Editors Note: This show is not a paid advertisement. I have received no compensation from any third party company involved, and everything I say in the show is my own opinion. 

I am so excited to welcome the founder of Lensrentals.com, Roger Cicala, and the co-owner Drew Cicala to Behind the Shot. The idea for an episode about rental gear was suggested a while back, and in all honesty I had conflicting thoughts about. I knew there was a great show in the concept, but I also wanted to be sure the resulting show would be something that would inform my audience, rather than be an ad for a rental company. Figuring out how to approach the topic in an educational way took a few detours, and then one day I tweeted a question…

Behind the Shot listeners / viewers:

Would you have any interest in a special episode where I have someone from a lens rental company on to talk about everything lenses: lens choice, brand differences, rental benefits, different look / feel of lenses etc?

The overwhelming response was “yes”, although there was one person that said no – at least the internet is predictable. One reply was from Philip Robertson, of Lensrentals.com, asking me to DM him. When Philip mentioned that Lensrentals founder Roger Cicala was open to coming on the show I jumped at the chance.

I am a fan of Roger Cicala. If you don’t know of Roger you might be wondering why on earth would someone be a fan of a lens and gear rental company founder. Let me explain, Roger tears gear apart in the most entertaining way possible, and he writes about…like it’s a diary. I have laughed out loud reading a blog post from Roger. Don Komarechka and I even discussed the post “Taking Apart the Canon RF 600mm f/11 IS STM” on an episode of Photo Geek Weekly. Roger brings not only his experience to the table, but a very fun attitude.

Roger’s background surprised me. He spent more than thirty years as a board certified anesthesiologist, and ran the only level-one trauma center in the Memphis, Tennessee region. His scientific background, coupled with a strong interest in photography, led Roger down a path I don’t think even he could have predicted. When the economy took a downturn, and camera equipment prices rose, an opportunity for rental equipment presented itself. That opportunity became Lensrentals in 2006.

Roger committed himself fully to the Lensrentals business, conducting equipment repairs, writing equipment reviews and investing in optical test benches to measure variance of the hundreds of thousands of individual pieces of equipment in the company’s inventory. His scientific research and understanding of optics has lead to industry recognition with articles published by the Optical Society (OSA).

In his spare time Roger enjoys shooting collimated light through 30x microscope objectives – when I first saw that I wanted to call Don Komarechka to geek out together. When shooting real pictures, Roger opts for “something different: medium format, Pentax K1 or Sony RX1R.”

Drew Cicala studied Law at University of Michigan, graduating in 2010, and he now overseas the day-to-day operations of Lensrentals, in addition to managing mergers and acquisitions, and the marketing and software development teams. Since Roger handed over day-to-day operations, the company has prospered under the current ownership team of Drew Cicala and Tyler Beckman. Lensrentals experienced approximately 400% growth in 9 years, to become the largest online provider of photo and video equipment for rental in the U.S. Drew has been responsible for successfully launching the industry leading programs Lensrentals HD, Keeper, and Lenscap+ to serve the needs of their customers. Started as a single location with 25 employees, Lensrentals has now expanded to three locations and a head count of 175 employees.

Please join Lensrentals Founder Roger Cicala, co-owner Drew Cicala, and me as we chat about all things gear rental. We’ll discuss the process, benefits, misconceptions, use cases for renting gear and more. We even take a look at some of the strange things they have found inside returned lenses, on this episode of Behind the Shot.

Website: lensrentals.com

Taking Apart the Canon RF 600mm f/11 IS STM: lensrentals.com/blog

Leonard Nimoy: rmichelson.com

Ernest Withers: thewitherscollection.com