DSLR Tips: Top ten accessories

One of the joys of photography is the wide range of accessories that are available, and they don't need to break the bank either. At DSLR Tips we'll be bringing you reviews of the latest accessories, but for now would like to share ten of our favourites from our sister site, Camera Labs. If you're shopping for a shutterbug, they also make ideal gifts...

Tripods are invaluable accessories, but can be a real pain to lug around, especially if you’re hiking or on holiday. Mini-tripods also rarely cut the mustard, being either too short or too flimsy for serious work. Enter Joby’s cunning Gorillapod which features jointed bendable legs with rubber grips which can be twisted around almost any object for a secure hold.

Joby offers three versions. The smallest ‘Original’ model is designed for compacts, measures 15x3x3cm and weighs just 45g. Next up is the ‘SLR’ model, designed for smaller (D)SLRs and camcorders, measuring 25x5x5cm, weighing 165g and good to handle a load of 800g. We tested the largest ‘SLR Zoom’ model which measures 25x6x6cm, weighs 241g and can handle a load of 3kg. We attached various semi-pro DSLRs with hefty zooms and securely wrapped the legs round fences, posts and even tree branches. So long as there’s something to wrap its legs around, the Gorillapod can prove invaluable for anyone who fancies taking the occasional long exposure or HDR shot, but likes to travel light.

Dust is the bane of every DSLR owner. It gets into your camera when you change lenses and settles on the filter in front of your sensor, casting shadows onto it. The result? Annoying dark fuzzy patches on your photos. Many DSLRs now feature anti-dust features, but few have proven 100% effective in our tests, so the simple fact is at some point you will need to manually intervene.

One of the simplest but most effective ways to get rid of dust is with a few well-placed gushes from a blower, and they don’t come better than Giottos Rocket Air. Shaped like something Tin-Tin might pilot to the Moon, the Rocket Air Blower delivers powerful gushes of air which should dislodge all but the most stubborn particles. They’re also great for getting rid of dust from nooks and crannies of other components. We’ve been using the biggest AA 1900 model for almost a year and found it an effective weapon in the battle against dust – and stood vertically on its tail fins, it looks pretty cool too.

The trouble with cleaning your sensor is not knowing whether the dust has truly gone until you’ve taken a test shot and analysed it on your computer – not exactly handy if you’re out and about without a laptop. Coming to the rescue is the Sensor Loupe from Visible Dust which allows you to visually spot any pesky marks on your sensor filter.

The Sensor Loupe is a special magnifying glass fitted to a cylinder that sits over your DSLR’s lens mount in the same way as a traditional Loupe is used to examine film. The cylinder employs six bright LED lamps to illuminate the surface of your sensor, allowing you to quickly and easily identify any foreign particles by eye. We tested the 5x version and it really works, saving you from repeatedly taking and analysing small aperture test shots. A 7x model is also available.

If there’s still dust on your DSLR sensor following several gushes from a blower then you’ll need to bring out the big guns. Offering a halfway solution between a blower and a physical wipe is Visible Dust’s Arctic Butterfly. This is a special brush designed specifically for cleaning the filters in front of DSLR sensors.

The ultra-fine fibres of the brush hold an electric charge which attracts dust and other foreign particles, and a quick wipe should eliminate all but the worst. Once removed from the camera body, the motorised handle spins the brush fibres, dispensing with the dust and electrically charging them for the next use. We tested the 724 version which effectively picked-up the worst particles in a Nikon D300 following our dust test. It also cleaned a Canon EOS 5D, although some lubricant from the chamber subsequently caused a smear on the filter’s surface. This is however a known issue and easily removed with one of Visible Dust’s cleaning swabs – see Visible Dust’s page on Smear troubleshooting.

Laptops are a little like tripods – very handy things to have, but a pain to lug around if you’re travelling light. And as you start shopping for smaller and lighter models, the prices tend to skyrocket. Not so with the Asus Eee PC 4G, which may be tiny and weigh less than a kilo, but comes in at a price more akin to a PDA. The secret is relatively modest hardware – a 900MHz Celeron, 7in screen, 512MB RAM and 4GB solid state drive – and Linux for an operating system.

