leonard_van_der_zwan

<p>Zach I have been to Kenya and Tanzania in 2007. How close you can get to animals depends on the landscape. For example a river running through a desert-like landscape will mean that animals will be concentrated on the river side, while a landscape with many trees in the wet season will make it harder to find and get close to animals.<br> Getting out of your car/ into back of pickup is a dangerous think to do in most wildlife parks. Lions, hyenas etc can be laying in the grass just 2 meters away and think of you as a free meal. Moreover, if a hippo (sometimes an elephant) finds you on its track it may attack your car and you need to be able to get away very quick. How about a bean bag in the window frame?<br> For your budget you may be better of renting a second body (e.g. nikon d7100 or d7200) and telephoto lens. Make sure your insurance covers this equipement if it gets damaged or is stolen.<br> The lenses suggested by Peter Hamm appear to be great options. The 80-400 (second generation) for larger animals and the 200-500 if somewhat smaller animals are your main focus. If possible I would recommend also to take with you (rent?) a wide/normal lens for landscape photography. A combined ND+UV filter could be useful if you have to photograph during daytime (transition from day to night is very swift near the equator).<br> For the Ngoro Ngoro crater please realise its in the tropics and at elevations. It was the only place I have been where an UV filter could have improved my photos (your camera is more modern than mine was and the extreme UV light may/might be a none issue).<br> Please drive very cautious in and certainly outside the parks.<br> Last but not least I hope you enjoy it a lot being there.</p>

<p>You have had some great suggestions for lenses and flashes. Just another suggestion: Have you considered to obtain a flash (e.g. SB400) and a little diffuser and experiment before you decide to buy another lens?<br> A flash can be of great use, not just to have more available light. For example modern indoor lights (LED, etc) have a limited color spectrum. If you add flash you may be able to improve the colors of your indoor pictures.</p> <p>good luck</p>

<p>+1 for the Panasonic lx100 (700$) suggested by Eric Arnold, if you can afford it.<br> In my previous comment I suggested the LX7 (400$) because you stressed affordability. Nonetheless, the LX100 has a much bigger sensor, has better manual controls and is more modern. It comes with a separate flash as well. The Sony rx100 was another good sugestion by Eric Arnold. It has a smaller sensor than the LX100 but a larger sensor than the lx7. One of its strength is its higher resolution.</p> <p>Audrey, what kind of lens are you using on your Nikon d3200? If its a heavy zoom?; would 1 or 2 regular fixed focal lenses be sufficient and weight less?</p>

<p>Hi Audrey,<br> <br />Wide-angle lenses on fullframe cameras often have a focal length in the order of 24 to 35mm (lenses of 20mm and wider do exist). For your Nikon d3200 you will need to divide these numbers by 1.5 to get a lens for your 4/3 with the same field of view. Hence a 16mm lens on your d3200 will give you the same field of view as a 24mm lens will give you on a fullframe camera. For 4/3 mirrorless cameras the crop factor is 2. Hence, you require a 12mm lens (24 devided by 2) to get the same field of view.Therefore, your 7-11mm lens on a 4/3 camera gives the same field of view range as a 14-22mm lens on a fullframe camera and gives an even wider view than the traditional wide-angle range on fullframe cameras. (I would not photograph people with this lens due to the unfavorable perspective).<br> With respect to P&S: you could have a look at the better P&S cameras: e.g. the Canon G16 or the Panasonic LX7, etc.<br> For quality P&S a larger sensor size (1, 2/3 or 1/1.7) and a wider aperature lens are important. a hotshoe for a flash could also help.<br> The Focal length of the lenses of P&S is only a couple of mm, therefore, often the fullframe/35mm equivalent is given in stead of the actual focal length.</p>

<p>Steve-- The first thing you could do is optimize your current laptop. run disc defragmenter, use a program like ccleaner to get rid of cookies, etc. You could also check whether your software is compatible with Windows 10 (a lot of software is) and install Windows 10. To optimize Windows 10 disable Cortana and make a choice which privacy settings you want to be enabled or not (see settings menu).<br> To improve your laptop you could also opt for additional RAM memory, however, for a 350$ laptop the costs are relatively high so also consider a new Laptop.<br> The speed of your internet usually is limited by the internet provider (check your subscription and what is on offer; no need for extremely fast, but if its really limited this might be an issue) and how far you are from your router/modem in your home (check signal strength). In addition, if you download large files the RAM memory could also be a limiting factor.<br> With respect to laptops and photo editing: laptops are usually made for office applications and watching videos. Hence, the average laptops does have a display with a limited color space; which could limit your ability to edit photo's.<br> A Macbook pro with retina display (as previously suggested) gets you about 99% sRGB color space, which is a lot better than most displays and I think a good suggestion. Windows laptops with similar color space are available (google Windows+sRGB or even adobe RGB) but are also more expensive than your current laptop.<br> Good luck finding the laptop that suits your needs!</p> <p> </p>

<p>Have you considered using a trial version first? e.g. you could make a copy of some of your files in a new folder and try to import the content of this folder in your trial version DAM?</p> <p>You may/might want to consider PaintshopPRo X8 Ultimate (Windows only).</p>