I usually carry a small shoulder bag or a messenger style bag for carrying my photography stuff. The bag usually has a camera with a lens mounted on it and sometimes a spare lens. Too many lenses tend to distract me. So I limit myself to just two prime lenses.

Apart from the lenses, my camera bag also has the following items –

• Lens cleaning microfiber cloth for cleaning any accidental finger prints on the lens or filters
• A soft but thick brush, which I sometimes use to clean the outside of the camera body
• Spare memory cards and battery. I use multiple small capacity cards.
• Small notepad and a pencil / pen
• Some spare money
• A rain cover for the camera bag if it is cloudy or when going out for the whole day in rainy season
• Clear filter and a polarizing filter. Sometimes a ND filter.
• I used to carry a small penlight which I have now stopped since my mobile phone has this functionality. No more film rolls either which have now been replaced by much smaller and space-efficient memory cards.

Things that I carry on a trip but prefer to leave behind in a hotel room –

• Battery charger
• Blower bulb
• Box for carrying memory cards which I usually wrap in multiple layers of foil
• Any spare lens which I do not plan to use on the field
• Backup drive
• Monopod / Tripod which I really hate to carry around but can be really useful for some shots. If I am traveling in a car, I carry it in the boot. I do not tug it around on me.

Things that I leave back at home –

• All the lenses that I don’t plan to use. If I am carrying a 135mm lens, I do not carry a 105 or even a 200mm lens. The zooms are comfortable to use but they tend to make one lazy. I prefer to use my feet as zoom.
• Flashes or speedlights. I use them only for studio portraits, product photography, some stop movement kind of photos and very rarely for macro.
• Cleaning equipment – Sensor Swabs and liquid, Fujin Cleaner, any magnification aids for viewing
• Laptop – I do post-processing in the comfort of my home. It is carry forward from dark-room for me. I never carried my chemicals, developing equipment, enlarger etc with me, so why should I post-process anywhere except in my house, with the comfort my chair and my desk? I am also not a photographer who spends months on the road.

(A waterfalls that I had clicked by placing my camera on a rock. Shutter Speed 1/4 sec. It was a steep trail to the waterfalls and I would not have made it had I been carrying my tripod, though the tripod would have really helped. I had used a ND filter to reduce the brightness.)

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