Hi Linda you vaguely mentioned you are going to South Africa and no mention of the nature of your transport, private vehicle or with a touring/safari company? I live in South Africa, west of Johannesburg and do travel a lot in my country and to Botswana and Namibia. Currently planning a month trip to Botswana and then towards
Namibia for three months. I travel mainly solo or sometimes my wife joins me - only if I promise not to go on 4x4 tracks! Therefore I use my three Pentax bodies with various lenses attached among a Sigma 150-500mm which I rarely use other than in the National Parks but always close to me, most of the time I use my 400mm lens. Yes, it is a long lens and can be heavy! I do use a tripod at dusk or trying shooting some stars or sometimes in low light situations. Dust, dust and dust is your biggest enemy and as mentioned a pillow case is wonderful to use as well as a bean bag for steady shots from a vehicle. Do not forget a Circular Polarizer Filter which is wonderful to use in Africas harsh light - winter or summer!

E.L. thank you for feedback and you mentioned something that I never thought about! Mount the plexiglass with the glass neg against a window facing the sun and try copy the neg! You will not believe it but during my days as a Military photographer (just out of school) I had to copy a neg (B&W) urgently and thought to use the enlarger but it was impossible - for many reasons. Used some carton, made a hole the size for 35mm stuck it to a window, placed the neg in the hole and took a photo with a short zoom (Nikon F1 camera) with sun behind, developed and made a 5x7 print. It was not the greatest but it served its purpose, after all it was during bush war period. Will do some various experiments before trying making a light box. Will publish the image here once done!

Thank you E.L. for your advise building a small lightbox. Yes in days gone by I had a small lightbox, the "glass" was clear perplex and on the one side I sanded it with water sandpaper. Use a rather longish filament globe which tend to become very hot but it was my b&w preview box and worked well till it tumbled down from my desk and the globe shattered! The globe no longer manufactured and I moved to digital and the box found the dustbin. A few days ago 12 glass negatives found their way from a friend that wanted a positive of them. No problem I said I can scan it as I did a lot of negative and slide scanning on my Epson Perfection 2400 flatbed. Left the negs on the desk, will do it some time until I read this post. O BOY although the glass are 4x3 in size I can not scan it (directly)
Reading your comment I decided to build a small lightbox and started to search on the Internet for Plexiglass, found some suppliers near me (I'm in South Africa) but wow, its EXPENSIVE, have to buy a whole sheet!!! This morning I had to visit my son close by and asked him if he does not have a small piece of Plexiglass as his wife is an fantastic art designer. Yes, he had a piece, 5mm thick! He cut me a piece of 200x200mm. Making a box is not a problem but the light source might be. Was thinking to use LED strip light (12volt) and found a shop that sells 1meter 6500k strips. My question: will the strip light be bright enough (luminance) for me to capture it with my DSLR 100mm closeup lens (Pentax K3ii)? But tonight there were more entries to this discussion and PlymouthWoodworker mentioned that he very successfully used his Epson 2400 to capture big glass negatives in stages!! Going to give it a try before building that lightbox but it might just be a good investment as the lightbox can also be used as a small sourch of light for closeup photography. Feed back would be appreciated, thanks.

I used to tell my safari clients that photography in the bush is not always easy and you not always have the time to be creative. Once you do see a lion in the veld, take a photo which I call "We did see a lion" aka snapshot! Then once the vehicle is better position and the lion is still there then you become creative, including composition, lighting, f-stop, ISO. You are going to give a lecture to junior high school kids, many of them might not have the "correct" lens or camera or are using cellular so its a to help them understand when you take your time to take a photo (composition and the rest) than just take a photo aka snapshot, image or picture.

Rick where did you get the info that it was filmed in the Kruger NP (South Africa) This is a very bad video and I believe it is not the Kruger!! The vehicle has no number plates as well! And yes I also seen this video before and it is disgusting!!

There is a difference in weatherproofing and waterproof! I use Pentax K3 and Pentax lenses and believe me they are weatherproof only in a very soft rain or mist or dust without wind involved! Visited Victoria Falls a few times and I used as mentioned above zip bags and rubberbands/elastic. Cut a hole on the bottom of the bag, big enouth for a tight fit around the lens and shoot. Tried the umbrella but no go for Fic Falls as it is raining from ALL directions, from the bottom, top and sides. There are occasional "breaks" in the showers then I use a chamois cloth (leather one) also known as shammy to quickly remove the water drops on the clear filter to quickly take a photo. I use the same clear plastic bags when I visit Botswana and Namibia for extreme dust situations.

