Surf Photography Gear: What I Want

If you have checked out my recent post you will have seen the kit I currently have, if I manage to save some cash (or actually make some money from this hobby) my kit bag will eventually include this:

1. Canon EOS 7D body, it uses the same chip but it’s faster, better and stronger than the 60D, it’s been around for a while so I expect Canon will release a direct replacement at some point so I will hopefully be able to snap one up at a bargain price when they do, another pretty massive benefit is that the CR60 housing and the CR7 housing for the 7D are nearly identical as far as I can tell, the only difference is the back plate and the connector on the pistol grip, I’m not too worried about the back plate controls, not having used the one control I have so far at all, and you can get a cheap adapter for the pistol grip connector from Ebay, so I can stick to the same housing with the new body.
2. Tokina 10-17mm fisheye, this seems to be the lens of choice for Canon water shooters, with the possible exception of the new Canon 8-15mm but that’s way out of my price range even for the future. I hardly ever see the Tokina come up second hand unfortunately so I might have to make do with the Sigma for a few years yet.
3. Canon 70-200 F4 L, this will be my next purchase I think, the non image stabilised version is actually pretty reasonable at around the £400 mark second hand and all reviews say it’s fantastic, Zak Noyle uses it a lot according to his Instagram feed and Aquatech make a port for it which is a big plus. I think it will be a lens I use a lot in and out of the water, and I definitely can’t afford a 500 or 600mm L lens unless I don’t want to go on holiday for about a decade.
4. Canon 50mm f1.4, a well made, very fast 50mm, apparently it’s great for shooting in the water, I want to try and get some of those crisp pitching lip shots that Mickey Smith takes a lot and I think this would be perfect, it would obviously replace my current 50mm which I use for lots of everyday shooting.
5. GoPro Hero 3 Black edition, it ups the spec’s of the Hero 2 by a fair bit, it’s smaller, lighter and comes with a flat port on the housing for shooting underwater, the Hero 2 is pretty amazing though and I’ll be sticking with it for the foreseeable future, I’d rather invest in a new lens than an upgraded GoPro.