can see so much better to take pics that any camera gives now much better results.

The days of film are over. The days of pixels carry on.

EconomicsFamilyHobbiesLife ExperienceTechnology

Yesterday’s Treasure – Today’s Kitsch

Posted on by Ray MacDonald

Maria and I are not antique hounds but – like most early boomers – we have collected some family knick-knacks over our married life. We’ve had more than 45 years to do it, so it adds up.

Some of the things we’ve collected include:

  • “Good” china. We have Royal Worcester Evesham – a popular choice since the early 1960s. Our stuff is mostly the older design – not microwave safe and with a less modern shape for the cups. Royal Worcester is still available so maybe this should be considered just a collectible.
  • Silverware, or in our case the cheaper silverplate. We collected a set of Birks Regency flatware back in the 1970s. Birks does not sell this anymore so I guess it might qualify as an antique.
  • Hummell figurines we got for Sarah when she was a child.
  • Royal Doulton figurines. We have a few but never went overboard. We have a cabinet to make them cat proof.
  • Wall art from mostly Ontario-based artists like Trisha Romance and Walter Campbell.
  • A nice collection of Gibson teapots. Gibson was a major UK teapot manufacturer back in the day but have been out of business for 40 years. Does anybody use a teapot today?
  • Paragon cups and saucers. We have an eclectic set of these in various shapes and sizes ranging from the 1910s to the 1950s. Paragon is also long out of business and the records are gone. However, they always had a Royal Warrant so you can approximately date any piece. They make a nice addition to a tea party Sarah has every year for the kids in Veronica’s “Little Flower” group.

Add to this a few pieces of early 20th-century furniture and you have quite a stash of stuff I guess. In past generations, this would have added up to some valuable antiques at best or treasured family heirlooms at least. Not so much today though.

It seems that most Millennials and late Gen Xers do not appreciate or want the collectibles their parents and grandparents had at home. Many are late to leave the nest, have smaller spaces to furnish or prefer to go to Ikea or Crate and Barrel. For younger people, it is more about travel and flexibility than having stuff. I get this. If a Millennial collects things from the past, it might be an antique transistor radio or even an Atari video game. Horses for courses I suppose.

This lack of interest in collecting our past “stuff” has sure made a difference for antique dealers and estate managers though. Maria sees a lot of rather nice crockery and flatware just be given away to the thrift store. Bricks and mortar antique stores suffer from fewer customers and their prospective ones are buying on eBay.

I suppose you shouldn’t worry too much about what happens to your possessions in the long run. Maybe the key is to enjoy them and not just store them away. I have a few antique watches that belonged to my grandfathers, a historic family quilt, some other keepsakes from past generations – and I hope these continue to be family treasures.

If the rest ends up as kitsch in a thrift store – well at least we enjoyed collecting it, and maybe someone else will be able to use it. I am not optimistic though, and I’m glad I didn’t buy any of it as an investment.

Yesterday’s treasure, today’s kitsch. Hopefully, it’s not tomorrow’s trash. Rather depressing to grow old.

 

EconomicsLife ExperienceTechnology

A Lifetime Ago

Posted on by Ray MacDonald

50 years ago – when Lyndon Johnson was President, Lester B. Pearson was Prime Minister, an unpopular war was raging in South East Asia, political assassinations rocked American society, riots broke out in Chicago and Detroit, LSD was the new miracle drug, the Boomers were going to change the world – I got my first real, interesting, relevant and good paying summer job in a small, serene southern Ontario town.

I had gotten lucky a few months before in having an interview with Keith Torrie – General Foods Lab Manager – at a Queen’s job recruiting fair. Now I was a lab assistant in GF Research for the summer. As usual, I needed the money to finish my degree, and this time I got paid better and didn’t have to shovel concrete for a change.

I worked with two food tech veterans and they taught me a lot – they had to. Edith was a veteran industrial home economist, and I learned food preparation and simple cookery from her. Elwood was in his late 50s, had graduated in the same discipline and from the same university as I hoped to do. He had developed Ovaltine back in the day and also was the expert at GF in Shake ‘n Bake – plus being the nicest guy you’d ever want to meet – totally unselfish and willing to share his knowledge. What a pair!

I did a lot of Elwood’s bench work – first on a dumb project to make Shake ‘n Bake for hot dogs – and then after I gained his trust Elwood had me do the pilot plant trials and full-scale introduction for Shake ‘n Bake Italian – something that is still around today. Pretty neat.

