About
My DIY camera bag
I bought a new lens a couple of weeks ago. It’s a lens I’ve long dreamt of owning. A fast wide angle. That was my reward for working 26 days straight. It was grueling. I still tense up whenever I hear a tractor go by, but that’s becoming less frequent, much to my happiness.
Back to the lens thing….I now possess a Canon Xti camera, a standard 18-50mm zoom, a 70-300mm zoom, a fast 50mm portrait lens, and now a fast 20mm wide angle lens. Add to that my lens cleaning supplies, a dust gun, and a pile of filters, my previous camera bags were way too small. I didn’t even have one bag that could hold them all. And let’s not get in to the issue of taking them out somewhere to a shoot. Which ones do I take? Like leaving a baby behind, I tell ya. If one doesn’t come with me then I will surely need that one.
I’ve been searching high and low for a decent camera bag. I like the ones that look like purses, but 1) they are not my style nor available in any colors I like, and 2) most of them are more than $100. Everyone knows that I’m waaaay to cheap for that.
I found a great camera bag tute over at Maryland Photographer where she converted her kate spade diaper bag into a camera bag using the guts from another bag. She made another one by creating her own guts for a purse she already owned. I used that idea and made this one for myself.
Tags
- rainbowjo86 added Diy Camera Bag to L Word - Shane 25 May 10:29
- CraftyCat favorited Diy Camera Bag 20 Dec 06:42
- M S. added Diy Camera Bag to bags 29 Sep 00:57
- Faith S. favorited Diy Camera Bag 27 Apr 04:29
- Jinx added Diy Camera Bag to Storage 25 Mar 05:33
- Kaiulani W. favorited Diy Camera Bag 14 Jan 23:46
- Ichigo M. favorited Diy Camera Bag 11 Dec 01:42
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Step 1
It it designed to fit a variety of bag sizes and can be easily configured for whatever I want to carry with me. I started with a bag I really liked that had plenty of room for what I was going to do. I needed the base to be at least 4″ wide and 14″ long. The straps needed to be heavy duty, and I wanted extra pockets both inside and out for miscellaneous things.
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Step 3
I created a frame with the chipboard and tape. This included some general configurations for the supplies it would hold. I created a bottom, a wrap around side, and three dividers. Then I covered them with a couple of layers of the batting, and sewed little pockets for them all out of pretty fabric. Before I sewed the wrap around side, I sewed a couple of velcro strips onto it.
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Step 6
I took this one with my iphone, so you could see how everything fits snuggly in and is easy access. I managed to fit all of my lenses, a few of my filters, cleaning supplies, wallet, glasses case, small makeup bag, keys, iphone, and camera into it. It weighs a lot but I’ve certainly carried around more. I don’t think this will be my standard supply list for every time I leave the house, but you can bet your sweet bippy that my camera and a few lenses are going everywhere with me now.
Total time spent: 4 hours over two days.
Total money spent: lined guts cost around $4, which I can use in other bags.
Bag alone cost under $40.