Ugh I forgot one question.

8.) Camera bags for the above equipment? Andys Gura gear has been the clear winner on the weight/capacity combo (the price hurts though )but it might come back into supply very close to my trip and hence need some good options! Billingham etc look too 'fancy' and equally pricey. Crumpler New Delhi looks decent size, and I think something from Tamron. Also shoulder bags or backpacks?

Thanks again, you guys rock!

Definitely backpacks over shoulder bags. Carrying heavy bags on the shoulder is just no good for the shoulder, and you absolutely don't want shoulder problems.

I've used various versions of Lowepro backpack bags, including the Mini Trekker and a smaller version of the Mini Trekker. Having grown weary of schlepping heavy camera gear on my back especially on creeping airport lines and during extended hikes from one end of an airport to the other, I recently bought a Lowepro rolling backpack---what a relief!! The bags do an excellent job of protecting the gear and are a lower-priced alternative to some of the bags out there.

P.S. The name of the bag I use is Lowepro Rolling CompuTrekker AW.

Anita

“As usual, look up to you guys for a lot of answers!”
Hey, it’s fun, several of us will spout photography all day long . As long as you don’t demand the –correct- answers!!! So, here’s my 2 pennys!!!

“I am gonna participate in two 4-day worskshops here in HK”
That’s great, the more you are exposed to photo talk and ideas the more you will learn and improve. We need to be comfortable with our equipment so we can think about photography. Good to have two bodies, makes lens swapping a non-issue. And also as a back-up body which I needed when one failed on my last safari. 7D and 5D lenses. The 5D is 35mm and the 7D is APS-C size sensors, yes? I’d be more inclined to put 24-70 on the 5D and the 100-400 on the 7D. And take only those two lenses. Yes, there is a mm gap from about 70mm to 150mm (the 100 end on the 7D becomes 150mm) - without switching bodies. But a little cropping in Photoshop will turn that 70mm into a say a 95mm. Which reminds me, you do use Photoshop or something similar for cropping and color tweaking of you images, yes? If not, you are throwing away at least half of the advantages/capabilities of digital photography.

Monopod, tripod, bean bags. Depends a lot on the type of vehicle. Two basic type vehicles I’ve used - totally open and pop-top van. In Bots I think a totally open, no top, no roof, no sides, vehicle is most used. So for bean bags there is nothing to support them unless it is the door sill which means you will be “standing” on you knees on the floor. So a tri or mono pod is necessary. A tripod demands a large triangular foot print which is not available with seats all around. BUT, if you have a private vehicle, ask them to remove (unbolt) a seat !! Most photographers use a monopod. Pop-top vehicles. But, if the vehicle is pop-top then it has a roof line that works really good with bean bags. Bean bags. You can make your own, base them on a small pillow case, cut away and sew one end closed. Take then empty and fill at destination, beans work, so does rice.

Lens filters. I don’t use them. Have to admit a CP (circular polarizer) does make a difference on some shots. Nor do I use graduated ND filters but agree can be useful for sun rise/sets.

CF memory card speeds. The 60mbps should be fine. How do your cameras work with them? You have 3 8GB cards now? Last safari (14 days long) I shot around 60 GB of stills and video. But my RAW sizes were lot smaller (12G each) than yours. Also I, and the other photographers in our group, downloaded our cards every day onto backup harddrives. Each did it a different way.

Camera bags. Wheels for airports, you know how much walking we do today around airports. Carry-on must have wheels. Re-read sdb2 reply just above. I have a regulation size typical bag carry-on with wheels. In it are two bags, one (simple cheap) with camera bodies and lenses, and one bag with all the support electronic kit. I wheel the carry-on bag around airports. At the safari camp I take for drives only the one camera bag. Works for me. You must carry-on all camera and electronic gear. If checked, way to big chance it will not arrive. I know.

More questions? Sure, takes me away from my Tanzania safari trip report . Which I’m trying to finish, writing is such a chore for me. Much rather play with pictures.

regards - tom

Steve - Thanks a lot! I looked it up and the size definitely meets my requirements. Still unsure of the weight as I will tally upto 8-9 kgs on the equipment itself.

Tom
Thanks a lot for your answers I was hoping the passion for photography here would compensate for the drudgery of answering similar questions all the time!

Yup the 5D and 7D are full frame and APS-C respectively- Thats the combination I wanted as a kit with or without safari plans. I find the 5D as one of the best value for money cameras and where it lacks in continuous shooting it really makes up on clarity and low light situations.

Re memory cards, ofcourse 24GB wont be enough- I plan to buy more but struggling with paying the hefty price of 90mbps ( 5D at 3.9 fps would be barely covered with this, 7D with 8fps might still not be covered within this at the capacity megapixels so probably I can work with lower megapixels for higher focal length- experience here appreciated!

Look forward to more advice and any experiences to share on the above choices I am considering!


Thanks again!

PS : Tom there is one more to the queue of people waiting for your trip report!

tanya-
Photography has been an on-and-off passion of mine for 40 years. It was "off" until the digital world gave me the image editing capabilities that frustrated me with 35 film. Well, that and safari which gives me subject(s) I love.