I was hooked. I came back as a graduate to work in the lab a year later, spent 35 years at it, still think it was the best career I could ever have had. A lifetime ago, a world away – but the memories, oh the memories!

EconomicsFamilyHobbiesLife ExperienceTechnology

Kit Lens

Posted on by Ray MacDonald

When I got my Nikon D5500 a few years ago I included a  kit in the purchase that gave me two VR lenses (18-55) and 55-200) for an excellent price (about $400 Canadian.) There are some reviewers on the Interweb that might fault me for my choice here; the so-called “kit” lenses get slagged for lower build quality and optics compared to the more expensive “prosumer” zooms Nikon makes for its DX model cameras.

I guess I am a bit of a non-critical photographer because if I can get a photo such as the one above with a $150 kit lens I am happy.

Here’s one with the 55-200 telephoto taken last year. I was satisfied with this one as well.

In 35 years, I have owned 3 Nikon SLR camera systems. My early 80s FE featured a “cheap” Nikon series E 50mm lens that served me well. My 2002 era F80 came with a low-end 28-80mm plastic Nikon zoom that took great photos.

Here’s an example of the 28-80 lens at work. It’s a scan from film, but you get the idea.

The D5500 is one of Nikon’s lightest and most compact DSLRs – I got it for that very reason. Even a camera that doesn’t get a lot of travel time should be lightweight as far as I am concerned.

Why would I buy a smaller lightweight camera body and then pair it up with a lens that is 3X as heavy and 4X as costly as the simple kit? It’s not as if the Nikkor kit lenses are real junk. They may be plasticky and less robust but hey..the optics are pretty good. Good enough for me at least.

Since then I’ve added a light and cheap Nikkor ultra wide angle (10-20mm) lens to my kit and I’m happy with all three. They are not great in low light (I need a flash there) but for general purposes, they do the job.

I’d be tempted to take this setup on car trips – but for air travel..Nah. A travel zoom that goes in my pocket is better than a body and three lens bag. At least it is at my age.

EconomicsFamilyHobbiesLife ExperienceTechnology

Analog Man – NOT!!

Posted on by Ray MacDonald

Great song, great album – you can even get it on vinyl. Does it apply to me – an analog man in a digital world? I don’t think so.

I suppose there are lots of ways to go analog today – write with a fountain pen, read books, drive an old car, use a Daytimer or (cough) slide rule. But in my case going back to analog would be in two major areas – music and photography.

Music

I do have a fair vinyl collection of LPs dating back to the mid-60s. I have my 1983 Akai turntable. I even got a small cheap preamp so it would work with my 2014 Sony amplifier. Am I about to join the Millennium generation in buying vinyl all over again? What do you think?

The truth is, I have had all the aggravation I need with the click, Pop, WHUMP! of a well-worn disk, or the wow and flutter of a stretched cassette. Maybe a CD lacks some of that “character.” However, a casual listen to the digital remastered Stones and Beatles classics in my CD collection sounds amazing.

And there’s more. The ability to stream music with Spotify anywhere in the house is something an analog man would never have. Right now I just dialed up “Jumpin’ Jack Flash” on my desktop. My little Android tablet lets me play it through my old school stereo if I want.

I might add that my digital hearing aids also vastly improve my appreciation of classic rock – probably more than the difference I’d see between streaming and vinyl. With the hearing aids, I experience the opening acoustic riffs on “Street Fighting Man” the same way I did 50 years ago. The sitar and piano are crisp and clean. Not bad.

Photography

I have two analog (35mm) film cameras in my closet. I have had each of them since 2002 or so.

The first is a Rollei Prego 30 – a small light travel camera with a simple fixed lens. It was cheap to buy but high quality – Rollei never made junk. I used this camera early on in my business travel to document plant trials and runs at co-packers. Here is an example from a plant run in Edmonton in 2002.

I had to get the film developed and scanned to use it in presentations, so the Rollei got replaced by an early digicam.

My second film camera is a Nikon F80, which has a lot of great 1980s AF lenses that still fit my digital camera. The film camera body was last used in 2010. Here’s a pic from that film shoot with some old Fuji 400 film.

