December 5, 2015
Vervet Monkey, Kruger National Park, South Africa, and Stolen Equipment

I love to photograph primates, and especially juveniles. I photographed this juvenile Vervet Monkey (Chlorocebus aethiops) while it was eating in Kruger National Park, South Africa in April.

Stolen Equipment

Practically all of my photography equipment was stolen from my vehicle earlier this week so I've been going through the hassle of filing the insurance claim paperwork and designing my ideal set of equipment. I had most of my photo gear insured through Chubb as a member of NANPA, so the loss isn't as bad as it could have been. However, I didn't insure anything that cost less than about $250, and all of that "inexpensive" gear added up to about $5500! I was also a bit generous with the replacement values I had claimed for the insured items, using values at the time of purchase, assuming that I would get that money back. Not so — I've been paying unnecessarily high premiums to have the items only covered up to their current replacement value. So, I will be rebuilding my kit slowly and getting only what I will definitely be using in the near term.

It would have been nice if the thieves had stolen my gear after the Canon 1D X Mk II started shipping so I wouldn't have to sell outdated gear to move up to the latest-and-greatest. I plan to only buy one 1D X now and hopefully the 1D X Mk II will be shipping by the time I really need a second body for active shooting and not just as a backup.

Based on what I'll be shooting next, which is landscapes, my initial purchase was: one Canon EOS 1D X (bundled with a Lexar Professional 1066x 128GB CF card and two spare batteries), an EF 24‑70mm II, a TS‑E 17mm, a TS‑E 24mm II, an 82mm B+W XS-Pro circular polarizer, a Canon Angle Finder C, a Gitzo GT3542XLS tripod, a Really Right Stuff BH-55 Pro ball head and replacement feet for the 100‑400 II and 600 IS II, a Kirk L‑bracket for the 1D X, and an f‑stop Satori EXP with a Large Pro ICU and a Small Pro ICU. I would have gotten a TS‑E 90mm instead of the 24‑70, but that's a really old lens design and I'm hoping Canon will release a Mk II version before I desperately miss that lens. I don't really need the Small Pro ICU now, and definitely don't need the replacement feet yet, but ordered them to save on shipping. I'll be ordering a lot more stuff as soon as the insurance check clears.

The thieves also stole a set of hard drives with backups on them, so I'm rethinking my backup strategy so that the backups and also my primary drives are encrypted.

Quiet On The Blog

I've been a bit quiet on the blog for the last few months because I've been working on another project that I should be able to tell you about in a couple of weeks.

I also had knee surgery about two weeks ago to repair the lateral meniscus I tore about three years ago. My knee had been giving me lots of trouble earlier this year so I finally decided to get it taken care of. Right now, my knee is doing pretty good. There is no pain like I had had before surgery, but my range of motion is still lower than before I had surgery and no where near what I had before I injured my knee. I'm still doing physical therapy, so we'll see where I end up. I feel good enough now to go out shooting, but I'm still waiting for the first part of my replacement gear — arg!