Big lenses and air travel

[The AvgasDinosaur]

Dear All,
With the restrictions on number of and weight of bags allowed on flights getting ever tighter, has anyone any ideas on how to travel with camera kit without exposing it to damage and or pilferage?
Your thoughts comments and observations appreciated.
Be lucky
David

[Fenders]

I experienced a similar problem in that I was only allowed 1 item of cabin baggage, so carrying a separate camera case was out of the question.
I have bought a Lowepro rucksack that has 2 compartments. The lower one is designed for camera equipment and is well padded. The upper one carriesall my personnel items, like passports, wallet, keys, etc.

[WexCan]

I have a similar Lowepro rucksack, if I'm travelling for only a night or two it fits into a cabin sized roll-on with a little space left over to shove some clothes in. As Fenders said, it's well padded, has space for camera body with lens attached, plus 4-5 other lenses and a number of little pockets for all the neccesary bits and bobs.

[Shimrod]

I travel slightly differently with my camera & lenses. I use a small rucksack to take my camera and lens (and some other bits) on board the plane. Within the rucksack I have a camera bag with camera and a lens/accessories, and take a 70-200mm F2.8 in its own case. I prefer to have the choice of whether what to take out with me when on holiday.

I have to admit I am finding the one bag rule quite annoying as camera and lenses leave me very little else to take on board, whereas previously I normally had the small rucksack and separate camera bag.

Shim

[Donkey497]

Try using a Peli Protector case, or similar, there are quite a few on the market now. They are a bit expensive, butb they are as good as theiur guarantee, you can drive a truck over them and drop them serious heights whilst frozen & they won't break. I used them a lot to ship very sensitive electronic gear as hold baggage worldwide in my last job and they never once let me down.

If you are travelling to the US, you can also fit pretty good padlocks to them and I think there is even a tamper proof version which a specific padlock can be fitted which cannot be opened (or removed by the TSA) without destroying the case. I understand that this would be illegal for the TSA to do and in such cases they are obliged to contact you to open the case. As a general tip, there are two locking points on these cases & I used to draw up a shipping list declaring that the contents were not for export and go visit Customs prior to checking in. The customs guys were very helpful and they would happily keep a copy of the list and would apply a customs seal to the case after slipping a couple of stamped copies inside for the return leg. You need to have your return travel plans on the shipping document and it helps on the return leg if you have some serialised tie-wrap type seals (these can be picked up quite reasonably from various (office/industrial) suppliers).

[Hartington]

Other sources of largish camera backpacks include Hama and Crumpler (who give their bags daft names but good bags.) In fact my last trip I took my big Crumpler bag (just fits the LHR/BA templates) and packed a small Hama in my hold baggage (filled with socks etc). The Hama is much more useable when popping in and out of a car and the Crumpler is good for capacity on the flight. It carries camera, laptop, a Jobo Giga One and various cables. I took a UK multi socket block in my checked baggage and one foreign adaptor to plug all that lot into.

I have considered Peli but not needed to go that route yet,

[GwynM]

My wife uses a large crumpler bag which fits her 1DMkIII with a 100-400 plus the 20D with the 24-105, and she can get the other bits and bobs (macro, converters, extension tubes, charger, cleaning kit, filters etc in as well) Just hope that it's never weighed!

I then carry my little kit in another bag (one body, 4 cheapish lenses), plus all the necessaries for the journey (suduko books etc). However, I've now gone and bought the 200 F1.8, so we haven't a clue how to travel now.

Peli cases are good, but not very versatile. Great for rafting down the Grand Canyon, rubbish for trekking with.

[Carry0nLuggage]

This is not a new problem from reading old photography books. The old way used to be to wear a coat with lots of pockets and fill them with lenses, bodies etc. when the worry was light fingered baggage handlers rather than ham fisted security.
These days I take either a Lowe Trekker or a small Billingham bag depending on the destination. The tripod has to go in the hold. One thing I've never had a problem with is a compact camera pouch strapped to the outside of my cabin bag. Not tried it with an SLR size pouch though. Might be a bit risky unless you can stuff it into your cabin bag in a hurry