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After years of flying fighter jets, solo sailing trips, and backpacking – along with not giving much thought to how I’ve hauled camera equipment around – I’ve ended up dealing with ongoing back, neck, and shoulder issues. So I’m starting a series documenting how I’m rethinking the way I carry my gear in different situations with the goal of preserving my body.
First up is a new addition to my bag lineup: the Think Tank DarkLight 14L backpack.
Where I’m Coming From
My go-to bag for years has been the Shimoda Action X30 and X50. I love these bags for getting equipment from place to place; it’s my carry-on for air travel and is my default pack for assignments where I’m on foot all day with a lot of gear. But it’s a bit overkill for much else. For short outings, like quick stops on a drive or a short day hike, it’s just too much.
For those situations, I’ve relied on Think Tank Retrospective shoulder bags. I have a small collection of these, including one that’s over 15 years old and still going strong. That’s a testament to how well Think Tank gear holds up. The best thing about these kinds of bags is accessibility. Open the flap, grab the camera, shoot. No obstacles to shooting.
But the problem is what you’d expect from a shoulder bag loaded with gear: all that weight sits on one shoulder. After a while, it starts to hurt, and I’d find myself constantly shifting the strap to find relief. It’s fine for a quick outing but not great for anything longer.
What I was looking for was something small and low-profile that could shift the majority of the weight to my hips, the same way the Shimoda packs do, but in a smaller package.
Why the DarkLight 14L
Think Tank makes the DarkLight in three sizes. There’s a 14L, 20L, and 25L (affiliate link). I went with the 14L specifically for its small, low-profile size, plus its expandability. I didn’t want a big pack I’d only ever fill partway, but I also wanted the option to add capacity. The DarkLight bags have attachment points for things like additional lens pouches if you need to bring something that doesn’t fit inside.
I don’t typically review gear after only a couple of weeks, but I’m comfortable talking about this one. I’ve used Think Tank products for over 15 years, some of them for the entire span, and I have zero doubts about their build quality. This bag is made of heavy-duty, slightly water-resistant nylon, with substantial zippers featuring long, easy-to-grab pulls, a MOLLE system on the back for attaching accessories, and side straps for things like lens pouches. It feels rugged and is built to last.
What It Can Carry
This is a 14L bag, but it holds more than you’d expect. It can fit the classic full-frame “trinity” of lenses, like your 10-24mm or equivalent wide-angle, a 24-70mm, and a 70-200mm. The 70-200mm can be mounted to the camera body with the hood extended. Like most camera bags, it comes with a padded main divider and configurable sub-dividers, so you can arrange the interior for one body and three lenses, two bodies and a couple of lenses, a camera plus a drone setup, or whatever your outing calls for.
Access to all your gear is primarily through the rear panel, but there’s also a padded top lid you can unzip to grab a camera body sitting on top without opening the whole back compartment.
What About Personal Gear?
The top compartment doesn’t offer much room for personal items. Maybe your wallet, keys, a candy bar, that kind of thing. But it does have attachment loops if you want to clip anything on it.
The front of the bag, behind the MOLLE straps and Velcro, opens to a compartment that can hold snacks and a lightweight rain jacket, plus a separate zippered pocket for keys to keep them secure. There’s also a small divided section here that houses the included rain cover. The rain cover itself is fairly large. I think I’ll leave it at home unless rain is in the forecast.
A Few Things That Could Be Better
The side water bottle pocket is too small. Standard Nalgene-style or aluminum reusable bottles don’t fit well, and if you force one in, it pushes into the main compartment and eats into your gear space. It works fine for a small 1L bottle, but that’s about it. On the upside, it doubles as a good tripod pocket, with straps above it to secure a tripod in place. If you want a proper water bottle solution, you could use the straps on the opposite side for a bottle holder or lens pouch instead.
The waist belt isn’t padded. If I were redesigning this bag, I’d add padding similar to what Think Tank uses on their BackLight Sprint, a 15L similar bag. That said, this is only a 14L bag. It’ll be difficult to load it to the point that the lack of padding becomes a problem, especially with a layer of clothing underneath. After several hours on multiple day hikes, I haven’t had any hot spots or discomfort. I should note that the 20L and 25L versions do have padded belts.
One more minor gripe: the shoulder straps sit close to the zippers, so you can’t just swing the bag off your back and immediately unzip the rear compartment. You need to fold the straps out of the way first.
What Works Really Well
Despite those small drawbacks, this bag does exactly what I needed it to do. With the hip belt adjusted properly, I genuinely don’t feel any weight on my shoulders. The shoulder straps are really just there to keep the bag from falling backward, not to bear any load. That’s the whole point, and it works.
The low profile also makes a real difference out on the trail. I can maneuver through tight spots and obstacles without the bag catching the way larger packs tend to.
The back panel has solid padding with an airflow channel, which doesn’t stop me from sweating (nothing does), but it stays comfortable against my back over long stretches. The shoulder straps are also cut in a way that’s comfortable for women to wear (an afterthought for many backpacks).
There are also small attachment loops on the shoulder straps themselves, handy for clipping on something like small sunscreen bottles.
The Trade-Off
Compared to a shoulder bag, getting a camera in and out of this pack takes a few more steps. But after dealing with shoulder pain for as long as I have, I wish I’d made this trade sooner. Distributing the load to your hips instead of one shoulder is backpacking 101. I’ve practiced that in every other aspect of hauling things, but ignored it for photography so that I could have easier access to my camera while being protected when not using it. I wish I hadn’t done that.
Is It Right for You?
If you’re carrying genuinely heavy gear, like big 600mm primes and things like that, this probably isn’t the bag for you. That kind of weight on a 14L hip belt won’t be comfortable, and you’ll want something more robust (check out the other DarkLight bags). But for most photographers heading out with a body and a few lenses for a day hike or short excursion, the Think Tank DarkLight 14L (affiliate link) is a great option, and the first step in my own effort to carry gear in a way that doesn’t wreck my body any further.
More to come as this series continues.