Taking A Short Photo Road Trip And Not Taking A Laptop

Gettysburg National Military Park Battlefield, Pennsylvania. (click to enlarge)

In my last post, I discussed the proposition that "less is more."  You can read that post, here.  Taking less gear with less weight and bulk as well as fewer lenses and accessories, to me, enhances the experience. Too much gear can add unnecessary decision-making and stress to my photographic endeavors and may actually serve to reduce pleasure.  Last week, I took a three day photo road trip to Gettysburg, Pennsylvania and decided against taking my 15" laptop, two external USB hard drive, Wacom tablet (I've used the Wacom tablet for so long and for everything that I no longer use a mouse for anything) and everything that goes along with cataloging, processing and editing my daily images.  How would it work out for me?

What I decided to do was only take my old iPad Pro 12.9" tablet along with my first generation Apple pencil.  Any images I would want to look at and/or edit or share in the evening could be done on the tablet.  After all, we get Lightroom Mobile and Photoshop Mobile with our basic Adobe subscription.

There were two considerations that I also needed to address.  How do I get my images onto my iPad and how do I backup my images each night?  The answers are pretty straightforward.  I brought along a SD reader/Lightning connector dongle to plug into the iPad which allowed me to look at my images or import them into Lightroom if I wanted to edit or share them.  Also, I have an older Western Digital My Passport Wireless 1TB hard drive that I can use for nightly backups.  The WD My Passport does not need to be connected to a computer, has it's own electronics, has a USB and SDXC slots and can run either on alternating current or by internal battery.

Over the three days, I found I did want to look at some of my images on a screen larger than my camera's LCD so I plugged my memory card into the dongle, plugged the dongle into the iPad and was able to view them.

Additionally, I wanted to edit a few to share and I was able to do that using Lightroom Mobile.  That said, I've not used LR Mobile much nor have I read any instructions so I struggled a bit finding some of the features I normally use on my desktop version.  It wasn't as smooth a process as I would have wished but, with time and experience, editing images using Lightroom Mobile and my iPad should be a perfectly viable alternative to bringing along a laptop, charger, cords, two external portable hard drive, a Wacom tablet, etc.  In fact, by the time I had played with editing a half dozen images, mostly for practice, I now feel pretty comfortable with using it.

Will I do this again in the future?  I think I will but for only short trips.  For longer and more complex trips (visiting multiple locations in multiple states) I believe I still would prefer having my laptop with me.  It has the desktop version of LR, my LR catalog with all of my images on a separate external hard drive.  My habit is to, each evening, upload all the day's images, keywording each and filing them in their appropriate folder.  I also create a Collection of all of the trip's images so they are in once place and easily accessible.  That way, when I return home, everything is already uploaded, keyworded, filed and cataloged.

By the way, even though my iPad Pro is old (second generation), does not have the new Apple M1 or M2 chips, it handles my 40mp Fujifilm X-T5 raw files as well as my 45.7mp Nikon Z7II raw files quickly and without issue.  It edits the files quickly and without lag.  No problems at all.

Here are a few random images I made.  None are great but I still wanted to share some with you.

I didn't intend to photograph birds nor wildlife but near Devil's Den is a beaver pond.  I spotted
this little green heron waiting patiently to strike at a hapless fish.  (click to enlarge)

Just west of Gettysburg on U.S. Route 30 (Lincoln Highway), I spotted an old barn with one
of the Mail Pouch Tobacco advertisements still visible.  When I was young, these were plentiful
throughout the countryside in Pennsylvania and other states but not many of them are left.
(click to enlarge)

Gettysburg National Military Park Battlefield, Pennsylvania. (click to enlarge)

Composite.  The sky was bald white and ugly so I thought I would take the liberty of adding some
interest in Photoshop.  I'm still not sure I like it. (click to enlarge)

Simple home. Gettysburg National Military Park Battlefield, Pennsylvania. (click to enlarge)

Gettysburg National Military Park Battlefield, Pennsylvania. (click to enlarge)

Get up. Get out. Make photographs.

Join me over at my website, https://www.dennismook.com.  

Thanks for looking. Enjoy!  

Dennis A. Mook  

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