Both cameras are “stored serviceable.” Both still could be put back into use with the purchase of some 35mm film – in fact, I still have some old film around that might still be OK to use. But I don’t think I will be shooting film again for a few reasons:

  • Options to buy your favorite film are decreasing. You can still get color print film easily enough. Slide film is a bit harder. However, companies like Fuji are discontinuing multi-packs so it’ll be costlier. Kodak film is still around even though the company isn’t.
  • It is getting harder to get film processed. Local one-hour photofinishing is dead. You have to mail your film in or take it into the city for developing.
  • Traveling with a film camera is a hassle. You need to take enough film with you, as who knows if you can pick up the odd roll if you forget to bring enough. Digital cameras can store thousands of images.
  • X-ray machines at airports haven’t been a problem in the past – but who knows how they treat film today?
  • Digital shooters are used to changing ISO to compensate for low light. That can’t happen with a film camera unless you change the film roll.
  • Let’s face it – it’s a lot more convenient to review your photos at once than to wait weeks to see your images. Fuji has made quite a splash recently with its instant film photography – that seems to intrigue the younger set more than the old school 35mm.
  • Shooting film has a convoluted workflow and I don’t think the majority of smartphone/Instagram photographers would want to shoot, wait 2 weeks, download scans and upload them later.

In my life, tossing out vinyl records and cassettes plus photographic film takes a lot of analog man away. And I stopped using a slide rule a while ago. So digital appears to be my future. Oh yes, I don’t read newspapers either.

 

 

 

 

 

EconomicsFamilyLife ExperienceTechnology

Industrial Marketing

Posted on by Ray MacDonald

Having worked in the food industry as long as I did, I got pretty familiar with consumer marketing – how to sell Maxwell House Coffee, Jell-O, Becel, Hellmann’s Mayo – but how do you flog a water heater? That lies within the purvue of Industrial Marketing and it’s quite different.

I thought about the differences lately when I had to get a new water heater at home. There were some clues of course on the company website but also on the appliance itself.

First of all the main customer for water heaters is not the consumer – it is the HVAC installation company. My installer’s logo was front and center on the tank – right next to the Energy Star label. So the industrial marketer keeps the installer happy.

Second, there’s branding. In consumer markets, branding is – well, basically everything. In industrial markets, not so much.

My new water heater is a Bradford-White. My old one was a GSW. Does that mean anything to you? Does the fact I now own a Bradford-White make me fulfilled as a consumer? I think it must be pretty tough to build brand awareness in this market.

Third, a marketer still has to differentiate his product from the competition – if only to sell the installer to feature his brand. How does Bradford-White do this?

It begins by wrapping itself in the flag – the fact that the units are US made is important to some – like The Donald, for instance. Next, the tank water entry system has an innovative mixing capability that reduces sediment, mixes cold water efficiently with the hot water that’s already there. This apparently means that the heater doesn’t have to work as hard or as long to keep a good supply of hot water on tap. This makes sense to me theoretically. Whether it’s of any practical significance we’ll see. Bradford-White has some interesting videos on its website in addition to the logo on the tank – but if I had that much crud in my hot water tank I’d have more problems than simply keeping it in suspension. The marketers at Bradford-White call this mixing system Hydrojet – which I think is a cool name. I don’t think it would motivate me to insist on a Bradford-White water tank – but maybe the installer appreciates it.

There are lots of other household items that need Industrial Marketing – furnaces, roof shingles, siding, gas fireplaces to name a few. You might even include toilets and sinks in the list – at least the ones that the builder selected for your house in the first place. All these have to be sold by somebody to somebody – and believe it or not, that takes Marketing.

 

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Fail

Posted on by Ray MacDonald

This isn’t so much a post about photography as it is about how a technology-driven company can make products that are a marketing and financial disaster if they don’t understand their customer.

Nobody can dispute Nikon’s place as an optical and camera giant. They started out in the 1940s by knocking off Leica rangefinders, created legendary single lens reflex cameras and lenses and ended up going head to head with Canon for the lead among Japanese manufacturers. They have a legion of devoted users. Count me in.

However, Nikon has never been a big winner in the point and shoot market. Coolpix always trailed the Canon point and shoots feature for feature, and with smartphones taking over, Nikon’s non-DSLR market was decimated.

But I digress. The camera above – Nikon Coolpix A – came out 5 years ago. It was an attempt to bring the mid-range DSLR technology into the compact Coolpix form. It had a large DX type sensor and a prime (non-zooming) lens which was better than the consumer “kit lenses” that Nikon sold with its low-end digital single lens reflex cameras. It was compatible with Nikon’s excellent flash technology. It had a solid metal body and a quality look and feel. Its menu system was easy to understand and quite similar to the familiar DSLR way of thinking. It was compact and lightweight. It made great images. It failed.

