Location Equipment Kits

We often get asked about the kind of gear we shoot or the equipment we use on location so in response we thought we'd give you a sneak peak into our "black boxes".


THE DSLR KIT
Our DSLR kit is the most used kit in the group and the first one to get pulled out for a job. We're definitely a Canon shop. Our digital kit contains a full-frame 1d Mark I body for landscape and wide-angle shots and the 10fps 1d Mark III body for sports and timelapse shoots. If all things are equal, the quality of your image will come down to your choice of lens so our kit includes the Canon 70-200mm f4 L, the Canon 24-70mm f2.8 L, the incredible Canon 85mm f1.2 L and a Tamron Aspherical 17-35 f2.8 to round out the bunch. The rest of the kit includes a set of neutral density filters, Sekonic L-758dr light meter, spare batteries for both bodies, a set of 2-way radios for the crew, an intervalometer for shooting time-lapse, battery charger for the 1d Mark III, various trigger cables and my photographer credentials. This all comfortably fits into the Pelican 1510 watertight case.

THE MEDIUM FORMAT KIT 

As good as digital technology is these days, we still love to shoot film! When a job calls for medium format resolution we turn to film and our medium format kit which includes a Mamiya RZ67 Professional with a 150mm f3.5 portrait lens and 220 film back for studio work.  For location work where we need a more hand-holdable solution we use our Mamiya 645 Pro TL with winder grip, 80mm f2.8 and a 150mm f3.5 lenses. If you're curious how film fits into our digital workflow we bring our rolls to a local vendor for quick turnaround then scan the films through our Canon Canoscan 8800F film scanner. Our last camera in this kit is the Canon G10 with various lens attachments which we use for location scouting or anything that require a really small digital camera with manual control. This all fits into the Pelican 1500 watertight case.

THE LIGHTING KIT

When it came to lighting we made an investment in Paul Buff's Alien Bee lighting system. We found their feature/price ratio to be unbeatable and their customer support to be top notch! The contents of our lighting kit include 3 AB800 monolights with the standard 6" reflectors, an ABR800 Ring Light, a Canon 430EX Speedlight with a set of Gary Fong Lightsphere diffusers along with some various grip gear. We completed our Paul Buff system by selling our Pocket Wizards and buying the CyberSync wireless triggers and the CyberCommander control unit which we love! The CyberCommander allows me to control up to 16 individual lights right from my camera. For good measure we also threw our Bogen 3021 pro tripod into the frame as well. All of this gear fits nicely into the Pelican 1620 watertight trunk.

THE LIGHTSTANDS & MODIFIERS - The last bit of luggage we bring on locations contains all the other grip and light modifiers we might need. This kit consists of 6 air cushioned light stands with assorted clamps and grip, two Dynaphos silver umbrellas, one white Dynaphos shoot-through umbrella, two small Dynaphos softboxes, one Dynaphos 6-foot strip lightbox and a large Dynaphos octobank. Our favorite light modifiers (which aren't pictured) are the 5-in-1 reflector disc by Dynaphos and two Paul Buff 22" High-Output Beauty Dishes.


So there you have it! That's a little bit of what it takes, in terms of equipment, to produce quality photographs on location.