In your bag 1782 – Eliot Herman
I have been chatting with Eliot over mail for a while now, about cameras and life. Eliot very kindly offered to share his bag with us and I am very glad he did. It is a beauty. Check it out.
Film day out bag.
I have carried this Domke bag since the 1990s, when it held a newly acquired Contax G with the 45 and 90 lenses, sometimes adding a 21/28 mm as well. All of it was purchased in Tokyo during the year I spent living in Japan. The bag has traveled the world—first with the Contax, then without it, and now sometimes with it again, as there are days when a point-and-shoot is simply the better choice.
Gear
Currently, the bag often carries an M, either the MP shown here or an M11P. I am an outdoor photographer, so a “center” 50 mm is essential. Shown here is a Leica 50 mm Rigid, a particularly nice copy. Alongside it is a recently acquired Leica 135 mm APO from JHC, and a 28 mm for landscape work—a small Voigtländer, chosen because it is my lightest 28 mm.
The 50 mm may be swapped for a Voigtländer f/1.2, a 45/2 Contax M-modified lens, perhaps my LLL Elcan, or maybe a 28 mm clone of the Elmarit. A vintage-rendering lens like the Elcan, paired with that LLL 28 mm, often goes in when the goal is capturing people and their things.
If it is a digital outing day, the kit shifts to the M11P with a Visoflex and two or three lenses covering a similar range.
Other items
To round out the kit there are Camtraption wraps (not shown), light and multipurpose; Luigi leather with the grip; and a small, very high-quality Swarovski binocular I bought in the 1990s for spotting wildlife. There is a space pen—always a space pen, I have carried one since they first appeared in the 1960s. A pocket knife is a given: sometimes a practical Swiss Army knife, but since the 1960s I have been partial to Buck knives. This one is a recent special Duke model with carbon fiber, chosen for this photo mostly because it looks good with the MP, the Domke, and my Explorers Club cap. I am a fellow of the NYC club.
At the center of it all is my now 30-year-old Domke, a bag with countless memories embedded in its cloth, which has impressively stood up to time far better than the photographer.
Eliot Herman
Thanks for sharing your bag with us, Eliot. I am glad to see the APO getting some use. And that Domke is gorgeous.
Please keep them coming folks, we need more submissions, so get your bag on Japancamerahunter.com
Send me a high resolution image of the bag. Optimum size is 1500px across. Please ensure there is a bag in the shot, unless you don’t use one. The more you can write about yourself the better, make it appealing and tell us a story. Snapshots of your gear with a camera phone and no words will not be featured.
Oh and don’t forget your contact details (twitter, flickr, tumbler et al). Send the bag shots here. Please understand that there is a long wait now as there is a backlog of submissions. Not all make the cut, so make sure yours is funny/interesting/quirky. And please make sure the shot is of good quality, as the ones that are not do not go up.
Cheers
Japancamerahunter
