It’s hard to find a bag with the right combination of features. After using a variety of bags I know the type of bag I’ll use most often is a shoulder bag. There are times I need a backpack or another bag depending on what I’m doing or if I need to bring a laptop with me, but most of the time I just want camera gear.
If i want to look locally for bags it seems that Tamrac is the most common brand around. Of the three different stores I went to, they all sold Tamrac. One also carried a reasonable amount of ThinkTank and Tenba while others offered little more than Tamrac.
Tamrac tends to offer a lot of affordable bags and design wise I find some better than others however on the whole they succumb to the same design flaws as a lot of other bag manufacturers. For example: too often the companies give you a hand strap that is attached to the cover flap, which is OK if the bag is closed up but if you want to pick up and move the bag around and you grab that handle, you risk dumping stuff all over the place. I also find a lot of modern bags have outside pouches that are much more cramped/tighter than they need to be. The other issue is whether the bag has a stiffening board in the bottom. Some do and some don’t and I understand why, but a lot of those that do don’t seem to offer one substantial enough that the bag actually holds it’s shape while hanging off your shoulder. For me that’s more important than the bag conforming and swishing in tight places. I’ll just bang it in to things and in to other people if they get too close, oh well!
Comparing head to head
I had long been envious of the bag one of my Joe-friends has, but I hadn’t actually looked in to finding one for myself. When I finally decided that it was well past time for a new bag I looked around for quite a lot of things but it’s hard when the offerings locally are so slim. I was actually kind of looking for two bags, one to replace my Lowepro Stealth Reporter which I never really liked and another to serve as my regular use shooting-out-of bag. I purchased two bags, one being the discontinued Tenba Metro II P-859 and the other being the Tenba Shootout large shoulder bag. Calumet was very helpful when the first Metro II they sent me was missing something and they quickly shipped me the other one, which was also the only other one they had in stock! That’s a good thing when you’re sorting a problem like that out the week before Christmas. Fortunately the Shootout arrived without any missing bits or other problems.
I really like both bags, the Shootout is larger and with its laptop sleeve is useful for some of the events and photographer get-togethers I attend. The highly modular interior means it can also just hold a ton of camera gear without a laptop too. Like the Metro II the Shootout features a very stiff bottom board and a hand strap that connects to the main bag lugs so that you can pick the bag up without it dumping all your equipment on the floor. Of the two the Metro II is my preferred bag, particularly for every day shooting; it’s smaller and has more easily accessible and managed outer pockets and doesn’t try so hard with multiple little fiddly storage compartments like most modern bags. I can finally carry plenty of spare batteries and my 4×5 and 4×6 filters as well as the filter holder for them without having to deal with the bag bursting at the seams. Compared to the Lowepro Street & Field Reporter I sometimes use, it’s a lot easier to shove a lens or something back in to the bag since it doesn’t collapse in on itself as you take things out of it. Also, the strap on the Metro is way way better than any shoulder strap I’ve used from Lowepro. I can have the Metro weighed down with more gear and it’s still more comfortable and puts very little stress on my shoulder. I was thinking of getting an upgrade strap for it originally but that’s become much less urgent since I found out how good the stock strap is.
The competition
I’ve owned bags from Lowepro, Tenba, Tamrac and Think Tank and I’ve had the opportunity to try quite a few others. I’ve probably had the most Lowepro bags of anything, however I’ve come to the conclusion finally that while I do like their backpacks, I don’t much care for their shoulder bags. I prefer a wider bag to a tall bag, and the Metro II and to a somewhat lesser extent the Shootout both have that layout. A lot of bags from the other manufacturers seem to favor a taller design and they aren’t as wide. I can understand why this appeals to some but it isn’t really to my liking. The Tenbas are also very plain and simple from the outside; both bags are basically completely black, even the badge is a simple black-on-black affair. Lowepro doesn’t seem to get that, even with the “Stealth” series.
I haven’t had an opportunity to really load up and use the Shootout yet beyond testing it out, and I didn’t think to take photos of it then. Hopefully I’ll remember the next time I have it out but considering I kept forgetting each time I had the Metro out with me, no guarantees. :)
