> On May 2, 2015, at 23:22 , Daniel J. Matyola <danmaty...@gmail.com> wrote: > > I need some advice. > > Later this month, we will be going on a trip. After 3 days in San > Diego (including the Zoo), we will fly to Japan for a week, mostly in > Tokyo, Kyoto and Mt Fuji/Hakone Park. We then will spend a few days > in Beijing, including a day trip to The Great Wall, followed by three > days in San Francisco. >
I just spent a week in China. I brought: K5 16-50 FA70-210 (which I almost never used) That's it! iPhone6 was a backup camera when I just couldn't be bothered to whip out the SLR, and I used my "GoPro clone" a few times for fun shots. The Canon S95 was tucked into a pocket of my bag and was used precisely 5 times. I could have left it at home. Be in the moment, enjoy the trip. I'd leave the monopod and most other lenses, just go with the SLR and the 18-135 and call it done. But that's just me. Oh, I see you have a GoPro. Sure, toss that in. The lenses you suggest are all pretty close in zoom range. If you've got 18-135, what good is the DA50-200? 35mm? 40mm? 50mm? All that is covered already. Unless you're doing some shots from very very far away, having more zoom than the 18-135 is probably pretty unnecessary. I'd just shoot at 135mm and then crop the heck out of it if you need to get closer. I took my external flash with me the last two times I was in China for "once in a lifetime" (gone 3 times now), and I used it about 4 times with the ist-DS, once with the K10D, and for the K5 this time I left it at home. Unless you're shooting professionally, where you HAVE TO GET THE SHOT, there's no need to overpack/overthink it. That's just my opinion though, of course. -Charles -- Charles Robinson - charl...@visi.com Minneapolis, MN http://charles.robinsontwins.org http://www.facebook.com/charles.robinson -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List PDML@pdml.net http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions.