Hiring camera gear to try it out before you buy it can be a great way to make sure you are buying gear that suits your requirements, rather than buying an expensive lens, only to find it doesn't quite meet your needs.


Camera gear can be expensive, particularly mid-high-end camera bodies and lenses. Before spending significant amounts of money on expensive items, how can you be sure that it is the right body or lens for you?

Online reviews on the web can be a useful source of information, and discussions in online forums can also be enlightening.
However, they typically will not provide specific information about how you intend to use the gear.

Photography gear can be expensive, so when you buy additional gear, you want to make sure you're not paying too much for it. Typically, camera gear is cheaper in the US than it is in Australia, even when taking into account the shipping costs, and depending on the cost, the GST and customs duty.
As a result, many people, myself included, have been buying camera gear from overseas sellers, including places such as B&H and Adorama.

However, with recent changes in the Australian exchange rate, it may not necessarily be cheaper to import items from overseas!



With the Aussie dollar having dropped against the US dollar in the last year or so, it has been cheaper to buy camera gear direct from the US, than it has been to buy it locally in Australia. In July/August 2008, the Australian dollar reached new heights of USD$0.97.

In November 2007, I bought the Canon 100mm f/2.8 USM Macro from B&H in New York. Even when taking into account the shipping costs, I still saved approx AUD$250 compared to the local Australian prices. B&H use UPS for shipping items around the world, and the lens was delivered to my door approximately 2.5 working days after the order was placed!

Note that because the lens was worth less than AUD$1000, I didn't have to pay any GST or customs duty when the lens arrived in Australia (there's no import duty on photographic gear).