It may all depend on the subject! It was mentioned the shoot was from a holiday. I depends on the nature of the holiday and the duration of it. I am also retired and work mainly at night on my photography (when we have power in South Africa!) Returned from a three week holiday in Namibia (camping and did 5460 km) and visited many interesting places using 2 camera bodies all the time and I did not want to change lenses in dusty conditions.
Three weeks after returning the first photo album was compiled for fellow touring member as I used cellular and DSLR footage to compile the book. I was the only "pro" in the group of four and also used my cellular occasionally. Then my wife asked to enlarge certain images that she really liked (me too) therefore my album increased to 128 pages. Now she has a book she can show her and my friends about our experiences and only rely on social media! That book took 3 months! During 2019 I did a solo visit of 1 month in Namibia and those images are not all processed as yet. I shoot in Raw and Jpeg and while processing the raw files I do research on the subject, if it's a plant or flower in the Namib I like to get the name of it and add it to the file info, then the raw is saved by replacing the original Jpeg file, Yes, there are hundreds of images and those that I don't like are deleted but still hundreds left! That project is still not completed and in a few months time I will be visiting Kaokoland, northwest Namibia again and this time for 3 months. I do not do any processing of my images while traveling only transfer it from the camera via my laptop to two portable drives, So at the end of the day it is my hobby and it keeps me busy back home when I don't have to look after the grand children or gardening or fixing things around the house! If it was an assignment, yes then you concentrate to complete the job but its my hobby and my time and I love it to bits!

I was in the same boat, using PS and not Lightroom. Was running Win7 Pro and when I upgraded to Win10 I had the world of problems! My desktop was old, yes, top of the range Win7 but I had to get a new motherboard and new chip, for the C drive I went SSD. Basic a new machine excluding the power source and other disk drives. Still using my laptops for field work, one is WinXP because I have to use the firewire port on it for sound recording, and a smaller laptop with Win7Pro to down load my images from my camera in the field. As a pensioner, money is tight and our currency is not great against the US$ (US$ more or less 4x our currency) Old timers got it tough!

Forgetting that in the digital age I can shoot at higher ISO what I used to in film! During film days mainly B&W press I never shot higher than 400 ASA/ISO even then I preferred 200ASA as max due to grain! During a trip in Namibia around 2018 I started to work on some of my shots taken in the upper Swakopmund River and noticed that they are not sharp! The info on the shot showed 100ISO/F8/and at a VERY slow shutter speed thus, not lack of sharpness but rather major shake!!

I believe that trail cameras are only for research and maybe for art photography, same goes for drones. If those photographs like it did happened were entered to a competition it must then be under Trail Camera and Drone section and not under general photography! I might be old fashioned but still believes that a human eye that must be behind a camera to capture a image including if the camera is on a tripod, a human must be behind the camera!

Jerry first don't visit Namibia during December and January, big school holiday period! Etosha must be on the list for wildlife especially during the Southern Africa's winter months. Spectacular huge dunes at Sossusvlei but spend the whole day there it's also a photographers haven! Also Fish River Canyon on your way to Luderitz and visit the ghost town of Kolmanskop. There are so many great places to visit like Messum Crater, Cape Cross, Brandberg and Twyfelfontein with it's hundreds of rock engravings. Then don't forget Kaokoland and the Ovahimbas!

The best time in general is the winter months and you need lots of time as many great destinations are far apart. Dust is in general a problem for photographers so be prepare, big plastic zip bags work great. Polaroid filter is a must for the harsh sunlight!

This June/July I am take 6 guests on a three week camping trip to the southern part of Namibia with a few 2 night stops for photo opportunities but driving is going to be hectic! The good thing is that most of the Namib received plenty of rain and the landscape is just going to be fantastic!

Planning for a photographers trip to Kaokoland and Damaraland later this year as well as for 2023, its a rough camping trip into the real remote parts of Namibia.