Anyway, have you -actually tried- the 5D at 3.9fps with a 60mbps card? Works good, yes, no? Here's what dpreview said in their review of 5D -
"The 5D Mark II uses the new Digic IV engine to process images and write files to the CF card. It is a good thing that there is a new processing engine as the file sizes have almost doubled, with RAW files in excess of 20 Mb each. While Canon quoted 3.9 fps as the fastest continuous shooting speed, we were never able to quite get there. The fastest we could achieve was 3.8 using a Sandisk Extreme III CF card (new version with 30 Mb/s speed rating). The Mark II really benefits from the use of a UDMA card."
This at- http://www.dpreview.com/reviews/cano...kii/page14.asp
The site dpreview is great camera site if you'r not familiar with it. You could ask same question of the Canon 5D forum there -
http://forums.dpreview.com/forums/forum.asp?forum=1032

"Tom there is one more to the queue of people waiting for your trip report!"
Hope its worth the wait!! For your eyes only, I already have snaps up on my smugmug site - http://tomgraham.smugmug.com/SAFARI2011TANZANIA
(photos from previous safaris also there, click on "tomgraham")

regards - tom

Hey Tom

I took a cheeky peak at it on a different thread when it wasnt for my eyes! They are awesome and having followed your threads its impressive that you get such good results with minimal accessory aid!

I have to work the 5D with the 60mbps which is this weekend ( at the expense of missing the first 2.5 hrs of the daughter of all cricket matches).

Sorry- I missed answering a couple of other questions- I have worked in detail with Lightroom- comfortable with working with layers, comfortable with most general editing stuff - my biggest problem so far has been underexposing almost always and so this is where I will focus my efforts on!

I do go to dpreview a lot -generally for gear related research but also end up accessing the forums through google search- you are right I should post my questions there too- but its good to hear actual experiences here from safari goers!

tanya
Good, good, good, you are well and truly into it

FWIW, re bean bags, tripods, etc. I'm too lazy too use them . My longest lens is 300mm (450 on the 1.5 crop body). But image sharpness is most critical so use highest shutter I can, typically 1/800 or faster. (The subject can also move). And take more than one shot.

regards - tom

Some comments on things that have worked for me...

I do take plenty of CF cards but also take two PSD (portable storage devices). The ones I use now are Nexto. At the end of each day my husband and I copy each card onto BOTH PSDs before reformatting/ clearing it. This way we have two copies incase one of the PSDs is damaged. Yes we're paranoid but I know I'd be devastated to lose images so it works for us.

Occasionally, on some trips, we take a small netbook, for example on our Falkland Islands trip last year or to Antarctica or Galapagos cruises, in which case CF cards are copied to laptop and just one PSD.

Our PSD models are chosen for speed of data transfer and long battery life so they don't have photo displays, they just copy and store data, that's it.

Thus far we have deliberately not upgraded our (Canon) camera bodies to full frame as we prefer the longer reach our lenses give us on the smaller sensors.

Lens wise, I always take my wider angle walk around, I recently switched this to a Sigma 18-200 which is a good lens. Used to be that such a long range from very wide to telephoto was poor quality but this lens is good across range, decent. Not L glass but good. I use this for camp photographs and people photographs and walking safaris.

I also take my 70-200 f2.8 L (no IS). I went for no IS as this lens is not too big or heavy, which is a major issue for me because of shoulder problems. I adore this lens and use it a lot. I also have a 2x convertor for it so can use it as 140-400 which gives me a lot of flexibility.

My husband has his own wider walkaround lens (forget range but smaller than mine) plus he uses an old 100-300 on occasion and mostly a 400 prime. The quality of the prime is just superb and it suits him well but I simply find myself better suited to zoom lenses.

We do take back up bodies so often have one lens on one body and a longer or shorter lens on the other. Better to switch whole things out in field than change lenses frequently when dusty.

Regarding supports:

In the closed vehicles, the ones common in Tanzania and used also in some camps in Kenya, a tripod and monopod both useless unless on own in a car. Used beanbags extensively here.

For the open vehicles with no sides, found the monopod invaluable for me. Because of the shoulder problems and weak arms generally, I can't hold heavy camera lenses up for more than a moment or two. So I use the monopod but set it to short length and prop it on the seat between my legs. That gives me full motion in all directions, and support for the weight too. I also sometimes use it standing up or place the foot down on vehicle floor. I would not travel without mine and it's not very heavy. I use a decent manfrotto ballhead on it to give full and easy movement.

We use Lowepro backpacks, they work well for us. We've resisted the rollers as that does add weight and we find we're already at top limit and sometimes over, as it is.

I shoot RAW as I prefer the flexibility it gives me on processing, and the expanded dynamic range. It also means that setting white balance is not an issue as it is for JPEG. (One can adjust colour afterwards for JPEGs but adjusting it more than a fraction will degrade the image file). I also find it a lot quicker to process RAW files through Lightroom than I used to find working JPEGs.

Oh and, the way data is stored in image files means there is more data in the brightest stop than in the darkest, someone mathy can describe the curve or algorithm, but I did study it in depth once upon a time.

