Happiness and Heather: Why a Good Camera Bag is Important

So as many of you know, I finally took the plunge and bought what I call "A Big Girl Camera". It's got fancy knobs and comes complete with graphs and buttons that I have no idea what they are used for (I'm working on that, I promise). When I first bought this camera, I decided not to invest in a good camera bag. I did the trendy thing and bought a big cross body purse and a really sturdy camera case to put into it. "Great idea!" Or so I thought.

My Trendy Purse that bulging from my camera case

The structure of this purse is great. So far I have taken it to eight different countries and it hasn't taken on much damage at all. However, my body has taken some damage. I chose a bag based only on it's carrying capacity and I didn't think about the size of the strap. Compared to the size of my bag, my strap is relatively skinny. This means that it digs into my shoulder when I use it as a camera bag. So, I have decided I need a real camera bag. I need something that is inexpensive but durable. I found a couple of things before for my birthday wish-list that I wanted for my camera, but at the time, I wasn't sure if I was going to commit to the camera completely yet. After a lot of soul searching and online shopping, I finally decided that I will keep photography in my life and I'm going to buy a good structured bag. Introducing the Siena by JoTotes.

The Siena is a great bag. It comes with a shoulder pad that has been wonderful for my back. It also perfectly holds my wallet, sunglasses, lipstick, and of course, my camera. I can't really bring my spare lens though, but it isn't always needed. It can't hold my little travel tri-pod either. However, for my last couple of trips, its been perfect. JoTotes has some amazing looking bags that are soundly built and are great too look at too. I've also read that these backpacks by PacSafe and CaseLogic are pretty great too. What do you think readers? Should I have gone with the backpack instead?