If you want more advise for your trip, don't hesitate contacting me. Email: sdelange(at)mweb(dot)co(dot)za

Sorry to learn that the shoot was cancelled, could have been an interesting project! It reminded me about a request I had to photograph a dressmaker/ballet tutu designer’s work years ago. She wanted me to photograph 6 tutus in various colours dressed on a mannequin for her internet portfolio. I said my fee is per 4 hrs as it is my free time (I’m not a pro photographer but did many weddings, never really made money either as I was to “cheap”!) She agreed that it might take longer to shoot as she does not want to rush it. It took a full day.

I had some homemade quartz lights on home dimmer switches on stands and three wide and high neutral background cloth as the shoot was in her living room. On arrival I noticed that the mannequin had some serious marks on it and ask her to clean it but without success. She said that she could spray paint it with a water based skin colour paint and it will dry quickly. It did as I used the four lights full blast onto the mannequin!

First I thought that I only have to take one image of every tutu but those tutus are fantastic, the work is just phenomenal and did about six to eight shots per tutu all under constant and same positioned light. Post production took fairly long time and only charge her for a full day. I did everything on a Saturday and Sunday including nights because it was important for me as well to deliver a good product.

The following Monday I had prints made of all the tutus, only frontal shots on 5x7 gloss and that afternoon gave her those as a gift and all the edited digital files in high resolution but prepared for internet size (a few years back it was rather small compared to today!)

She was extremely happy with the end results. We never discussed any form of copyright as I thought she asked me to photograph her work but I did say that I keep the original files as they are my work and if she wanted more copies or whatever she will have to pay me to do it for her. That never materialized as she had the edited digital files! Year or two later she asked me to do another shoot of tutus and she paid me more or less the same fee. At that stage she was a single mother of two girls and her basic income was from making and designing ballet costumes and somehow I felt that I helped her to generate an income. Did asked to give credit to the photographer which she did but never got any referral to do work for someone else.

My preparation for the shoot I did not consult the internet but paged through several magazines, did it helped me, not really as all dresses where shot with a lovely ladies in them! All I knew was to keep a clean and natural background with consistent lighting, I did not had any fancy strobes and reflecting umbrellas only my first digital camera with a kit lens; Pentax K10!

After reading all the comments I visited the Etsy site, just to get an idea of photos and yes, there are some grand shoots with models and there are some done with mannequins and some mannequin shoots were very good. Why? The photographer paid attention to all the detail especially to the background, I mean, do you really want a wall lighting switch in the background, or unfinished skirting at floor level? On average there were about five shots per dress. Tom Kitoko said that he had to shoot 70 dresses that would have been about 350 shots in total! My 6 tutus turned out to be about 36 photos in total which took a full day to capture.

At the end of the day I enjoyed the shoot and learnt something new.

I’ve been in the Television industry for 40 odd years (PAL) where I’ve used various video cameras BIG and fairly heavy ones and concentrated on video editing, started with non-linear 2inch tape. I’ve experienced the evolution in Tv Broadcasting and retired fairly deep into the digital environment, video editing wise.

Before retiring I always had a problem with low cost productions because of progressive video format coming from non “broadcasting” camera equipment also some audio problems. I’ve discovered that many small productions were using Canon SDLR for their shoots also using Gopros. Canon and Gopros use progressive shooting format which is field rate where interlaced uses two fields to make one frame.

When you use the latest editing systems which are computer and software based and computer screens it is really difficult to spot interlaced or progressive problems on a pc screen. I always had a high quality professional Tv screen connected to my editing desk. You will not see any real problems with progressive video on a computer screen as computer screens are native progressive but when you mix the formats on your timeline you can see the difference especially on the television screen!

As PAL or Scam uses interlace video it is highly irritating to see progressive signals mixed with interlaced! You have to convert the progressive video format to interlace format. With this converting you will lose some quality, only for the trained eye thou. The modern platform for video is the internet and YouTube which is progressive and you will not see the “flickering” rate, maybe in super slowmos created by “cheaper” camera recordings.

I do know that Nigeria has properly have the biggest video industry after Bollywood where the guys are using DSLR cameras because they are by far cheaper than broadcast equipment and some production houses use cheap video editing and sound post mixing software. Most of these productions are not for the television broadcasting but for the DVD market and they are coining it!