SO, knowing that, I deliberately shoot to expose to the right of the histogram and can then dial down brightness in processing if too light/ bright, while retaining all the detail. As long as one doesn't actually clip past the edge of the histogram, though even there, by half a stop can be pulled back in if shooting RAW.

If you shoot underexposed and then correct in post processing you are introducing FAR more image noise into your final image, both colour and luminance noise. I did experiments to check this was the case and it certainly is.

Kavey said: <i>I do take plenty of CF cards but also take two PSD (portable storage devices). ... At the end of each day my husband and I copy each card onto BOTH PSDs before reformatting/ clearing it. This way we have two copies in case one of the PSDs is damaged. Yes we're paranoid but I know I'd be devastated to lose images so it works for us.</i>

This is exactly what I do and it has also worked for me. Since I work in the disk drive industry I'm also paranoid about them - I know how amazingly complicated they are!

I happen to use an old Hyperdrive HD-80, (not even sure they still make them) but it's just like Kavey's - no viewing capability, only a fast copy of the day's shooting each night. They run on AAA batteries or an AC power adapter.

http://www.hypershop.com/HyperDrive-HD80-s/2.htm

When we travel my wife carries one and I carry the other so they are never in the same handbag.

@ Kavey : Thanks a lot, those are all very helpful points. Ha! I almost forgot PSDs

I am zeroing on the Lowepro bags and currently waiting to check out the Trekker 300 and 400. There is a much much cheaper make called Aktiva so I will check that out too (An AP 400 is 70 USD and AP 600 is USD 95!). Not sure about the quality though as the lowepro bags are much on the higher side.

BTW - This is a great non mathy link to the mathy part

http://www.luminous-landscape.com/tu...se-right.shtml

@Nelson : I will check out the HD HD Thanks a lot!

re Hyperdrive HD-80, not sure, but don't think it is still being sold. Note also, if it matters to you, the HD 80 can only read max SD (2gig) not SDHC cards. Unless you have an adapter to convert an SDHC card into a CF card. And, its max hardrive size is 128G due to its BIOS. And, the hardrive interface is IDE/PATA (not SATA).

Soooo, I recently (4 months ago) got the Nexto ND-2700, essentially an HD80 upgraded. IMHO, it is rather expensive as usually sold with a hard drive. With 500GB drive $325. I got the bare case from Hong Kong ( http://tinyurl.com/4y25hsp ) and put my own 500GB hard drive in it, total cost $210.

Expose-right is good. Just don't over expose, blow out a lot of the highlights/whites. I prefer to err on the underexposed side. What part of the image ends up in the shadows/dark is hardly ever as important as what is on the other/lightest end. Unless it is gorillas in the rain .
regards - tom

Tom, absolutely, I expose to the right, but as per above, I make sure not to clip the right of the histogram, or if so, no more than a quarter to half a stop...

A bit of chimping the histogram for just a moment after shots in changed light helps to ensure that I don't blow the highlights out. (I have mine set to show small thumb, mini histogram and the basics such as fstop, speed and so on...

Tanya, that Luminous Landscape link is exactly it, yes!

I read up a lot on RAW files and how to get the best out of them, partly because of my own interest as a new digital photographer, partly because I am an IT Trainer and was getting some demand for Photoshop/ Adobe Camera Raw training and partly because I'm slightly geeky by nature!

Tom, are you monkeying about the gorillas?? I thought that's a classic case of minus EC so that our ancestors dont look all grey/slatish ( a different reason than the normal 'expose right' which is to ensure that the brightest zone is used, maximising tonal values captured at minimum noise )

@Kavey : seems I am restarting that cycle for myself now Its quite addictive ( if a bit geeky )

I'll try and remember the book that really helped me, when I get home. It'll be outdated now in terms of which software/ version as it was some years back, and author now passes away, very sad loss to the industry... my brain has gone blank on name. But great on the understanding of raw, though you can find/ collate the same date online mostly anyway...

Here is another nice article about shooting to the right. Due to many years of shooting slide film I'm strongly conditioned to shoot to the left, but even an old dog can learn new tricks.

http://www.pixelatedimage.com/blog/2...-and-metering/

That said there is no question that large areas of blown highlights are worse than black shadows.

duChemin's books are good, IMHO.

Nelson mentioning slide film reminds me. The standard 3to2 DSLR image aspect ratio is not optimal for a lot of subjects. And many times I find my as shot subject position in frame could be better. So I try to pull back a bit from a tight composition in the camera to allow later cropping. Something next to impossible with slides and makes this digital stuff so much more fun.

Hmm, gorillas, haven't tried those. I wonder, if you exposed to right, image would look greyish, like tanya says. If you expose for proper gorilla grey/black then image would be left and thus have less than optimal bit depth, Signal-to-Noise ratio. So this argues to still expose to the right for best S/N. But the image will "monitor" bright, to light, greyish. But you then take the brightness down to proper/real gorilla grey/black in post processing?

regards - tom

"That said there is no question that large areas of blown highlights are worse than black shadows."

Completely agree! The trick is to expose to the right without going too far to the right!