Large Backpack for Agfa 8x10

[Laura_Campbell]

I'm looking for a backpack recommendation for my heavy Agfa 8x10 Commercial View. Dimensions are 11.25" wide x 14.75" tall x 7" deep. I'm not looking to backpack with it, but I need to find a pack that is padded that I can wear on my back for short distances. I'm currently carrying the camera in a tote.

[lenser]

Laura,

PM sent.

[Chauncey Walden]

What I did was add a shelf to a good backpack frame like a packer's frame would have. Then you can carry your camera in anything strapped to the frame.

[Vaughn]

I have a MRI travel pack. bought new years ago. I think it would be closest to the Trekker:

http://www.meipacks.com/TravelPacks01.html

Five (6 in a pinch) 8x10 film holders fit into the attached day pack, side pockets tuck away when not in use (I don't use them often -- usually only if I plan to be away from the car all day..more than 6 hours).

There is a panel that zips up to enclose all the shoulder straps and hip belts -- looks and carries like a suitcase. Comfortable for all day hiking. Holds my Zone VI 8x10, several lenses, meter, etc -- I built compartments using closed cell foam. Besides the five holders in the daypack, I sometimes slip in a couple more in the main compartment.

The photos of it show the daypack off the pack. The pack is a front-loader. Everything is accessable when you unzip the front panel.

Vaughn

Here are two photos of my pack: http://www.largeformatphotography.info/forum/showpost.php?p=298992&postcount=40

[cdholden]

The problem is that most commercial packs have excessive weight to start with. If you can shave off all the weight possible by getting a frameless pack, you could put in a neoprene sleeve, foam pad, and some "ditty bags" to hold miscellaneous items. Every pound you can cut makes the hike that much more enjoyable. It will allow your knees, back, shoulders to go through the day so much easier. Your body will reward you with fewer aches and more miles on the trail. Check out the ULA Catalyst.
Happy hiking!
Chris

[Vaughn]

The ULA Catalyst looks like a great backpacking pack. I'll have to look into them if and when I replace my expedition-sized 25+ year old Gregory pack -- I don't plan on carrying the 85 pound packs I use to!LOL!

But top loaders are a bit awkward for photo equipment -- one has to pull everything out and set it on the ground to get to things on the bottom. My extra-large daypack for my 4x5 worked was a top loader and I got it to work by having everything in stuff sacks -- one for the holders, one for all the accessories (meter, etc) one for the lens and one for the camera itself. There was a piece of closed cell foam in the pack (served to keep any equipment from sticking into my back) that I could set things on in the case of wet ground. But it also worked because I carried only one lens, and I used everything in the pack to take one shot. Multiple lenses and the large 8x10 holders would not work as well as 4x5.

A front loader you just open up and all the equipment is right there to grab as you need it. If it starts to rain, you just zip up the front panel. You want to change lenses, it is right there. The weight difference between my MEI pack and the ULA Catalyst is two pounds. Frankly, if one is carrying an 8x10, the difference of 2 pounds will never be noticed. I don't think her camera is going to fit into a ULA Catalyst, anyway -- and no easy place to store 8x10 holders. One has to be careful to protect the holders from objects pressing into them and damaging the dark slides...and the larger the holder, the easier it is to damage them.

But it is an individual thing -- whatever works best for the individual.

[cdholden]

After thinking about this, I remembered a few that are custom sized that I've heard good things about:
http://www.aarnpacks.com/
http://www.mchalepacks.com/

Another forum member spoke highly of his McHale used to carry an 8x20. I only suggested the ULA above, as I've had good results out of mine, and the Dyneema material is pretty tough, yet lightweight.
Chris

[Thebes]

The problem is that most commercial packs have excessive weight to start with. If you can shave off all the weight possible by getting a frameless pack, you could put in a neoprene sleeve, foam pad, and some "ditty bags" to hold miscellaneous items. Every pound you can cut makes the hike that much more enjoyable. It will allow your knees, back, shoulders to go through the day so much easier. Your body will reward you with fewer aches and more miles on the trail. Check out the ULA Catalyst.
Happy hiking!
Chris


I shudder!!! I've hiked from Georgia to Maine (without LF gear!) and its my experience the only people who do well with frameless packs are young ultra-lighters and quite used to hardship. Some packs are too heavy, but at least a basic frame, well padded hip-pads on the belt, and preferably lifters on the belt and shoulder straps- IMHO these things are vital carrying a heavy load. That the heavy load can't be padded with sleeping bag and clothes- golite style, makes a good pack that much more vital.

