Planning for a year in Asia-film or digital?

<p>As it's been described, charging battery will require some sort of reliable source, whether using mains, car or solar. Sometimes several batteries will keep you going....so long you don't shoot too much....till you can recharge them. All relative...and digital will likely be easier to deal with.</p>

<p>That said, the reality of film access may be an issue. Unless you have a space where you can obtain more film on reg basis (reliably)....whether you can purchase and/or have it delivered or someone send it to you directly. Additional difficulties will arise from storing film in cool and in non-humid bla bla bla. Also, you may have to look under rocks to find some reliable labs in the area.....tho not necessarily in the same country where you'll be. Do some serious search/inquiry in Singapore, Indonesia, Korea, Japan, Thailand, Phillippines, China, etc. In particular, you need a lab that will work with you. If your concern is seeing what you have shot, you might be able to arrange to have them scan (however level you desire...and cost) your images and slap them on the net....so you can access them from any internet cafe in the world. Also, you might be able to trim some of the obscene mail costs and have the lab hold your processed film till you give them the OK to send all the negatives/pos to a stable address (in US or wherever)....as you return from this journey.<br /><br /></p>

<p>Furthermore, I'd test the lab that you choose....making sure the processing is of consistent quality. You may have to repeat this process....you can also test (using same shot/s) other labs....weeding out the mediocre ones. As to edits, I'd wait till you get back and you can quality scan those frames that work best for you.</p>

<p>Oh, one more thing, if you (by a chance) could have fresh film forwarded to someone within the area where you'll be....that would be one workaround.</p>

<p>In any case, you have some hurdles, but you may be able to resolve them. Good luck.</p>

<p>Les</p>

 

Hi Scot, sounds like a great trip.<br>

<br>I haven't traveled for extended periods of time but did take a Hasselblad with film and a small digital camera on a trip to Mongolia. Always requesting that my film be hand-checked, I had trouble only at the Genghis Khan International Airport in Ulaan Bataar, a very small airport with aggressive agents, where they finally agreed to hand-check it after much arguing. None of my film was fogged.<br>

<br>

Both cameras saw a lot of use. When I didn't have time to set up the Hasselblad on tripod, the small digital camera came in handy.  However, charging it was a problem, particularly in the Gobi Desert where the electricity often went out without warning. <br>

<br>I didn't try to do any editing on the trip. And since I don't shoot a large number of photos, I came back with unused film and space on my card for more digital pictures.  It was useful to have both cameras.<br>

<br>Good luck and let us know what you decide.  --Sally</p>

<p>Scott, your trip sounds serious and I am thinking this is not a dedicated photo trip? I would suggest shooting digital for convenience. Make sure you have enough spare batteries and memory cards, so you won't be caught short. You may want to have a backup camera and a few external drives to store and backup the images you shot. Don't put the backup drives all in one place. Have fun!</p>

<p>My favourite places to shoot in Asia are Cambodia and Bangladesh. </p>

Thanks for your responses! As for the purpose of the trip, I'm not really sure. Call it a quarter life crisis? Maybe taking a

shot at photographing full time? Portfolio building trip? A pilgrimage? It's probably all of those things rolled up into one. I

do have photography aspirations I guess, but just getting to travel and photograph is more important. And to be exposed

to cultures and people I would never otherwise have the opportunity to interact with. Those kind of experiences have

shaped me immensely already, and I expect this trip to do the same.

 

Sally- thanks for the perspective! How long was the trip? I'm really leaning towards digital at this point, out of

convenience, although being able to let go of the images after their shot until I can get them processed is still a huge draw

for me.

 

Ian- I've heard a lot of good things about Bangladesh. Any specific recommendations around times of year, places, etc?

Ian- By the way, I had a look at your website. Your work is excellent. Really like the India portfolio and Bangladesh

portfolio.

<p>Having lived in SE Asia (Cambodia) for 10 years and traveled extensively round the region. I cant speak for mainland China; but i have traveled extensively in Myanmar,Vietnam, Thailand, Laos and Malaysia. Al have well developed electricity supplies.<br>

The worst places for electricity are some of the more remote villages in Cambodia, where local generators and batteries with a/c converters are used. I have never run out of power for cameras here or anywhere else. The Australian outback was the worst; but by having plenty of spare batteries one could last for a couple of weeks with 3-4 batteries; if you ration yourself to 200 shots per day. Try doing that with film!<br>

If you are using cars, its easy to buy a small d/c ac converter which can be used for laptop or camera battery charger.<br>

An essential would be a lightweight Laptop like a macbook air or small Windows PC and a portable Hard drive for backups. Internet access to send JPG files to Dropbox or similar will give you another backup in case your gear is lost for any reason.<br>

If you need any specific advice photo or otherwise on SE Asia please let me know.</p>

Dave-

 

Thanks for the info on SE Asia, I will definitely be spending some time there, but hoping to spend a lot of time in India and

China. I'm planning to bring a laptop, most likely what you said, and a couple of hard drives.

