What’s In Our Camera Bag? Everything You Need To Take Amazing Pictures & Videos

If you have a vision of how you want your photos to look, but don’t know the tools you need to bring them to life? This is for you! After shooting our own pictures and videos basically everyday for the past 4 years and creating for major brands, tourism boards, and bucket list hotels, here’s everything I wish I knew sooner to shoot amazing content! I’ve shot on FujiFilm, Canon, Sony, and iPhone and I’ve learned that the equipment you use does matter! After this, you will have everything you need to take your photography to the next level! I will include links to all the gear we use.

IPHONE

I promise, you don’t need a fancy camera to take amazing pictures! The camera in your pocket is a great, convenient way to practice your photography. It’s always with you and takes photos and videos just as good (and sometimes better) than some cameras twice to three times more expensive.

Tips for taking better photos:

Use Rule of Thirds

Avoid harsh lighting
Have inspiration!
Practice your composition
Back camera = Better Quality

I recommend iPhone 13 Pro or later!

MIRRORLESS CAMERA

Influencer Content Creator camera gear what’s in our bag how to be an influencer how to take your own pictures — Shot on Fujifilm X-T3

Picking your first camera can be overwhelming. So how do you choose?

Brands like Canon, Sony, and Fujifilm, all have similar capabilities, but in the end it’s about how you want your content to look. I highly recommend putting time into watching as many videos on the specific camera you’re interested in to make sure you like the content it creates!

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FUJIFILM X-T5 with 18-55mm Lens

I chose the Fujifilm X-T3 because it has amazing auto focus, we LOVE how Fuji colors bring the content to life, and the aesthetic camera body.

We have owned it since 2019 and it has been a daily driver for most of our content since! If it wasn’t shot on our phone, it was shot on the Fujifilm X-T3!

If I bought a new camera body today it would probably be the Fujifilm X-T5!

Tip: Get the kit! It comes with everything you need to get started and saves you money!

UPGRADE YOUR LENSES

We used the kit lens that came with our Fuji for almost three years before adding a new lens to our collection. When it’s time to buy a new lens, I suggest doing your own research on what lens fits your needs most because they can be expensive! Consider this, do you take more close up shoots like portraits or family? Then you might want a zoom lens. Or do shoot mostly wider shoots like travel and landscapes? Then you might want a wider lens.

We now shoot majority of our content on the Fujifilm XF16-55 F2.8 and occasionally switch to our Fujifilm XF50-140 F2.8 for any shots that requires zoom! Check out how the 50-140mm makes the Golden Gate Bridge stand out!

Vlog Camera

Canon EOS M50 Mark II Content Creator Kit

We use the Canon M50 Mark ii for our vlog and video content. We knew we needed something compact, great auto-focus and we prefer our video to look great straight out of camera (with no editing or color grading needed) because we didn’t want to have to touch up our vlog footage post production. Plus the front facing screen was a must for vlogging!

Canon M50 Mark II + 15-45mm Lens

We have had our trials with vlog cameras and when it’s comes to the debate of Canon vs. Sony, we prefer Canon colors over Sony. The Canon M50 Mark ii is a great camera that won’t break the bank and gets the job done! It has amazing auto focus so we don’t have to worry about key shots being out of focus. It’s also a great camera for beginners as it’s easy to learn how to use!

Tip: The Content Creator kit also comes with a Canon Tripod Grip and a microphone which are also must-haves when it comes to vlogging.

Tripods

I HIGHLY recommend purchasing a “nicer” tripod if you plan on investing money into an expensive camera. You’ll find out quickly that tripods vary in price AND quality and most of the time if the tripod is cheap in price, it will also be cheap in quality.

Since we shoot all of our content ourselves, having a reliable tripod was important for us! We needed something durable, light and compact, but strong enough to hold our heavy camera with a big lens! You are relying on this tripod to not just take your pictures, but also to protect your $2000+ camera from falling. So having faith in your tripod during a photoshoot is a big deal!

