Laptop Thoughts: Tenba's Small Messenger Photo Bag: A Worthy Bag For Your Laptop and DSLR

Figure 10: The rings that the shoulder strap attaches to are metal, and so are the clasps for the shoulder strap. Very solid design.

Figure 11: The front top zipper is extremely clever; it gives you immediate access to the DSLR portion of the bag.

You'd have to have a fairly small DSLR with a small lens on it to store the camera vertically and be able to quickly remove it with this size of bag, but a larger camera and lens combo would work if it was stored horizontally. Either way, being able to open the DSLR segment without having to open the flap is brilliant design.

Figure 12: The underside of the flap; two pieces of Velcro help secure the bag when shut. It would have been nice to have a business card ID slot here, or perhaps a small pouch for memory cards.

Figure 13: A top-down look at the inside of the Tenba Small Messenger Photo Bag.

For my trip I packed, from left to right, the Nikkor 70-200mm f/2.8 lens, the Nikkor 50mm f/1.8 lens, the Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8 lens, my Nikon D300 with the attached battery grip, and on top of the D300 I put my Panasonic GF-1 (I was using it to take these pictures). In this photo you can also see the laptop pouch.

Figure 14: The inside front.

The left and right pouches are bigger than the ones on the front; they'll fit a passport, my HTC HD2, etc. They're not very wide horizontally, but are spacious enough for one device, a couple of passports or paperwork, etc. I put my Ultimate Ears metal case in one and it fit OK. The top two pouches in the centre are big enough to hold a device or two (Zune HD and iPod Touch in my case), or a few CDs/DVDs; I'd have preferred to see elasticized pouches so items would be held in place. Below that there are four pen holders, which seems like a waste - who needs to travel with four pens? Give me two pen holders, each just a bit wider so I can carry a pen and a lens cleaning pen, and then give me a small pouch with a Velcro flap on top so I can carry a few extra memory cards or other camera accessories.

Figure 15: The entire DSLR segment is removable - brilliant! I'm not sure how often I'd do this, but it can be handy to be able to access all your photo gear at once.