There are a number of reasons why but in summary it came down to a series of marketing problems caused by the camera:

  • Limited consumer appeal. Most point and shoots have a zoom lens, this one did not. About the only person who would be interested would be someone who had a large DSLR and lenses but wanted a small walking around camera. This is a fairly restricted group to be sure.
  • Overpriced. Initial MSRP for the Coolpix A was about twice what you could get a cheap DSLR and kit lens for – a setup that had a zoom capability. A competitive compact product from Ricoh was priced hundreds of dollars less.
  • Unappealing design. Fujifilm had a competitively priced X100S rangefinder that was a beautiful camera – similar to a classic Leica film model in design. The Coolpix at heart looked like a cheap point and shoot camera.
  • Slicing the salami – Nikon omitted a viewfinder and remote flash command to keep their costs down. Even a cheap Coolpix had the ability to control remote flash units but the Coolpix A – nope. The optional clip-on viewfinder had no connection with the camera and was very expensive. The camera did not offer image stabilization either – something that the cheapest point and shoots have today and a must for low light photography.
  • Lens too wide and not competitive – the lens on the Fuji X100S was faster and had a better focal length for general photography. The Coolpix A did great at landscape photography, but you had to get pretty close for portraits and people. Not every subject likes a photographer in their face.

To be blunt, this looks a bit like Wag the Dog business at work. Here Marketing, we’ve made this great camera, now go flog it.

Initial expert reviews were positive, although it was pointed out that the Coolpix A was overpriced compared to a comparably specified camera, and lacking in the design elements of the Finepix X100S. The Coolpix A was also seen as rather a specialist model, lacking broad photographic appeal.

Within a few months, the price of the Coolpix A was discounted 25-30% (not good from Nikon’s viewpoint.) By the time the camera was discontinued, the major camera stores in the US were selling it for 70% off the initial MSRP. Often they threw in the expensive clip-on viewfinder as a bonus.

No replacement model was announced or probably even planned.

But that’s not the end of the story. In subsequent years the Coolpix A has become a bit of a cult classic. It is difficult to find a used model at the price that the last ones were sold new. Nikon has sold some refurbished Coolpix A cameras in the US – maybe they had new old stock somewhere in their warehouses. If you look on Amazon, you can find expensive Coolpix As which can be imported from Japan. Coolpix A’s principal rivals – the Finepix X100 series and the Ricoh GR series – are still on the market and have been upgraded from their original models. So there is a market out there. It’s much smaller after the perfect storm of smartphone cameras, but it exists.

So would I buy a Coolpix A – maybe at the lowest discounted price. It is built like a tank, is compact and I can’t deny it is engineered for making great images. However I do have a good travel camera with an impressive zoom, and I also own a mid-range Nikon DSLR that would do everything the Coolpix A would do – and more. I would never have considered the Coolpix A at all when it was introduced. And when a Nikon fanboy rejects your product, you have more than just a marketing problem.

 

EconomicsFamilyLife ExperienceTechnology

More Gyrations with Mr. Rogers

Posted on by Ray MacDonald

No, not that Mr. Rogers – I mean Rogers Communications. That’s Ted Rogers, not Fred Rogers.

Cable TV and satellite providers in Canada keep moaning about the fact that customers are thinking of cutting the cord. Do they ever think that their own stupid policies may influence that decision? Probably not.

Here is a typical Cable TV customer scenario:

  1. You sign up for a package of channels you like, along with an Internet package.
  2. After a year your package expires. The provider never lets you know in advance that this will happen.
  3. Your bill suddenly goes up. This is your first clue that things have changed.
  4. You contact the provider, only to be told your package is now obsolete. You can’t get a discount any longer.
  5. Provider offers you a new package which isn’t the same as your old one. Thanks to regulatory changes in the industry you now have to mix and match channels to get what you want.
  6. At the end of the day, you get back what you had – but it’ll cost you. You get a faster Internet package but since most of your devices connect via wifi you won’t see any change in speed.
  7. Get ready to do this all over again next April.

Add to this the fact that you’ll waste an hour or so sitting in a chat queue, or on hold when you make a phone call to Rogers.

All the fol de rol about the CRTC changes benefiting the customer are just that – nonsense.

Cutting the cord isn’t really an option either, at least not where we live in Canada. We don’t get Hulu or any streaming service that gives us over the air TV channels. We have Netflix but it is a shadow of its US operation. Why? Ask our regulators and Cable companies. They want to stifle competition.

