Panny DMC-GH2 or What Else?

[bradbunnin]

I made a similar trip to Kenya and Tanzania (bracketed by a short visit to Dubai on the way there and three days on Zanzibar on the way back) last year, and I found the 14-140 and the 100-300 extremely useful. In fact, those were the only lenses I needed. My 45-200 was sharp enough, but the other two lenses were the only ones I used. The Micro 4/3 conversion factor means, in essence, that you'd have a focal length range of 28mm to 600mm. And, because the GH2 can roughly double the focal length electronically, your effective range is really extended to about 1200mm. You'll use the long focal lengths!

Take plenty of memory cards with you, and at least two batteries (three are better). And prepare to shoot video. I hadn't planned to, but when I experimented the first day, I decided that I'd use the camera's extraordinary video capabilities whenever animals were in motion. I was astonished at the quality, and I'd had next to no experience with video.

I had a beanbag and a wooden bowl-shaped device with a tripod screw, but I never used it. The GH2's stabilization worked extremely well.

 

[GSWayne]

When I went to Botswana and South Africa last year I only brought an LX-5 and assumed my brother-in-law with the DSLR and big lens would get the animal shots and I would be content with landscape photos. I discovered when traveling in the open vehicles we got close enough to all of the animals to get great shots with the LX-5 and I would see my brother-in-law frantically changing lenses because he wanted to get a shot of more than just the eyeball of the lion, cape buffalo, hippo, leopard or elephant. Where his long lenses paid off was for bird photos. I have a FZ-150 now and I think that would have been an ideal camera for Safari use. I could get the bird shots and the landscape photos, and movies with stereo sound with one piece of hardware.