One of the reasons that the never-ending search for the perfect bag is **never-ending** is that there isn't a perfect bag, even for one person. What works in the woods, or what is needed for a long hike or multi-day outing, is different from what is needed for street photography; and what is needed for a small compact outfit is different then what you need for large format. All of this seems pretty obvious, but it never stopped me from trying to find the perfect bag; I have literally a dozen bags of all sizes and shapes.
Recently, I've tried a different approach: It started when I bought a Kata Teddy-2, and found that I could order lots of extra "guts." I tore out what came with the bag, and rebuilt the interior like I wanted it, to carry a small Nikon D2x system. Then I decided to build a bag to carry a street-shooting system, starting from scratch. I hunted through camera, office supply, and outdoor stores (REI was the best) to find the components. I was building it for an Epson R-D1 and a selection of Leica lenses. It will also fit the Digital Leica M, when that camera comes out.
Basically, I started with a backpack of the kind designed to carry laptops and to replace briefcases. It's waterproof black nylon, and the main compartment is divided vertically across the width of the pack (that is, you have the full width, but the depth of the pack is divided about 1/3-2/3.) The pack is also lightly padded, because it was made to protect a laptop. This pack has a good one-hand carry strap on top, in addition to the packpack shoulder straps, but no waist belt; the lack of the waist belt was okay in a pack this size, because it's essentially meant to carry a small system. The shoulder straps are comfortable to wear off either shoulder, or on both at the same time.
In REI, I found small plastic-foam containers called "Candle Lantern Cocoons" which fit the Leica lenses perfectly. I can put four standard camera-bag separators in the bottom of the bag, to hold the R-D1 with an attached lens, facing down, and on the sides of the separators, cluster as many as four to six additional Leica lenses in these foam carriers.
Because the bag was designed to be a briefcase, there are lots of little pockets for accessories and stuff like notebooks, cell-phones, pens, water bottles, etc. For air travel, you could stick a laptop in it, with all the camera equipment, although that makes it a pretty heavy load. On the other hand, when you're traveling with camera equipment, there's going to be a pretty heavy load somewhere, and this bag-size meets all the airline regs for carry-on.
The bag empty, including the lens protectors, but without any equipment, is way lighter than any camera bag of similar capacity, quite a bit cheaper, and it looks like a book-bag, rather than a camera bag. Hardly worth stealing, in other words.
When I was putting the bag together, I looked at lots of packs, and realized that if you have a few old bags around that you can strip of their guts, or if you can find or buy camera-bag padding somewhere (the guts), you can almost always make a better carry-bag than you can buy. That's because you're making a custom bag that fits you and your equipment. (I'd make an exception for certain specialty bags like roller bags, or hard-shells.)
One of my problems with most camera carry bags is that they have WAY too much padding; you're carrying a load before you put the equipment in. I have a small Kata bag (it's like a 100), and it has so much padding that if I ever fell far and hard enough to break anything in it, the least of my problems would be the camera equipment; I'd need an ambulance. On the other hand, there are camera bags that are intelligently padded, like the Domkes, but those scream "camera bag" and that's not usually what I want.
I also want to be able to carry other stuff in the bag -- notebooks, pens, a cell phone. A lot of camera bags don't have room for that.
I think building your own would have an even bigger benefit for people who carry long distances -- you can buy a "real" backpack and customize it and come up with something a heck of a lot more comfortable and carryable than anything I've seen in photo bags. If you look around a variety of stores, you can find all kinds of components for a pack like this-- little hardshell boxes for delicate stuff, little zip bags for things like remote releases. Domke sells "wraps" that can be used to pad anything, and are are about the size and weight of a handkerchief.
I've still got a way to go with my pack, but I'm getting there. Better to roll your own, IMHO.
JC
