Ultimate Photography Travel Gear: What I Pack for my Holiday

Planning a holiday is exciting, but if you’re a photographer, knowing what to pack can be a challenge. The right photography travel gear makes all the difference between missing a shot and capturing memories that last a lifetime. In this guide, I’ll share the essential equipment I take, and must-have accessories to help you travel lighter, shoot smarter, and enjoy your holiday without worrying about leaving anything important behind.

If you’re a pro, if it’s your job, and if you can’t afford to miss that shot, then you are likely to take a lot of gear, to cover all eventualities.

Why the Right Photography Travel Gear Matters

But what if you are like me? Someone who refuses to take bad photos, but also someone who has a family. With the objective of the trip is a holiday, not a travel photography expedition with a ton of gear?

Well, if this is you, then you need to find the right balance. Between enjoying your family holiday, and not lugging around rucksacks and bags. Bags full of cameras, lenses, tripods and everything else that comes with it.

Now, I am about to show you what holiday photography gear I generally take on a major family trip. And it includes a camera (obviously). But it also includes a few lenses. A tripod, and other things. In fact, all the stuff in the previous paragraph I mentioned you shouldn’t take!

But, it is not over the top, and it all fits into a modest size shoulder bag that, while being a tad on the heavy side, is easy to manage.

The Video of my Travel Photography Gear – What is in my Bag?

Essential Photography Travel Gear Checklist

My main Camera – Canon EOS R6

This Full Frame Mirrorless is my camera of choice. I have been a Canon Shooter since I got heavily involved in Photography back in 2009. A 5D Mk3 was always my camera of choice. However, with the advent of the (slightly) smaller but lighter mirrorless range, the Canon R6 is the perfect choice for me.

Lenses To Take on Holiday

If you want to to capture everything from a sweeping landscape to a grizzly bear at a safe distance, and still maintain decent quality, and be good in low light, then you are going to need more than one lens.

I am sorry, but you just cannot get all of the above in one lens. Yes, I have heard good things about the Canon RF 24-240mm f4-6.3 IS USM. It goes from 24mm up to 240mm. You will lose a ton of low-light capability as you utilise the zoom though. If you want to see my thought on this lens, check out the video here.

But, you have the one lens that can cover most scenarios in terms of focal length and is a damn sight cheaper than the list I have made below.

Please don’t beat me up for choosing the below 3 expensive lenses over the much cheaper one lens. It is, after all, personal preference.

Wide Angle Lens – Canon RF 14-35 F4 L IS USM

Being an L lens, the quality is not in question. It is great for those wide shots when you want to get as much of the scene in as possible.

There will be issues at its widest, but nothing that a bit of correction in Lightroom can’t fix.

The 14-35mm lens is definitely one of my favourites.

My Walkabout Lens – Canon RF 24-105 f4 L IS USM

OK, so this is not the perfect walkabout lens. If I could only take one lens, this would be top of the list for my travel photography gear. You would go perhaps for the 24-70mm F2.8 for that. But, the F4 version, at over £1,000 cheaper is a serious consideration for a travel lens.

Better reach than the 24-70, but you do lose the low-light capabilities of the F2.8. However, for me, this is a great lens and gets great images and is easy to have it to hand, and be ready.

My Zoom Lens – Canon RF 70-200mm f2.8L IS USM

My favourite RF lens in my bag. I love the look, the contrast and the quality of this lens. A world away from the EF version, in terms of size and weight.

Largely thanks to it not having an internal zoom, it makes travelling with it much simpler.

Other Gear

Listed below are the other important items that I take. From Chargers to Tripods, to Back Ups.

Batteries and Chargers

The Canon R6 takes reasonably small batteries in the LP-E6NH Battery. I usually carry 3 or 4 of these. In terms of a charger, in the past, I took the main charger and lead that came with the camera.

In trips, like our Summer 2024 USA Road Trip, I took a K&F double battery charger, that is USB-C compatible. This means I didn’t have to take a UK Plug. I can just plug this into any USB socket.

Less to carry, more convenient for tapping into power, and the base also charges two batteries.

Back-Up Solution

I have done a whole post and video on this, so I will be brief. The solution I am adopting uses a 1TB SSD hard drive and an iPad.

Simply put, the iPad is used as a mechanism to get the photos from the memory card to the hard drive.

This, coupled with the Canon R6’s two memory card slots means I feel comfortable with my Travel Backup solution.

Check out the other Blog post for how to do this.

Filters

Not normally something I use on holiday. But definitely something I would take if I was out on a dedicated Landscape Photography trip.

This being my first set of proper filters, and my desire for an easy life, I have gone for the magnetic filters.

An adapter ring screws into the lens filter, and your filter of choice clips onto the ring. They can stack, which means you can add a Circular polariser. Then an ND filter for example, if you wanted/needed to.

The ones I have are the K&F Concept Filter Kit, a pretty good starter kit, based on my minimal use so far.

Bag and Tripod for your photography travel gear

Out of all the things included in this list, these two items are the ones that actually took me the longest to select.

The Tripod – Small enough to carry, sturdy enough to hold what I need it to, yet cheap enough to not break the bank. This meets all three criteria, with a couple of compromises. I went for the Neewer Litetrip LT 32 62″ Travel Tripod.

The Bag – Every single photographer seems to have a rucksack. For my trips, and mainly holidays, I wanted an over-the-shoulder bag. I meant I could access and change lenses, add filters, change batteries etc, all without taking the bag off my shoulder, and almost do all this when walking around.

The bag I decided to go for was the Lowepro Nova SH 200 AW II Shoulder Bag in Black. It is not as slim as I would like, but when you are asking it to carry one camera body, 3 lenses, plus accessories, then you can only go so small.

Summary of my Photography Travel Gear

The key thing here is, that you take what is right for you.

The travel photography gear above is pretty much all the bits you need and can be carried around quite easily.

Yes, this is not cheap, and I am lucky enough to be able to own it thanks to my job, but, it can be accumulated over time, and bought second-hand if better.

Thanks for reading, and let me know if you think I missed anything off that is a crucial piece of holiday photography gear.