Cool gear for summer photography

— -- Summer prompts us to go outdoors, bask in the sun, be with friends and create new memories. By the time fall arrives, we want to be able to relive these carefree moments in stunning detail.

Our friends at Reviewed.com often give you the down low on fancy new cameras, but we wanted to showcase some nifty accessories and software to help you along your photo journey.

Flipside Sport great for shooting outdoors

Photographers who are looking for the ideal hiking bag can stop searching.

The Flipside Sport 10L AW is an ultra-compact and lightweight pack, compartmentalized to hold a variety of photo and outdoor gear, including a full-frame SLR camera with additional lenses, a hydration bladder, travel tripod and hiking pole.

Even when fully packed, the Flipside bag by Lowepro isn't overbearing on the shoulders, sporting breathable and comfortable straps. The main compartment opens from the back, unveiling a divider system that can be removed in its entirety. This smart flexible design essentially doubles the bag's functionality, giving it additional utility as a small daypack.

If you're planning on spending some time in the great outdoors this summer — and you should — this bag is a great fit to meld your hobbies. The Flipside Sport 10L AW retails for $124.99.

Control your SLR remotely with ioShutter

For shooting timelapse videos and night photos, a camera remote is a must. One of the most innovative ones on the market is the ioShutter, a remote trigger controlled by your iPhone.

Out of the box, ioShutter includes a 3-foot-long cord and carrying pouch. With a free app, an iOS device becomes an interval timer that can tell the camera to fire in six modes, most of which can be combined: standard trigger, motion trigger, sound trigger, timelapse, timer and bulb. The pro app offers more advanced functionality to these modes, for example, allowing photographers to set the sound trigger's decibel sensitivity. Instead of fumbling with small buttons that you're not entirely sure are the right ones to press, the app features large buttons with easy-to-follow tutorials.

For now, the major drawback is compatibility. IoShutter works with Canon cameras as well as some Samsung, Hasselblad and Pentax models. Nikon compatibility is expected later in the summer. The ioShutter is available from Photojojo for $70.

Easily create timelapse movies with iStopMotion

Compiling timelapse videos requires sifting through hundreds if not thousands of photos. This is quite a laborious process, made better with Boinx's iStopMotion applications for Apple desktops and iPads.

As the name suggests, the software is designed for animation and stop-motion movies. But it can handle timelapses beautifully as well in two ways. There's an option to capture frames as you're using the application. But if you're looking to shoot on location, dragging a laptop around might be too cumbersome, so the software includes an option to import previously taken photos to quickly process and output videos.

The desktop app for iStopMotion begins at $49, and the iPad version, which has more limited functionality, costs $9.99.

Artistic effects without the sticker shock