It has finally arrived - rain. Time to consider what to do with your photography for the next three months:
1. Stay inside and drink.
2. Go outside and take pictures.
3. Bring your waterlogged equipment in to the repair department and hope it can be rescued.
Assuming that you won't be permitted to do the first, and you would like to avoid the third, give a thought to some of the products that we stock designed to cope with wet weather.
If you are going to be outdoors in intermittent showers or mist, good camera and lens protection can be had with flexible hoods and pouches made by Op/Tech, Aquatech,Think Tank,or Kata. They range in price, durability, and complexity from simple plastic bag sleeves to fitted raincoats that cover arms, flashes, and long tele lenses. The really cheap ones are really cheap and are a good insurance policy for landscape shooters. The expensive ones are intended for working sports pros or wildlife photographers who might be standing in a drizzle for hours. Of course those of us who have elected to stay inside and drink may burst into laughter at this point, but let's move on.
If it is going to be splashy as well as drizzly, consider one of the Dicapac DSLR or compact housings for your camera. You won't be able to use a long tele, but you can go to a moderate zoom and the thing will happily exclude water to 5 metres. That's money well spent with an expensive camera.
If you don't want to haul out a big DSLR but still want to stand in the rain, Nikon, Canon, Pentax, Panasonic, Olympus, and Fuji all make dedicated little waterproof compact cameras that can dive right in to depths of 3 to 10 metres. Some are even shockproof so when you slip over during the football riot no harm will be done. They give compact results, but these can be very good.
Finally, if you must, you can get specially-made cases for even the largest or oddest DSLR and film cameras. These are the pro jobs that are made of fibreglass, perspex, aluminium, and crystallized money. Expect to be quoted a price that would feed a third world village for a month.
Now, I have to go. There is a Mr. Toddy waiting for me ....inside.
