It’s been seven years since I did my first trip to India; a trip that filled me with great memories and experiences, and photography-wise, it was a blast! This time, it would be slightly different though: I’m not going alone, and I’m not going to obsess over photography as much as I did last time. It’s a fact that I’m not doing photography as much as I used to, back in the days. So this time, apart from photography, I’m going to enjoy myself a bit more, and I’m not going to roughen it up as much as I did last time. After all, I’m not the same person as I was seven years ago (hint: I’m older)!

The focus of this trip is going to be the famous Pushkar Fair. Last time, I did visit Pushkar, but that was a month or so before the fair, and everyone was saying the fair is amazing and I should come back, etc. So when my wife suggested to go to India, I timed the trip to coincide with the fair (it also helped that it overlaps with Thanksgiving!). Apart from Pushkar, we’re going to visit Delhi, Agra, and (since my wife insisted) Varanasi. It’s mostly a return trip for me, except Delhi, so it would be interesting to see how those places have changed.

Although I said photography is not the main highlight of the trip, it is nevertheless a great chance to rekindle my love for people photography. Sadly I haven’t done serious portraits since my last trip to India, so this is a great time to try my hands at it again. And that brings me right into the question of what camera/lenses should I bring with myself! I have a Sony A6300 with 50mm 1.8 and 30mm 1.4 lenses, but it’s not the best setup for portraits. I love how small and lightweight the whole thing is, but the lenses I have are less than ideal for portraits. First off, the 50mm 1.8 and 30mm 1.4 are in fact 75mm 2.4, and 45mm 2.0 on full frame, respectively. 45mm and 75mm are weird portrait focal lengths, and are too close together. In our trip to Peru, I found myself mostly using the 30mm 1.4, and not switching to the 50mm. Also 45mm is too tele for environmental portrait. They are also not as fast as I like them to be. And last but not least, I can’t say that I like Sony’s color science very much (I miss Canon’s great colors).

So this is what I’m thinking right now: I don’t go to India that often, and I don’t get the chance of doing portrait photography that often either. So I have to do it right! In order to fully enjoy my portrait photography, I need to have a full frame camera and 35mm 1.4 and 85mm 1.8 lenses. That’s it. It’s going to be twice heavier than my Sony setup, but it’s worth it. Having settled on that, here are my options:

  1. Take my old 5D Classic (!), trusty 85mm 1.8, and rent/buy a Sigma 35mm 1.4.

  2. Take my 85mm 1.8, and rent a 6D mk II and a Sigma 35mm 1.4.

  3. Rent a whole new camera system like Nikon D610 or Sony A7 III with the corresponding lenses.

Option 1 is less than ideal. My old 5D is only 12MP, it has a crappy screen and autofocus system. So that’s not a good option. I’m gravitating more towards option 2, but option 3 is not that much more expensive. Also I’m not sure whether I should buy those or rent them. If I buy them used, and sell them afterwards, I may not spend as much money. Not sure…

Anyhow, I can’t wait to get back to India! More to come…