Can You Survive the Weekend with Just One Camera Lens?

Mudgee vineyards, originally uploaded by Adriana Glackin.

That was the question I asked myself when deciding on a last minute weekend trip to Mudgee. We would be surprising friends already out there, non-photographer friends, at that. I knew the agenda would be packed with wine tasting, shopping and eating – my friends are quite organised and had already planned their weekend with the various places to visit. So, did I really need to take all my gear? And what lens to take? What if I took the wrong lens? I then asked myself some more questions –

1. What was the purpose of the weekend away?
2. What was the reason for taking the camera?
3. What lens would best suit the purpose of question one?

Upon answering those questions, I decided on taking the 17-85mm lens, no back-up battery and only one CF card. Now that’s living life on the knife’s edge! Or is it? The purpose of the weekend was to spend time with those friends and the photography would only be a very small part of our weekend. I really only needed to take two photos – one for each day away as part of my Project365, so I certainly didn’t need to fill an 8gb card with endless photos; and as we were in some very picturesque country, it made sense to take the very versatile 17-85mm (as much as I would have loved to take the Lensbaby!)

I have no regrets. I achieve my photography goals with battery life and room on the CF card to spare. It actually felt quite good not to be lugging around all that gear and it made me really think about the photographs I would be taking. I tried to maximise the capabilities of the 17-85mm and it was quite freeing not having to worry about swapping this lens for that. Importantly, it meant that I could spend time with my friends and that’s what the weekend was all about.

Mind you, I would love to organise a weekend away in Mudgee with a group of fellow photographers – and in that case, the answers to my questions above would yield very different results!