When it comes to tripods, you get what you pay for. And I promise you, this Manfrotto BeFree Advanced Carbon Fiber Tripod is still one of my favorite pieces of gear I own! We also use this Manfrotto Mini Tripod for vlogging!

We also own a $20 tripod that we use when we take pictures/videos with our phone, because it’s lighter, more compact, easier to carry around, and comes with a bluetooth remote to help us film content on our own. The major problem with this is we have already been through about 5 different ones!

UBeesize Selfie Stick Tripod

They tend to break easily, they aren’t always even which makes your pictures/videos come out wonky, and aren’t sturdy on windy days. All of this will affect how good or bad your content turns out.

Since we use our tripods basically everyday and these are extremely affordable, we can just buy another one when it breaks. Unfortunately, we still haven’t found an affordable tripod that comes close to the high-valued ones mentioned earlier.

Lighting on the go

Newmowa Rechargeable Clip Video Light

Good lighting can make or break your photo or video! And we can’t bring a big ring light on the go. This Newmowa 60 LED High Power Rechargeable Clip Fill Video Light is perfect for any time we need some extra light! Trust me, I kinda wish I had this sooner!

Extra Batteries

If you catch me buying a new camera, you’ll catch me buying extra batteries! There are a few key essentials that we don’t travel without, and extra batteries are one of them!

Tip: We at least like to have one extra fully charged battery with us at all times because we never want our gear to die on us in the middle of creating! TWO EXTRA BATTERIES ARE EVEN BETTER!

Memory Cards

SanDisk 256GB Extreme PRO

Another key essential to our camera bag is memory cards! Nothing is worse than dead batteries or no memory in the middle of creating content. I highly recommend memory cards with higher amounts of storage and speed like the Sandisk Extreme Pro! Higher speed makes exporting pictures from your camera to your computer or phone so much easier and quicker!

Memory Card Reader

We use this for exporting our footage from our memory card to our laptop or iPad for editing! Apple also has memory card readers made for your iPhone! So you can transfer content from your camera straight to your phone without any trouble.

Camera Bag

Manfrotto Befree Camera Backpack

I needed a camera bag with space and protection with a little bit of style. So we use the Manfrotto BeFree Advanced! Comes with a waterproof shell to keep it dry and has plenty of space for everything we need while we travel!

You might not think you need a waterproof shell, but imagine it starts raining and your camera gear, worth thousands of dollars, gets exposed to even a drop of water! Avoid this nightmare and trust me.

Make sure your camera bag has a water proof shell.

SSD Storage

SanDisk 1TB Extreme PRO

You will eventually need somewhere to clear your memory cards to keep them ready for new projects and somewhere to store all of your content.

I personally do not recommend external hard drives because they aren’t as secure as SSD. I HIGHLY recommend the this Sandisk Extreme Pro SSD! 10/10!

Microphone

Rode VideoMic GO II Camera Mic

You can’t go wrong with anything Rode. We use this for all vlogging content! Having great audio is an easy way to level up your content.

Or check out the Canon Vlogging Kit that comes with a microphone and mini tripod!

What we use to edit

Phone or Camera, we edit all of our images with Lightroom! If you really want to take your photography to the next level, Lightroom has everything you need to edit an ordinary photo into something special!

We do all of our photography editing on iPad (with Apple Pencil for precise edits) unless it was shot on iPhone then we use our Lightroom app on our phones.

We use Filmora for editing all our vlog and high-resolution video content! It has all the tools we need, extremely easy to use, and doesn’t require a monthly subscription like Premiere Pro and other editing apps. Plus you can try it for FREE!

For video content we shoot on our iPhone we use either InShot or CapCut. They are free and super easy to use!

If this list helps just one person, I will be happy! If you want to know how we take our own photos we have a video below on exactly how we do it. It’s actually a lot easier than you might think!

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