Stephen DesRoches

Landscape | Last Updated: April 4, 2024

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Hi, my name is Stephen DesRoches and I’m a photographer and designer located in Prince Edward Island, Canada’s smallest province. My path to photography started with an interest in painting, followed by an interest in designing product based websites. I became a buyer of stock images and an editor. It was after all of that, that I bought my first camera around 2002. A Toshiba 3 megapixel compact camera.

I’m a landscape photographer. It’s images of nature, the weather, our environment and the impact we have on it that resonates with me most. I will accept commercial and tourism assignments but it’s that fantastic landscape in beautiful light that I want to return to again and again.

I think you’ll quickly realize that my budget and money goes to everything but upgrading. It takes some serious motivation for me to sell and replace equipment that I’m very familiar with. Simply put, there are more important things to experience than always chasing the latest — even thought I do currently have the strong desire to jump into the smaller and lighter mirrorless systems once I decide which brand I want to support.

Maybe it’s an excuse to make me feel better but having older gear removes the urge to protect and take more risks. A camera covered in salt water and sand in an effort to capture crashing waves is a common situation that you will find me in. You may even hear grains of sand crushing with the movement of the focus and/or zoom rings. The images are the most important thing and I’m more than willing to take those calculated risks.

My current go-to combination is the Canon 5D Mark II paired with a Canon EF 17-40mm f/4 L. These two pieces of gear do the majority of the heavy lifting and everything else I own is secondary. My second most used lens is a Canon EF 70-200mm f/4 IS which is usually attached to a Canon 7D. These two lenses along with using both APS-C and FF sensors gives me the range for almost anything I need.

I have 4 extra lenses that I take with me on occasion. A Canon EF 100mm f/2.8 Macro for fun close up images – usually paired with the Canon MR-14EX Macro Ring Light. I have the Canon EF 85mm f/1.8 for the occasional portrait, family or indoor low-light events. I have recently been playing with a full manual Bower 24mm f/1.4 for midnight and aurora images. And I also have a bit of fun with a cheap Rokinon 8mm f/3.8 HD Fisheye.

If there is anything that I obsess and research too much over, it’s camera bags. It will always be a challenge searching for the best way to carry everything while hiking, driving, flying or just every day commuting. If I’m driving, my current primary backpack is a MindShift Gear Rotation180 Professional 38L.

I’ve always been a fan of ThinkTankPhoto, so when they announced this sister company for outdoor photographers, I purchased this bag through their Kickstarter fundraiser. But it’s big and lacks laptop support so I recently just added a MindShift Gear BackLight 26L for travel needs after a challenging packing experience to Greenland.

For everyday commuting, I’ve been using a Think Tank Photo Urban Disguise 50 since 2008. It is still as good as it was the day I bought it. And finally, before MindShiftGear was born, I was and still am a big fan of the LowePro Flipside 400AW. It’s smaller than the others but still too good to part with. It’s super comfortable and a great little backpack.

I’m a photographer and a website usability designer. I like to create things and the two are very much intertwined. My current design focused projects include the reverse image search engine TinEye.com and a couple medical educational products. To date, I’ve helped create and launch 24 ebooks on photography.

Here’s a list of the main gear I use:

Canon 5D Mark II w/ Kirk BL-5DII L-Bracket
Canon 7D
Canon EF 17-40mm f/4 L
Canon EF 70-200mm f/4 L IS
Canon EF 100mm f/2.8 Macro
Canon EF 85mm f/1.8
Bower 24mm f1.4
Rokinon 8mm f/3.8 HD Fisheye

Canon PowerShot S100
Canon WP-DC43 Waterproof Case
GoPro Hero4

Gepe Card Safe Extreme
SanDisk 16GB Compact Flash Cards

Induro BHL1 Ballhead
Induro BHD0 Ballhead
Induro CLT104 Stealth Carbon Tripod
Induro Alloy 8M AT214 Tripod
Induro Alloy 8M AM25 Monopod

LEE Filters Foundation Kit
LEE Filters 4×6” Grad ND.6 Hard
LEE Filters 4×6” Grad ND.6 Soft
LEE Filters 4×6” Grad ND.9 Soft
LEE Filters 4×4” ND.9
LEE Filters 4×4” Big Stopper

B+W 77mm XS-PRO Nano-MC Kaesemn Circular Polarizer
B+W 77mm 1.8 ND6 Neutral Density
Breakthrough 77mm X3 ND6 Neutral Density
Hoya 67mm Circular Polarizer

MindShift Gear rotation180 Professional 38L
MindShift Gear BackLight 26L
ThinkTank Photo Urban Disguise 50
ThinkTank Photo Digital Holster 20
LowePro Flipside 400AW
MindShift Gear Filter Hive

(2) Canon Speedlite 430EX
Canon MR-14EX Macro Ring Lite

Westcott Rapid Box Octa – 26”
Lastolite Ezybox 8.6” Square
Westcott 20: DigiTent
Cactus Wireless Flash Transceiver v5 Duo

Apple 13” MacBook Pro
Dell 27” Ultrasharp U2713HM
Wacom Intuos Art Medium
Wacom Intuos3 Medium
X-Rite I1Display Pro
Seagate 4TB Thunderbolt Backup Plus Desktop Drives
Western Digital 750GB Passport Travel Drives
Epson Stylus Photo R3000 Inkjet Printer
Logan Graphics 32” Compact Elite Mat Cutter