Earlier this year I acquired a Lowerpro Nova 200 AW camera bag. I have been meaning to write my review, but I’ve managed to delay. I think this is partly a result of the nature of this bag. No, there is nothing wrong with it – in fact, I like it a lot. It is just there is nothing flashy about it either – instead it is just a very competent and useful piece of basic equipment.

The Nova 200 is of an over-the-shoulder classic camera bag (or “gadget bag,” if you want to sufficiently date yourself… ;-) type: a basic rectangular main compartment, additional interior and exterior pockets, a shoulder strap (detachable) for quickly slinging the load over one shoulder, and a large top opening with a cover flap that is fully secured by zipper and/or latch. While this type of bag is neither as capacious or as easily carried as backpacks and sling bags, it is extremely versatile in use and provides quick access to your gear, either while you wear that bag or after you take it off and put it down.

The Nova 200 is constructed of the now-familiar Lowepro materials – a durable nylon exterior over dense foam padding with a smoother nylon interior. The padding protects all around including the bottom and top of the bag and seems to me to provide the right combination of protection and flexibility. The bag comes with a good set of interior dividers that can and should be reconfigured for your camera, lenses and other gear. (My bag is basic black, but it comes in several colors as well.)

Interior capacity, while obviously less than the large camera backpacks, is quite good. For typical use I might use the main compartment of my Nova 200 to carry a Canon 5D with EF 24-105 f/4 L attached, Canon EF 17-40mm f/4 L, Canon EF 70-200mm f/4 L, perhaps a couple of small primes, and even my Canon 580EXII flash. I’ve even used it to carry my EF 100-400mm f/4.5-5.6 L, which is no small lens. All of this gear is easily accessible by opening the large top flap – with the possible exception of one prime if I pack them two-deep, everything is visible and accessible without digging through the bag. You can access the gear while wearing the bag, though it is probably easier to do so if you set it down first.

Pockets inside the top flap are shallow, but can handle thin items such as business cards, filters, and memory cards. A couple small pockets inside the flap are sized specifically for memory card storage. There is another slim but wide pocket inside the portion of the top flap that extends down to the “latch” of the lower outside of the pack – this pocket is accessed via a long zipper along the upper seam of the flap, and it provide yet another place to store items that you want to get at without opening up the main compartment. The top flap itself is secured by a full-length zipper designed to seal off the bag and/or a simple latch – the zipper is more secure and protective, but the latch permits quicker access to bag contents.

Another small zippered exterior pocket is found on the “back” of the bag, with the zipper along the upper seam of the bag. This pocket can hold thin but large items, perhaps a good sized white balance card or similar.

TAa large zippered exterior pocket is found along the “front” of the bag. The interior of this pocket has a simple design, but it includes several pockets for organizing gear. The main portion of this pocket can handle slightly bulkier items that the pockets in the top flap including things like cell phone, wallet, glasses case, etc. The flap of this pocket holds the “AW” (all weather) rain cover which can quickly be deployed by opening a separate exterior zipper along the bottom of the flap.

An additional piece of material on the back side forms a flat “tube” that is open at the top and bottom. I understand that its purpose is to allow you to quickly attach the bag to, for example, the handle of an airport wheeled carry-on bag by sliding it over the carry-on bag’s handle. It doesn’t work with my current carry-on which because its handle is too large to pass through this section of the bag, but it could be useful with other brands/models of carry-on bags.

There are expandable stretchy mesh pockets on each end of the bag. These can be catch-all pockets for a variety of larger items or things you may want to access without unzipping the bag. I’ve used them to carry small water bottles or a light windbreaker.

Yes, this bag has a lot of pockets! It seems that Lowepro has used just about every available place on the bag for pockets of one sort or another.

Many photographers end up with quite a variety of bags for different purposes. I probably have at least a half dozen at this point, each with its advantages and disadvantages, and I select different bags depending on how and where I’ll be shooting. Some situations in which the Nova 200 excels include:

• Working on foot in a situation in which I’ll need to get into the bag quite frequently, the Nova 200 provides quicker and easier access to its contents than a sling bag or a backpack.
• Likewise, in a situation where you can put the bag down, you can manage this bag much more quickly and easily than the other options.
• It is also very useful for certain types of “urban” shooting where you have to carry a fair amount of equipment along with some additional non-photographic gear (perhaps a water bottle and windbreaker) but don’t want the bulk of a backpack.

As an example of one shooting situation in which the Nova 200 worked perfectly for me, I recently photographed an airshow during Fleetweek in San Francisco. I did not need all of my lenses, but I needed a significant subset – and my large 100-400mm zoom was among them. I had to park a distance away from the site and walk to the best shooting locations. I had to move around quite a bit, and I had to make lens changes without a lot of fuss. My sling pack would not have been large enough, and the Nova allowed my to get at the gear I needed with much less fuss than if I had used a backpack.

G Dan Mitchell Photography
About | Flickr | Twitter | Facebook | Google+ | 500px.com | LinkedIn | Email

Text, photographs, and other media are © Copyright G Dan Mitchell (or others when indicated) and are not in the public domain and may not be used on websites, blogs, or in other media without advance permission from G Dan Mitchell.

(Basic EXIF data is available by “mousing over” large images in blog posts. Leave a comment if you want to know more.)