I have to amid that I was never keen on using a DSLR for video capture because of its progressive recording format and a lack of professional audio recording.

Our pay tv station got the contract to cover the first Miss World event in South Africa and I was send to Sony’s head office in Basingstoke in the UK to learn the latest linear video editing system to be able to edit this special production and various inserts. It was a fantastic setup that controlled 8 Betacam video playback machines and one Dat player and recording on two Betacam and Dat machines! The controller and desk look like the interior of an aircraft’s cockpit! Impressive and powerful for an analog system. You can not compare it to today’s non-linear computer systems, somehow it’s easier to edit today than many moons ago but you have so many additional “things” you can do to the video on your timeline also when you only have to worry about one format: progressive.

The Television world has been invaded by consumer recording devices among the photography world. Most DSLR cameras are capable to record video and some does it very well, it all depends on the eye behind the camera! The only thing that is really lacking is proper audio recording but that is also catching up were the guys are investing in proper microphones and/or external audio recording devices. Many DSLR cameras does not have any audio recording settings!

My other problem with DSLR as a video recording device is the lack of weight! They are so light and fit into you hand but difficult to hold steady and forget the stabilizers in lenses or bodies because when you can not keep the camera still nothing is going to stabilize the image! It is so much easier to put your camcorder on your shoulder supported by your right arm (if you right handed) and your right hand easily on the zoom bottom and your left hand to do manual focusing. You used a mic on the camera for camera sound and a XLR cable external mic if needed. Yes that camera was heavy especially when you were shooting sport events and have to change tapes every 30 minutes! In a documentary or studio situations you hardly ever shot long continued scenes, only short durations like 3 to 5 minutes and make the work for the video editor difficult!


Time has brought major changes especially to the world video recording devices. Every Tom, Dick and Harry started to become video producers, camera operators and editors. One Man Show! The audience is the internet and very hungry for material and basically any video recording device will do the job! As long as you know how to do the filming (recording), how to do good sound recording and how to put everything together in post-production, who cares if it was filmed on a cellular or DSLR as long as the end product is of high standard for you to receive thousands of “likes” that might turn into some dollars!

I’m months away from a three months epic solo journey to the Namib Desert. My dream is to capture it on stills, but the more people, friends and family learn about this journey the more they pressurize me to capture it on video as well! That is very difficult, so many angles you have to use which is time consuming then you also want to concentrate on photography! I’m not going to mount my beloved DSLR on the bonnet while driving over rocks, deep sand or water, not going to mount it on a 10 meter stick and stick it out of the window to act like a drone or hand held it inside the vehicle while driving for a “selfie” image! I only have a DSLR and a cellular, no GoPro or drone and not sure if I have the budget for a GoPro either, don’t like drones either! The video editing software I do have, portable digital sound recording I do have but if you really want to make a proper documentary, you do need some dedicated equipment.

To go back to “burkphoto” “…why Mirrorless Cameras are so popular for recording video, OVER a traditional, dedicated video camera.” Yes the digital image recording consumer devices has really become very special and in many aspects they are way cheaper than the professional broadcasting equipment. It also makes it very possible for any person with the right mind set to become content producers and the world via the internet is your audience!

Sorry, I know this is a loooong post but I just had to give my 2C!

I damage my camera eye due to welding a few years ago and still use it for most of the time, no longer can I confirm the focus therefore the beep. I concentrate more on wildlife and nature and most of the times I am alone but when I am sitting at a water hole and there are other photographers, I switch off the beep and shoot with my good eye! When I am very close to elephants and lions in the bush I do switch off the beep and use the good eye, difficult but I do manage. My irritation is at water holes where other photographers with their big lenses (famous know camera) shoot rapid fire, sounds like a canon! It's so loud! I do shoot rapid but some how its way softer than theirs even when I do wear my artificial ears! The beep is handy for me. But on a more public game drive the most annoying sound are cellular beeps! They just go on and on and at slightly low light their flashes!

Bil, three parks, where and for how long in each park? Take your two bodies, one with wide to mid zoom and the other one mid to far zoom. I will add a polarize filter on the short zoom as light in Africa's wilderness is very harsh and to cut out glare! A quick idea to make a cover for your gear while on game drives is a modified pillow case but made from light brown cloth. It does not create static and is light!