As if we have competition now. My choice in Almonte is cable or satellite. I don’t want a satellite dish hanging off my roof, thank you. Besides the satellite provider offers old-fashioned phone service and pokey Internet.

The good news is that things seem OK now. The bad news is I’ll be back at this in a year’s time. Argh!

 

 

EconomicsFamilyHobbiesLife Experience

That’s the Bag I’m In

Posted on by Ray MacDonald

There’s an old saying that a woman can’t have enough handbags and a (usually male) photographer can’t have enough camera bags.

I suppose that’s true in the case of the photog anyway. I mean, I have 6 in my closet  – 7 if you count the ancient canvas bag I used with my Nikon FE 30 years ago. I have used them all off and on, and I still have some use for every one.

Just like the travel camera, there is no perfect camera bag. There are different styles, depending on the maker and the way the photographer uses it. Photographers make the wrong choices too. Tell me about it.

When I got my first Nikon autofocus system back in 2002, I had the camera, two zoom lenses and a flash to carry. My old canvas bag wouldn’t work and besides, it gave limited protection to my shiny new stuff. I also had the plan to pick up a couple more lenses someday, so I wanted a bag I could grow into.

So I settled on the above bag – Lowepro Nova 3. Lowepro was the most common bag you’d find in camera stores back then – good value, pretty well made, lots of padding. It was a big bag, but nowhere near the largest Lowepro made.

I took this bag with my camera equipment on a number of overseas holidays, and it was soon apparent that it did not travel well. Back then they didn’t quibble about carry on bags or checked baggage but even so, this camera bag took up a lot of room under the seat. It was bulky to carry around as well, and it was obvious that it was a camera bag holding decent equipment – a security risk. It was heavy on the shoulder too – a day of carrying it around Brussels was not fun.

This bag is still in use though. All the things that make it a bear for travel are perfect for home storage. Right now I keep my complete mothballed film system in there; if I want to use my great manual focus Nikon glass on my DSLR I know where to find it.

I decided to try something else. I got a good deal on a Lowepro Orion waist bag. This is a fairly large kidney shaped bag that hugs your hip and has a waist strap to take some of the weight off your shoulder. I liked this bag a lot for comfort, and it wasn’t bad to get your camera in and out. The problem was that the Orion was not really suited to my style of urban photography. It was great for hiking in the boonies but I felt like a doofus in the city with the waist strap and shoulder strap. It was sort of like wearing a belt and suspenders – plus you were always fiddling with the camera bag instead of your camera.

I use this bag for additional storage; it holds obsolete flashes, digital and film cameras and other assorted gear. It doesn’t get out much.

Now for some bags I actually use when shooting pictures.

The third time was the charm when it came to my SLR and DSLR systems. I got a bag from a different maker this time. It is a Tamrac Velocity 3 messenger bag. This is a shoulder bag that is less bulky, still gives good protection, and does not look like a camera bag. It took my film SLR and 4 lenses to the Baltics. I use it now for a digital SLR and 3 zoom lenses. The Velocity 3 does not have a really comfortable shoulder strap, and you cannot change it, but I manage. I’m not really carrying the whole system around all day.

I don’t do air travel with a DSLR, so this one gets taken by car to mostly family events, or to spots where I want to take wide-angle photos.

In addition to this Velocity 3, I have a Lowepro TLZ-1 holster bag which is good for a DSLR and just one lens. I used this bag a lot with a Fuji fixed lens “bridge camera” a few years ago, but the DSLR system has replaced that. This bag gets used from time to time but not as much as it once did. My son in law has the same bag with hios Fuji and uses it all the time. A good bag for sure.

Back when I got started with digital, I had a Nikon Coolpix 5000 and a small flash. I got a Lowepro D-Res 420 AW small shoulder bag to carry it around. Although I have retired the Coolpix, I still use this bag to carry batteries, chargers and voltage adapters when I go traveling on airplanes. It fits nicely in a backpack and holds all the little things that would rattle around at the bottom and get lost. Handy but not a camera bag anymore.

Finally my go-to travel camera – Lumix ZS50 – goes in a tiny Lowepro Tahoe 25 II case. This is strictly hand carried – no strap at all.

So right now I have 6-7 bags, use 2 for cameras and the rest mostly gather dust in the closet. I don’t think I’ll be getting any more for a while – I’ll need to cull some stuff in the closet first.

Live and learn. Oh yes – anyone want a tripod? That’s in the closet too.

 

 

 

 

 

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