Might be harder on the knees, any weight is, but it will be far easier on the rest of the body. If its an internal frame pack it should snug up to the body and fit "like a glove".

[cdholden]

Have you seen these packs? They're all designed with load bearing features, just not the traditional definition of a retail store's internal/external frame pack.
Check it out. Hiking doesn't require carrying 50+ pounds.
You can read the forums over at backpackinglight.com and learn to cut some of that weight by replacing lighter gear. The easiest and most notable changes usually start with replacing the tent, the sleeping bag, and the backpack. My 4 day pack weighs a little over 12 pounds.
Best of luck.
Chris

[Vaughn]

Chris, what you said is true, but it still makes me laugh -- but at myself ! I have made several 11-day solo trips in the Grand Canyon. My pack would start out at 85 pounds (might have been a little more, actually), and I would hike out of the Canyon with a 45 pound or so pack. I think my 4x5 equipment was at least 25 pounds. I did not even take a camp stove and since no fires are allowed in the Canyon, had uncooked food the whole time (I had a batch of alfalfa sprouts growing the whole trip).

But I was young and dumb, and even with blowing out my knee on the 14 mile hike down into the Canyon that I would do the first day (causing me to hobble around for the next 10 days) did not deter me. Three knee surgeries (due also to years of basketball and 10 years of wilderness trail construction work) and 30 years later, I would have to limit myself to my Rolleiflex and the lightest possible equipment if I were to repeat those journeys...which I hope to with my three boys in the next couple of years (but they are teenagers -- maybe I can con them into carrying my 4x5 equipment! or ever 5x7!)

But I keep myself in shape by carrying about 60 pounds of 8x10 gear around in the redwoods all day (but really only for 4 or 5 miles).

[cdholden]

A TLR and 3 sherpas? Now you're talking and walking light!

[Thebes]

Have you seen these packs? They're all designed with load bearing features, just not the traditional definition of a retail store's internal/external frame pack.
Check it out. Hiking doesn't require carrying 50+ pounds.
You can read the forums over at backpackinglight.com and learn to cut some of that weight by replacing lighter gear. The easiest and most notable changes usually start with replacing the tent, the sleeping bag, and the backpack. My 4 day pack weighs a little over 12 pounds.
Best of luck.
Chris

Packs that I saw with no frame on the AT when I hiked in 2000/2001 did not have any load lifters and this was one of the complaints. They were sil-nylon and the user had to pack stuff in a very specific fashion to provide a sort of frame. About 2/3rds of them sent it home and bought a heavier pack. Most said that the pack "felt lighter" which was often my subjective opinion about a well fit pack.

During the summer my pack weight was about 18.5 lbs + food and water. This was in a Dana Design pack with the top lid shipped up the trail, betamid floorless tent and a shared sleeping bag for my wife and I... our stove was a 1/2 oz alcohol job. I wonder how little you ate that you got down to 12 lbs for 4 days, of course with a long distance hike your appetite increases so my wife and I were both at about 2 lbs of energy dense food a day. Once I had to carry as much as 85lbs (largely food and water) when she was injured.

I can't see a typical 8x10 outfit getting down bellow 30 lbs, not with a "heavy camera" as its base. I could see a large 8x10, maybe, working in the lightest pack I carried, a 1st gen Mountainsmith Ghost, which had a very simple delrin hoop and hdpe sheet for a frame, frontloader. FWIW, I will no longer carry a pack which does not protect my neck- my wife claims hers may have saved her life in a bad fall she took down a cliff just North of the Maine border on the AT.

[Vaughn]

A TLR and 3 sherpas? Now you're talking and walking light!

My three boys and I have been talking about a Grand Canyon adventure in 2011 during their Spring break (Mid-April). This is the time of year I use to plan my hikes for -- the inner Canyon can be an incredible flower garden. They'll be newly 14-year-olds, I'll be almost 57.

The inner Canyon is like being on a different world...I miss it! Vaughn