Yep the second one is better! The rotors look just right and it is in clear ar.
Hopefully the person they came to airlift out is doing OK?

Ray could you reduce the size of the photo so it will fit on the screen - I can't appreciate it properly when I have to keep scrolloning to see bits of it.
Thanks.

I knew Wim would come through! Making notes myself because I still hope to get back there one day.

I took the kit lens too, but I never used it. It was my intention to use it for landscapes and maybe the masses of gnus, but in the end I just stuck to the Tamron, and managed just fine with that. It was a bit short for only two animals in Tanzania - the leopard and the rhino - but we just weren't lucky with the rhino - others saw them from pretty close - we only saw them through binoculars at over 1km away! Even the Bigma wouldn't have helped much with that.
Do take good binocs with you. I know they add weight but they really are essential.
Ishpuini, who occasionally visits this forum, has been to Zambia I believe. You could try PMing him for advice on conditions there. He is off to Namibia in September lucky thing!

Having been on safari - Tanzania - I would take just one zoom - such as the 55-300. The animals are not all so far away that you need the 300 all the time, really some are so close that the 55 may be too long! However you don't want to be changing lenses, from a dust point of view but also because you may miss that special shot that way!
I used my trusty old Tamron 28-300 and was very happy with it. If I went again and had a weight limit (which luckily we didn't) I would take the same lens again. If there was no wieght limit then the Bigma would be the lens of choice - if only to get a decent photo of a leopard.

I assume the weight limit is because you are flying on small planes to get to your camps? In which case the weight limit is there for a reason, and you don't want to go too far over it. It was the same in TZ but we were on a drive in safari, not a fly in one. Not something you can do in every country. Carrying things in pockets is not really an option in African heat.

The 60-250* may be a bit short, but if the SDM teleconverter comes out between now and next June that may well be the best you could get.

And if all else fails maybe some kind soul on this forum who lives in the UK can get one for you?

Well you're getting there Ted - you are spotting interesting things - I like this and would have tried it myself. Not a lot you can do about the grass really. A bit tighter in would have helped maybe, but as you say the chips around the log. Maybe you could have got down lower and taken it?

As to duff photos, unless they are truly duff and unsaveable - eg out of focus, severe lens flare, bird flies away, I tend to keep them. I learn a lot by looking back at photos and thinking about what I did wrong and how I should have done it. I am not someone who shoots hundreds of photos just to get one good one, I try and make every one a good one and take fewer photos as a result, but have more keepers. Of the photos I took on holiday some were just holiday snaps, but those I really wanted to get right all turned out as I wanted them, except the condors - and that was cos I didn't have the Bigma with me. However when I was starting out I took stacks of awful photos, and I still have them - just to remind me of what not to do!

Take a breath and walk around a subject, look at it from different angles, high, low, think about it - then reach for the camera. One of the biggest mistakes people make is not getting close enough to their subject.
On a course I did we had to take 15 photos of an object of our choice, using the kit lens at it's widest. I chose a new garden chair we'd just bought and ended up with over 30 photos of it from all angle, some from far away, some so close as to be almost abstract. It is a great exercise and teaches you to look at things differently and not be afraid to get up close and personal!

Great Pics!


Have a look at coots feet too - they are really amazing!

The Sugababes were awful. I was really disappointed in them. Maybe nerves got to them, I don't know, but they were not good. It was especially painful watching them trying to get the crowd to sing along with them.

Given that Amy Winehouse only got out of hospital that morning I think she did OK, Not great but OK. It was good to see her performing again. I got the feeling she was bored singing Rehab yet again. I wonder if she'll turn up for Glasto and how she'll do there. I can't see her managing a full set somehow.

As for Queen with Paul Rogers, I think I'd go and see them in concert. I was worried it would be the Brian May show but thankfully it wasn't. And with Paul Rogers there he (May) doesn't have to sing. Having seen Brian May solo once believe me he should stick to guitar.

Anyway chaps, if you get the chance to see it again do.

Ok i can answer teh John Deacon question - he hasn't played with them since the Freddie Mercury tribute. the new bass payer is Danny Miranda - and he is impressive! As a bass player myslef i thought he was actually better than Deacon.