South Georgia and the Sub-Antarctic

King Penguins - St. Andrew's Bay, South Georgia, Antarctica - Fujifilm X100

In December of 2010, I had the honour and privilege of visiting Antarctica for the first time.  It was an unbelievable experience and I am very grateful that I had the opportunity to take this 3 week trip.

On our way to the Antarctic Peninsula, we stopped for 5 days at someplace very special - the island of South Georgia.  Prior to this trip, I did not know much about South Georgia other that it was a British Overseas Territory and that in the early twentieth century, it was home several (now abandoned) whaling stations.  It is within the Antarctic Convergence in the southern ocean which means that is a Sub-Antarctic island.

Fujifilm X100 (goes to Antarctica)

As a wedding photographer, I have had a long history with Fujifilm and their imaging products.  They have successfully targeted niche markets in the past - be it with their film or digital technologies.  And it always seems like I was always in one of these niche markets :o)

In the past, I shot with their film exclusively and when I switched to digital, my first DSLRs were made by them.   Their Finepix S1, S2, S3 and S5 Pro DSLRs were based on a Nikon camera body, but incorporated Fujifilm's own sensors and image processing electronics.  There has always been "something special" (a new and highly sophisticated technical term) with images produced by a Fujifilm camera and they just seem to "come to life"- not to forget, they always had the best skin tones and dynamic range.

Samsung NX200 (goes to Portugal)

For those of you who read this blog on a regular basis, you will know that I am a fan of the Micro Four Thirds mirrorless system.  For a traveling photographer who does not want to schlep around a lot of (heavy) camera gear with them, it is a decent compromise between size and image quality.  Having said that, I sold all of my Micro Four Thirds camera gear a few months ago.

Why, you ask?

It is a great system and it has some excellent lenses... but I am spoiled by the image quality that I get with my Nikon D3s (and Nikon lenses) so I started my search for another compact camera system that would give me better image quality, especially with respect to high ISO and dynamic range.

Please keep in mind that I am not a professional camera reviewer... there are websites such as dpreview.com that have extensive reviews of camera gear.  I am a working photographer and approach camera equipment from that perspective.  I am more interested in how it performs in the field (i.e. can I create sell-able images with it).   I've never been a fan of a controlled test environments, therefore, you will not see any brick wall photos on this site :o)

Namibia, Africa - Part 7: Index and Final Thoughts

This series of posts on Namibia contains a lot of information, so here is an index which will hopefully help you better navigate and find what you are looking for:

Part 1: Preparations
Part 2: Camera Equipment
Part 3: NamibRand (Wolwedans)
Part 4: Sossusvlei and Deadvlei
Part 5: Damaraland (via Walvis Bay and Swakopmund)
Part 6: Etosha National Park (Dolomite and Okaukuejo)


You can also view more images from Namibia on my main website, www.roelphoto.com (click on "namibia" in the menu).

Preparing for a trip like this takes a bit of time as it is a long, expensive journey.  It is money and time well spent as Namibia is an absolutely beautiful country.

Namibia, Africa - Part 6: Etosha National Park (Dolomite and Okaukuejo)

Above photo taken with the Nikon D3s and 70-200mm f/2.8G zoom lens

After leaving Khowarib Lodge in Damaraland, we stopped off in Palmwag and Kamanjab to fill up with fuel.  I had gotten used to helping the gas station attendants "rock" our Nissan 4x4 in order to get a bit more petrol into the gas tanks.  I figured that we could get a maximum of 60 litres (total) into the tanks, but that was a far cry from the 145 litre capacity we were supposed to have.  At least we had enough fuel to make it to the next petrol station.

We were headed to Etosha National Park (NP) - one of the world's finest and most beautiful wildlife reserves.  We were staying at two different camps over the next 4 days - here we are on the map:

Namibia, Africa - Part 5: Damaraland (via Walvis Bay and Swakopmund)

Above photo taken with the Nikon D3s and the Sigma 150-500mm zoom lens

After leaving Sossusvlei and Deadvlei, we headed off toward Damaraland - but we were going to stop for a couple of days on the coast at Walvis Bay and Swakopmund. 

You can see them on this map of Namibia:

Namibia, Africa - Part 4: Sossusvlei and Deadvlei

Above photo taken with the Nikon D3s and 70-200mm f/2.8G zoom lens

We said goodbye to the folks at Wolwedans and headed to our next destination:  Sossusvlei and Deadvlei.  They are located in the Namib-Naukluft National Park which was supposed to be a 1 hour drive away, however, with our vehicle, it took almost 3 hours.  Good thing we were not in a rush to get there.

Here we are on the map (we are now heading to the big red star):