Option 1: In the left side Canon R5II with EF 100-400 lens attached, 14-35 f/4 RF lens, set of magnetic filters. On the right side we have the Sigma 500 f/5.6, Sony A7R5 with 35-150 f/2-2.8 lens, DJI Osmo Pocket 3, Canon 1.4x EF teleconverter.
We are not long term planners, usually deciding on trips a few weeks ahead and then just doing our own thing without a major schedule or others to rely on. This year we decided to finally do an African safari, basically a trip of a lifetime for us, but we are doing so with 3 other couples. This is a photography trip and we are all nature photographers so at least we will have the same priorities for the most part. We started planning this trip more than 8 months ago so for once I have plenty of time to consider what I need/want to bring with me from a gear perspective. I normally carry a long telephoto zoom and a big white telephoto prime for much of my photography closer to home but I don’t think this is going to be the best gear for this trip. Taking that gear on a number of planes would also be challenging so I have really had to think about what we are going to be shooting, the distances from the subject, how much gear and how heavy my bag will be.
I’ve watched a number of different youtube shows from other photographers on different safaris to try to get some idea of what will be most useful that can all fit in one backpack. The general consensus seems to be that unless the trip is mostly birding you will not really need a super long lens. 400mm is likely as long as will be needed most of the time and with some of the bigger animals you may be close enough to need a normal or wide lens. I always like to do some landscape work while traveling so most likely an ultrawide zoom will be good to have. To keep things light and still have a good assortment of focal lengths zooms will be most practical.
Based on all of that, I think I have determined that the types of photography I will be doing will be closer to the bear photography that I do in the fall where we have larger subjects often at medium to fairly close distances and in low light. To this end I have put together a set of kit that I think I will take on the trip and have been using that most of the time during salmon season this year.
The gear includes the following:
Canon R5II
Canon 100-400 EF f/4-5.6 L
Canon EF 1.4x teleconverter
Canon RF 14-35 f/4 L
Sony A7R5
Tamron 35-150 f/2-2.8
Sigma 500 f/5.6
I will also be bringing along the DJI Pocket 3 and the Sony ZV1 for capturing video as we are shooting. I have also now a new MacBook Air m4 plus a number of external SSD drives for backing up pictures and videos each night.
Accessories going in one of the bags are the Macbook air, 2 small cases of memory cards, extra batteries for all cameras, card readers for CF Express type A and B as well as for SD cards, external SSDs for quick backup of files each night and the trusty Sony ZV1 for quick videos.
To hold everything I have 2 options, a PGYTech Onemo 2 35L camera bag shown above or the Gura Gear Kiboko 16L below. The PGYTech fits everything above fairly easily but with the Gura Gear I would need to leave the 500 Sigma at home. That bag would not have worked at all originally since it can’t fit a large laptop but now with the macbook air I can take either easily. I haven’t made the decision yet but am leaning towards the smaller bag at the moment.
For Option 2 in the Gura Gear bag which is significantly smaller I have the Canon R5II with the EF 100-400 lens and the Canon EF 1.4 teleconverter.
Side 2. I have the Sony A7R5 with the 35-150, Osmo Pocket 3, and the Canon 14-35 f/4. This bag has plenty of storage for all the accessories and a small area that will fit the Macbook air.
During Salmon season this year I have mostly carried the Canon R5II with the 100-400 lens and the Sony A7r5 with the Tamron 35-150 lens and have found this to cover fairly well what I am shooting. Most of the time for these medium sized mammals at distances of between 10-40 metres these lenses have worked out well. I’m hoping most of the time the shooting will be similar from the safari vehicles based on what I have heard from other photographers.
If money were no object, I would absolutely prefer to have a low light beast like the Canon 100-300 f/2.8 along with a couple of teleconverters which would allow for a great range plus good low light performance but that lens is significantly out of budget and I’m hoping Sigma will come out with a new version of their 120-300 at some point for FE mount at a much more reasonable price point.
The 35-150 has turned out to be a very versatile lens for both photography and video. I think that this lens may stay on the Sony camera for much of the trip especially for many of the large animals that we will come across and for more environmental shots with the animals.
The 100-400 range will likely be sufficient for most of the other nature photography and I’m expecting that we will have pretty good light much of the trip. The 1.4 teleconverter is for just in case we see some birds that I can’t pass up the chance of capturing.
If I have the 14-35mm lens on the Canon for some landscape or wide environmental shots then I might switch to the 500mm on the Sony to ensure that I have a long telephoto ready for big cat action. The Sigma 500 is such a light and small super telephoto prime that it may be worth bringing even if I don’t use it most of the time. Salwa will have a 16-35 in her bag if I do need a quick wide angle shot on the A7RV and the Canon is busy.
he main reason for the wide range of the lenses on a trip like this is because most of the time we will be in a safari vehicle and will be unable to get out to change perspective so we will absolutely have to do so with the zoom lenses.
Salwa similarly will be bringing a set of lenses that cover the gamut from 16mm to 560mm with a 16-35 f/4, 24-105 f/4, 100-400 f/4-5.6 and a 1.4 teleconverter all on her Sony A74. It is likely she will be doing a lot more video than I will and she is very comfortable with this lens setup that she takes on most of her video shoots.
The other little things we will be bringing:
Many memory cards for all the cameras.
SSDs for backup
Insta360 X5
Filters (ND and polarizers)
DJI wireless microphone
On camera microphone
Otherwise we will have minimal clothing, a bit of medicine incase of any trip related issues and not much more. Can’t wait to get out there, planning a trip this far ahead is very difficult for us to not get too excited too early. Hopefully I haven’t over examined this with all the time I have had…sometimes overthinking is bad :)
I will revisit my decisions once we come back from the trip to see if we ended up having what we needed or if we should have brought other gear. So far things are working well enough for shooting black bears on the rivers edge and elk out in the fields.