Safari Photography Tips
After taking this tour, I have a few photography tips to pass on. This is primarily aimed at DSLR shooters with some experience.
On the game drives I primarily used a 100-400mm Tamron lens on my Nikon D7200 (APS sensor). This is equivalent to a 150-600mm range on a camera with a full frame sensor. This worked very well for me. The long end of the range was helpful on those occaisions where we couldn't get close to the animals. However, most of the time I was using shorter focal lengths. An argument could be made to bring a 70-200mm f2.8 instead. The game drives take place in the early morning and late afternoon when lighting is often low, so the faster lens could be an advantage. However, I was happy with my choice and was glad to have the longer focal lengths for some shots. I also carried with me a good point and shoot camera for when the shot was too wide for my DSLR. I only used it a few times on the drives. Some people might be tempted to buy an all-in-one lens like the Tamron 18-400mm. These lenses have the advantage that you get the full range without having to change lenses, but the image quality, especially at long focal lengths is not as good. It depends on how picky you are. I have an 18-250mm all-in-one that I use for traveling light, but I think that pushing the length to 300mm or 400mm on an all-in-one seems to be a step too far. Changing lenses in the vehicles is probably not a good idea.
As I said previously, the light is often low and since you are using a long lens you will want to push the shutter speed up to avoid blur from camera shake. As a result, I found myself frequently pushing my ISO up to 800 or higher. Before you go, I would do some practice shots at twilight time to get a feel for your camera at the longest focal length in these conditions. Also do some depth of field tests.
There is some good photography advices on the Sabi Sabi website here:
sabisabi.com/photography/a-guide-to-photography-at-sabi-sabi/
Comments
September 2023 trip, Canon 80D 70 - 300 lens certainly do not need more focal length than that, in fact less would be OK. Wildlife is so close. Enjoy...
https://youtu.be/pDlBahhtgfY South Africa an Elegant Adventure and it was !
I basically agree with Ken From Vegas. I used an APS-C camera (Fujifilm X-H2) with the Tamron 18-300mm, f3.5-6.3 lens in Africa. The camera automatically adjust ISO for the light and I didn't have any places where I felt the shutter speed was too low. Most of the time I was shooting animals which were not moving.
The Fuji has the ability to do a 1.4X or 2X digital zoom. The 1.4X is quite good. The 2X starts to lose quality.
The crop factor for APS-C is 1.5 so my Tamron is equivalent to a 27-450mm lens on a 35mm camera. With the 1.4X digital zoom, it's equivalent to about a 38-630mm lens. And at 2X, it's about 54-900mm.
The Tamron lens was excellent - sharp and even across the field.
For wider shots, I used my iPhone 13 Pro. I thought about getting a super wide angle lens for the Fuji but that would mean I'd have to carry it and change lenses. It's easier to grab my iPhone. The iPhone images are not wonderful but they're not terrible, either.
You can see some of my animal pictures at https://www.mikeandjudytravel.com/2023-1RiversAndRails-02.htm, about half way down the page, and at https://www.mikeandjudytravel.com/2023-1RiversAndRails-03.htm and https://www.mikeandjudytravel.com/2023-1RiversAndRails-04.htm
I've gone through a lot of cameras. I originally wanted a small camera for travel, but that meant a smaller sensor, and that meant noise in the images. I gradually worked up to APS-C and I've been satisfied with that sensor size. Full frame camera lenses are too big and heavy if you want a really long lens. There's no question that full frame gives you a better picture, but I'm satisfied with what I get with APS-C. It's a tradeoff.
My first APS-C was a Nikon D7500 with a mirror and I didn't like the noise it made when taking a picture. The Fuji is mirrorless.
A couple of people on my tour used SLRs, however the majority used their cell phones. You get close enough to the animals and the cell phone cameras take really good pictures