The choice of my equipment is always based on a compromise between quality, reliability, weight, size, and of course, price.
For mountain photography, the weight and size often limits the type of equipment I can carry, especially when I go several days bivouacking in full autonomy The best compromise I have settled for so far is based on SLR equipment. The latest Canon professional body, the 1Ds Mark III, offers with its 21 Mpix, tremendous photographic quality for a reasonable weight and size. It also allows me to work in panoramic format by using the digital stitching technique of up to 7 vertical shots, which provides final images that can be greatly enlarged.

So here is my more or less complete list of equipment, which currently follows me around:
  • A pair of eyes of make "Mother and Father Bitton" :-)
  • Canon EOS 1Ds Mark III body (21 Mpix full frame SLR)
  • Canon EOS 5D Mark II body (21 Mpix full frame SLR)
  • Canon 17-40mm L lens
  • Canon 24-105mm IS lens
  • Canon 28-135mm IS lens
  • Canon 100-400mm IS L lens
  • Feisol CT-3342 carbon fibre tripod with Markins Q10 ball head
  • Velbon CF435 carbon fibre tripod
  • Nodal Ninja 3 and 5 panoramic head
  • Several GBytes of CF and SD SanDisk cards
  • 40GB Jobo Mini hard drive
  • 80GB Hyperdrive hard drive
  • Polarising filter B&W Slim MRC (multicoated)
  • Set of neutral density graduate filters from Lee (0.6ND, 0.9ND and 1.2 grad hard and soft)
  • Canon PROGRAF iPF8300 large format inkjet professional printer (awarded the accolade of ‘Best Photographic Printer of the Year 2011’ by the European Digital Press Association (EDP))