Gear
Learning the gear that suits you
For the first 4 years of my photography journey I shot on Canon systems, starting with a Canon 1300D. A year later I upgraded to a Canon 7d mark II with a Canon EF 100-400mm f/4.5-5.6L IS USM. Despite its age I’d still recommend this setup in a heartbeat to anyone wanting to venture into wildlife photography: it’s widely available on the used market while having some serious quality and flexibility for a fraction of the price of today’s prime gear.
However, there came a moment in 2021 where I found myself longing for more yet no reasonable option was in reach. My 7D mark II body was showing its age and I felt more and more limited by its high-ISO noise capacity and slower autofocus. With the industry’s on-going paradigm shift toward mirrorless systems, and after another year of reflection, I took a leap of faith and in spring 2022 I bought a Sony A9 II camera with the Sony FE 200-600mm f/5.6-6.3 G OSS.
It was a much larger investment than anything before, but one that reflected my own commitment to photography and how much this hobby has grown into my daily life. After about 3 years, I was yet suffering from the same issue: the wanting for more reach and more light, but anything above my current equipment landing square into professional and “not remotely in my budget” territory. But a nagging voice in me was also growing wary of the growing weight and encumbrance, with those massive prime lenses not really fitting my style of wandering photography.
So, in early 2026, after yet another round of deliberations, I decided to take another leap, sold my entire Sony kit, and replaced it with the much more portable micro 4/3rd ecosystem. I am now a few months into learning my OM-1 Mark II with the M-Zuiko Digital ED 100-400mm f/5.6-6.3 IS II. A powerhouse of a camera that I can’t wait to master, with unbeatable range for the size and compactness. Because we never learn our lessons though, I am already eyeing adding a few others lenses to it…
List
Body: OM-1 Mark II
Lenses:
Support:
Clothing & extras:
Post-processing
Philosophy
One of my main goals in photography is to approach living subjects with the most artistic angle I can in a given set of conditions, to showcase their natural beauty. This is therefore where I draw the line: while there is intrinsically no problem with composites or altered images, I have major issues with the amount of content where this is not disclosed and the image is treated as in-camera result, something even more emphasized by the current social media era and the chase after virtual clout.
I have been using Adobe Lightroom Classic since I started taking images. It’s an amazing product with just the right amount of complexity to it and straightforward editing and archiving tools. The Topaz AI products made waves in the world of wildlife photography these last years. Both Topaz Denoise and Topaz Sharpen were staples of my editing, but with the recent developments of Lightroom’s native denoising they really haven’t seen much use. Similarly, I originally needed an extra flexibility Lightroom wasn’t always providing, and included Photoshop as part of my routine software for edits. However, as Lightroom developed its own masking functionalities, this too became a much sporadic.
I find that editing routines ebb and flow in complexity, with shiny new toy taking a backseat once I realize I much more enjoy a streamlined and simpler process. Right now I am back to using Lightroom alone and only drawing the best from the wealth of information recorded by the camera and stored in the RAW files. There may be some rare images where I’ll remove small elements of the background in immediate proximity of the animal, but those are few and far between and will always be disclosed (and of course, not entered in any contest).
