There are two types of professional photographers in the world.

Those who take their camera on holiday with them, and those who don’t.

I fall firmly in the first category.

That’s not to say that I don’t get bored with the daily slog of taking pictures that others want me to take, but rather than seeing a holiday as an opportunity to get away from my camera, I see it as a chance to get back to basics and shoot the things I love.

No surprise, then, that my camera was the first thing I packed when I planned a trip to Sri Lanka. In went the tripod, the 35mm film body, an array of lenses, and the filters I still carry out of habit.

And as I stated in a previous blog entry, I was really planning on keeping my camera in the plane with me, relegating the wife to the hold, but the airline staff wanted to hear none of this idea, and parted me from my camera.

Woe be me.

The F90x, which has never been know as Nikon’s most reliable body, did not like the turbulence, and though it appeared to be in one piece, suffered internal damage, leaving me without an SLR.

Fortunately the wife has forgiven me for threatening to put her in the hold, and agreed to let me use her Fuji Compact camera (which I feel is only fair, as I was the one who bought it for her).

Anyway, to cut a long story short, all the pictures on my trip was taken with this piece of kit, and though it is a capable little camera, the lack of manual functions left me feeling rather restrictive.

But because I could not take all the pictures I want in exactly the way I want, I was forced to think about my images more. It made me plan, and it made me visualize. And to be honest, the entire experience was extremely liberating.