It's that time of the year, you're manic, your kids have runny noses, your wife is buying more christmas decorations every other day, you just want to sit in a dark corner and rock back and forth muttering something evil about vixen, dancer, prancer and that fat old bastard, santa... yes, well, you can't.. and you know why? because there are WAY TOO MANY COOOL PHOTOGRAPHIC GADGETS TO GOOGLE! here's my Best of the Best, 2010... ...in no particular ord... oh, wait, yeah, we'll start at 10!... (and work up to the BEST)
10. Yep, it's the darn tasty Sony Alpha NEX 5 camera that I took to Africa with me.. Small, sexy and actually takes a really nice photo!
9. You have multiple memory cards, but there's always one that you 'go to' right? My 'Go To' CF card is my SanDisk 16GB Extreme Pro ...never failed me yet, fast as me to a tray of cakes...
8. Chase Jarvis popped a book onto the shelves recently, and I have a copy that I have been through and through and love... check it out, it's called Seattle 100: Portrait of a City and should be on your coffee table, soon.
7. A proper compact camera, small, fast, solid... i'd ask Santa to pop a Canon PowerShot S95 in his tightly packed sack and deliver it to me, with a smile...
6. If I was going to get all this gear from Santa, I'd want to make sure I had the best darn camera bag on the planet to cart it around, so I'd have to pickup a Think Tank Photo Retrospective 20 and I'd get it in Pinestone, too...
5. For those of you that are going to insist on taking your new dSLR camera to the Christmas lunch and taking photos with the onboard flash, you should all pop out and grab a Gary Fong Puffer Pop Up Flash Diffuser to help yourselves make your guests look a little like startled dear in bright shiny headlights...
4. I'm not brandist, I hate everybody... but I'd really love a Nikon FM2 Black Body and I'd certainly like a 50mm f/1.4 manual focus lens to go with it...
3. Like the Retrospective 20, if you're going to have all this gear, there's no point having it without having a worth strap for your cameras, right? I'd suggest any of the BLackRapid range, but my current fave is still the RS-5 Camera Strap it's almost a bag, and such a comfortable strap...
2. My best, Nathan Pask, delivered a rip snorted of a gift this year on my 12th birthday... the damned awesome Fujifilm INSTAX 210 ...it proved just how cool it was when I took it out at a gig, walked into the pit and FOUR photographers wanted to play with it... damn analog coolness baby
1. There really is nothing else to say about the Canon EF 70-200mm f/2.8L II IS aside from that it's sex... it's so sharp it' carve slices of Julian Asange... You want fast and sharp and heavy, just get one.. simple..
There you have it, an Amazon filled list of pure photographic goodness... Anything you buy means that I get a kickback, and yes, you can be assured that I will spend all 47 cents on mince pies!
Have a great Christmas and we'll see you.. well, probably tomorrow, but you know...
Sime