Gear Choices for Hokkaido Photo Tours

Reflections and ruminations from one of Japan Dreamscapes Photo Workshop Leaders:

I have had a camera in my hand before my adulthood, and I have been fortunate to be able to afford the best gear.  Nikon has been my choice through the years, and I still have my 600mm & 800mm manual lenses in my collection, and I have the 600mm and 800mm autofocus VR lenses, you could say they have become a part of my family.  Also, I do love the products from Aizu Fukushima Sigma Corporation, the 300-800mm f5.6 I have trusted since it's release, and I am on my 3rd lens, the other two met with unfortunate events; but that my business adventure photography, and we are not easy on our gear.    Lately, my go-to lens is the sigma is the 120-300mm F2.8 DG OS HSM, but I am starting to feel I might be missing out on what other camera makers have to offer.  Next week I am co-leading an adventure photography workshop with Kevin Raber of Rock Hopper Workshops.  And when I found out, I was the only one in our group with a long heavy telephoto lens; my mind started to race.  Also, one of our clients on our upcoming workshop who I thought was using Canon and long telephoto lenses, changed over to Sony, and for wildlife, he now uses the Sony 400mm 2.8 lens, with a teleconverter x2 that's an 800mm lens, my prefeed mm.  I  attend several big cameras shows throughout the year,  but in truth, I am more interested in being in the field photographing or studio then at camera shows, but I still love to buy my camera gear at shops. 

This year to Hokkaido I will bring along the Sigma 300-800mm 5.6, but I believe this may be it's the last visit to Hokkaido.  In the coming months, I will most likely change camera makers, possibly to Sony, Fuji or Olympus, I will still hold onto some of my Nikon gear, D5, D850, 200mm f4 for macro photography, some studio lenses, and my telephoto’s, but I now think for wildlife adventures, Nikon and Canon are a little behind the times, and I hope they will catch up.  Who knows I may not change over at all, and may just update my lens selection?