The Airport Commuter is my second camera bag from Thinktank. While there are many styles of camera bags, including backpacks, Thinktank is particularly adept at identifying the needs of urban (and suburban) photographers, at home or on the road. The design and workmanship is of the highest order heavy fabric, self-healing, water-resistant zippers and efficient use of space. Camera backpacks are usually designed for active sports like hiking and climbing, with weight concentrated low, shape-molding construction and a complicated harnesses. Thinktank caters to travelers, with a rectangular design, a well-defined shape, stiff outer construction and three handles. It fits in an overhead compartment. The harness is fairly simple, but effective. Best of all, the harness can be tucked out of the way until you need it. You can carry it by one strap for convenience, or two for serious schlepping. In either case, the weight is borne by your hips, not shoulder, and it stays put better than any shoulder bag. This configuration is perfect for use in public transportation. In practice, all your gear is in one layer, not stacked up as in a shoulder bag. If you are uncomfortable with a shoulder bag exceeding 15 pounds, you can carry 35 pounds in a backpack. That's easily reached with a pro DSLR, three or four big lenses and accessories. I bought the Airport Commuter for an Hasselblad kit with 8 lenses (no zooms).
There's room for a 15" laptop, but I find it better to carry a slim computer bag, with accessories, as my "personal" carry-on. I've never yet needed a laptop in the field, and extra memory cards are a lot lighter than a computer.
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I was looking for a new back pack to carry my camera equipment for a recent trip to London, UK. I did a bunch of research and found the Think Tank series to be reviewed favorably. I wanted something that I could carry my camera equipment on the plane. I eventually chose the Commuter size and I carried two mid size DSLR's, 70-200 f2.8, 10-22mm, 17-55 f2.8, 600EX flash, iPad, various batteries, flash cards, chargers, card readers, etc. very comfortably. The back pack adjusted very comfortably to my back and aside from the weight of the equipment it carried very comfortably. It is very well built and should last me for the rest of my life. However, it is not something you would want to carry on a day long trek with that much weight unless you are in really good shape. It was the perfect choice for me to carry the amount of equipment I wanted to take to London. I think my next purchase will be the Essentials which is the next smaller size. For me, this would be more practical from a weight perspective and I could carry all day with a little less equipment. I can't imagine there is a better designed, more well buil back pack out there made for photography equipment for traveling on airlines.
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While I like the amount of storage for this back pack, I can't imagine carrying all this weight around an airport. I ended up returning it and getting the Think Tank Shape Shifter instead. It's an ok compromise. With this much capacity, it's probably best to opt for a roller board bag instead.
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