For our summer holiday in California I was keen to avoid carrying too much camera kit, so I could travel light, plus ensure I wouldn’t eat into precious family time by getting side-tracked with my usual bag full of different lenses. So I decided to take only one Canon EOS camera body and one Canon lens.
That’s a bit restrictive isn’t it? Well, I actually discovered it gave me more creative freedom, as I wasn’t always thinking should I change lenses? Instead I could concentrate on better compositions with the focal lengths I had at my disposal.
This would also enable me to manage the precarious balancing act of capturing great travel photography in a quick and efficient way, while keeping the family happy during our epic road trip from LA to San Francisco.
So, I took an old Canon EOS 5D Mark IV DSLR with a Canon EF 24-105mm f/4L IS II USM standard lens stalwart.
Deciding which lens to take on our vacation wasn’t as tricky as you might think. Some may want to take a superzoom that covers everything from 18mm to 400mm, but I didn’t need a super wide or super long lens for my travel photos. I just needed standard wide-angle to telephoto focal lengths, and I didn’t mind if my lens wasn’t small and compact. I also didn’t want to compromise on image quality. I wanted a fast-ish lens so I could set a wide aperture and get a shallow depth of field when I felt like it. The EF 24-105mm f/4 is the perfect compromise. Plus it’s not as heavy as the modern 24-105mm F2.8L hybrid lens, or some 24-70mm f/2.8 lenses.
24mm was wide-angle enough for my needs on a full-frame camera, but I could zoom up to telephoto 105mm for capturing ‘a scene within a scene’ or distant objects like boats on the sea, or zooming in on bustling boardwalk of a Californian beach town. Although I’ve found I often end up shooting around 40mm or 50mm for scenic shots for the better compositions, such as this shot of the Golden Gate Bridge.
The EF 24-105mm is a reassuring and tried-and-trusted piece of glass, so I knew my shots would be sharp across the frame, especially when shooting between the sweet spot of f/8 to f/11. Plus it’s got image stabilization, which is great when I was shooting handheld on the streets of LA, and wanted to shoot quick and fast.
It also complements the weight and size of a 5D Mark IV body perfectly, which is a camera I know back to front. I’m able to adjust camera settings on the fly without taking my eye away from the viewfinder.
This is another reason I took this camera with me – rather than a newer mirrorless model – as I wouldn’t waste time thinking about what new settings to use. I could focus on more important things, like exposure and composition, and simply enjoying my holiday.
By the way, here’s a top tip – don’t carry an obvious camera bag when travelling. I hadn’t brought a specific camera bag with me on our vacation on purpose. Instead I just used my son’s small Nike backpack to keep the camera with lens inside when we were out on our daily American adventures. It was great as it didn’t shout out that I’m a tourist, or even worse - I’m a tourist with a camera bag and some expensive Canon kit! So it meant I could covertly take my camera with me wherever I went, which meant I didn’t ever miss any photo ops.