 

Do you have any contacts for guides locally you would recommend?

<p>I mainly shoot film. Most 35 mm, sometimes 120. I never take 20 rols of film with me for a 1 week trip. Maybe I would take 200 rols for a 1 year trip. Not such a big weight but to be counted on top of the weight for the camera and the lenses.<br>

A year ago, I went on a 3 week trip to Iceland. It was a tour by 4x4 across the country, camping and on occasion a hut. I used a Nikon P7000 and an Olympus E300. Both camera's with an extra battery. In total that was 4 battery loads, more than 300 foto's each, almost 1500 foto's. Enough for me. I tried to safe battery power and on occasion, we could charge the battery in a hut. I never ran out of power. I took apx 1000 pictures in total, I printed max 100 of them. The rest was OK but not good enough to visualise my trip. The main reason I used digital equipment was for the colour printing. I print at home and try to make quality prints on selected paper.<br>

The trip was bad for the equipment and a one year trip would have damaged my Nikon for shore. I took the Nikon for the limited weight, in combination with te extra wide angle it is a fantastic camera.<br>

The Olympus was just for the fun of using an older camera. It proved to be super reliable and gave me some nice shots.<br>

If I would go to Iceland again, I would take a film camera as well. Maybe one 35 mm film a day. Combined film B&W printing with digital colour printing. But I would take better equipment with me than I did last time.<br>

Maybe a digital solution isn't that bad for a one year trip. Battery power is not such an issue.<br>

But stick to trusted quality equipment. </p>

<p>You could "reload" by posting yourself packages of film to a mail point? I did that on one trip. The problem with film is not so much airport scanners, unless you have very high ISO film, but keeping it cool in very hot climates.</p>

<p>On one trip I went through 70 rolls of 120 in a week but most of that was due to bracketing exposures before digital came along. You could get around that by using a grey card reading which is easy to do on a Mamiya rangefinder. However, they tend to meter off to one side of the frame. My 7 always was more accurate when I selected the lower right side as the spot meter so to speak.</p>

<p>Good luck with your trip, post lots of images for everyone to see when it is over.</p>

<p><em>Electricity w/ Tibetan Nomads......</em><br>

<em> </em><br>

I would go digital. I traveled in remote regions in the world for 15 years, using film. But will never go back to film. You would be surprised, I have seen quite a few nomads in Tibet and Mongolia who have solar chargers connected to car batteries/ w inverters to power their radios, TV's and to charge their cell phones. </p>

<p>When I was cycling in the Himalayas in Eastern Tibet and Ladakh 10 years ago, it was rare that I went for long stretch w/o electricity. West Tibet or the Nothern Chang Tang are more remote, and may be an exception, but it is really sunny, so a solar charge should be fine. You may want to bring a light bulb adapter that has a 220V plug adapter to plug your charger into. At least in 2004, there were many Ladakhi homes that had one or two light bulbs in their house, but no tap for electricity, but that was 10 years ago.<br /><br />The space/money you save by not bringing 100 rolls of film, and processing charges you can use for extra batteries and rugged hardrives, and increasing your travel budget. Also, I have 1000's of 35mm slides that I have been dragging my feet to scan. Plus you never have to worry about high vs low ISO Films. It is also alot easier to do HDR, and Panoramas as well. In addition, I can review my work as I go, to make sure I get a balanced photographic view of the trip.<br /><br />Also, one unexpected advantage of going digital I found was that when I meet a person that I would like to shoot a portrait of, I usually ask and I am often rejected at first. Then I show the person some playback images from my DLSR or P&S that I took of other people, and suddenly they want their photo taken.<br /><br />The second unexpected advantage is being able to playback your digital images to use as another form of communication to break the language barrier. Families, especially the nomads will love to see the digital images, and it will help you tell your travel story to them, and show them parts of the world they will never see.<br /><br />Also, I always need down time on the road, editing photos it is good way to take a break.</p>

<p>I would be happy to discuss my travels offline. also feel free to look at my website www.dphoton.org. Also I would be interested if you can tell me which photos are Kodachrome and which are digital.</p>

Don-

 

Thanks for the reply. I've decided on digital at this point. Appreciate the thoughts on traveling and recharging batteries, I

will take a look for those items you mentioned.

 

Also, took a look at some of the images on your site. I'm guessing a bunch of your Tibet photos are on Kodachrome? I will

definitely be in touch about travel offline!

 

Scott