Camera Labs

For awhile now I have been wanting a camera bag that I can carry around without showing off to everyone that I have >$1000 of gear on me. I also wanted a slot for my Wind (a netbook) which I regularly use to upload photos.

New bags that are 'stealth' are pretty expensive, and inserts for all-purpose bags don't always fit what I need. I decided that I should just make one for myself out of foam padding.

I couldn't find any appropriate foam anywhere local, and nearly nowhere online, but I found a kayak supply store in Texas that had something nearly exactly what I wanted. After some clicking, about $15 (including the shipping), and a few days waiting I had two 1 ft by 2 ft pieces of 1/2 inch foam.



I took my current Lowepro camera bag and started figuring out how much room I needed for all my camera gear. It took some measurements and, after visiting very dangerous new levels of mental math, I had a handle on how to slice up the foam.




The pieces I cut up fit together pretty well and I had plenty of foam left over.



Initially I put a lid of sorts on the foam box, but I relized it was more trouble than it was worth and ended up cutting it off.



Once it was taped together with duct tape it slid into my Timbuk2 bag quite perfectly, with just the right amount of room for my wind to slide in behind.

I think that I might take the extra foam and make an attached sleeve/pocket for the wind so it's not just floating around my bag. Then I also won't have to worry about carrying the free carrying case that MSI sends out too. I'm also considering making a slightly smaller foam box/case for my Wind & photo equipment to go in a smaller bag that I have.

I'm not sure if anyone will find this helpful, but hopefully some photo nerds will enjoy the pictures. This could easily be modified depending on the internal dimensions of whatever sort of messenger bag it was suppoed to fit in.

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you're very creative

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That's great! Nice ideas. I have a small Slingshot style backpack that I like to use even more than my Lowepro Flipside. I think I might try to make some small compartments like you did.

Can you share the contact info of the place where you purchased the foam from?

Thanks!!

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WOW! Thats amazing & brilliant idea though this are made from cheap material but can be useful, I want to try out some day!

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Soon.....

Nice work, I should do something like this. I have an Asus EEEPC and I'm going on a trip this summer. Something like this would come in handy.

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Hi Wilfurd, great work - I completely agree with you and have long been using non-camera bags (some with modifications for protection and to handle greater weights) for discretion!

You might enjoy this article I wrote a while back:

http://www.cameralabs.com/blog/may06/29/