Don’t run for the hills though – the Asus Eee PC is surprisingly quick and comes with a stack of useful applications pre-installed, along with a friendly front-end to launch them. We also installed the free GIMP image editing program to adjust photos. And if you don’t like Linux, Asus even supplies instructions and drivers to install Windows XP. Sure, the 4GB of internal storage ain’t gonna backup many photos, but with an SD card slot and three USB ports, it’s easy to copy the contents of your memory card onto an external hard disk. It’s simply the best value ultra-portable laptop on the market right now. See our Asus Eee PC discussion on the Camera Labs forum.

Photographers simply can’t have enough storage and external hard disks provide a great solution for accessing your photos on multiple systems. You’d naturally assume desktop models with the biggest capacities would be best of all, but portable disks based on laptop hard disks can be a pretty compelling alternative. They’re small, light and can normally be powered by a USB connection alone, eliminating the need to carry a mains adapter – and of course the need for a mains outlet.

Seagate’s FreeAgent Go is such a model offering up to 160GB of storage in a compact package you can carry around easily. It’s great to use as a backup while you’re away from home or the office, and also provides additional storage for laptops, including the Asus Eee PC. And powered by two USB ports, no mains electricity is required.

You may be able to connect your camera direct to a computer, but for the fastest means of copying photos onto your hard disk, you can’t beat a good card reader – and the quickest we’ve tested to date is the Lexar Professional UDMA FireWire 800 Reader. This is designed exclusively for reading Compact Flash cards and optimised for those employing the latest UDMA standard.

As its name suggests, the Lexar UDMA FireWire 800 Reader employs a FireWire 800 interface and while it’s backwards-compatible with traditional FireWire 400 ports, you’ll need to connect it to a modern FireWire 800 port for the best performance. Connected to a PC, we copied 924MB worth of photos from an older ‘80x’ CF card in 86 seconds and the same data from a ‘300x’ UDMA card in 34 seconds. Connected to a new Mac it was even quicker, reading 924MB of photos from the ‘300x’ UDMA card in just 22.6 seconds.

If your camera uses Compact Flash memory cards and you want the best performance, some of the fastest models right now are Lexar’s Professional UDMA 300x models. These are available in 2, 4 and 8GB capacities.

While only a handful of professional DSLRs exploit UDMA cards to clear their buffers quicker, anyone can enjoy their speed when it comes to copying images onto their computer. To unleash the full speed of a UDMA memory card, you’ll need a UDMA card reader such as the Lexar model above.

All cameras come with straps, so why buy another one? Because a better strap will make carrying your camera more comfortable, and like a good rucksack, can even make the load feel lighter. We’ve been using a Lowe Pro Voyager C strap for some time and have found its wide neoprene construction makes carrying big and heavy cameras or binoculars much more comfortable.

Under the strap is a non-slip backing which keeps it secure around your neck or shoulder, and there’s quick-release buckles for when you need to remove the camera in a hurry. Another strap to consider that’s recommended by several Camera Labs forum members is the Optech Pro.

You’ve got your gear, now you need some means to carry it around. There are tons of camera bags on the market of all shapes and sizes, but a company which continues to impress us is Crumpler. We still haven’t found the perfect model, but many of theirs come pretty close with their tough construction, hefty zips, padded interiors and stylish looks.

If you’re looking for a hybrid bag with a dedicated section for kit, along with compartments for a laptop and general stuff, then the Sinking Barge is a great choice. Alternatively if you’d like a bag dedicated entirely to carrying cameras and lenses, then the Keystone is worth considering. Both bags are designed to accommodate smaller DSLR kits, but bigger versions are available for larger models. The Customary Barge is a bigger version of the Sinking Barge, while the Whickey and Cox and Karachi Outpost are bigger versions of the Keystone.

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