Camera FAILS: Or Tell Us How You Trashed Your Camera.

[Xebadir]

Ooh I've got a few.
First DSLR was a D40 I was given for a birthday - I treasured it after coming from film. Went to Tassie on a holiday after finishing my undergraduate study, first day after I got there, heading into King Solomons Caves, the camera was (I thought) well secured in a lowpro carry case (which was zipped up), as I am walking towards the holding point I hear a crack and feel something hitting me against the legs...I look round and there was my D40 and a 55-200 - the lens shattered and broken from the mount (not before leaving its mounting ring) debris everywhere...Needless to say the lens was a writeoff, but the camera was repaired and still works to this day (and I got a 70-300VR instead via insurance). Lesson learnt: Never trust zips on the lower side of a bag, always bring them to the top - the camera had worked the zip open and eventually pushed through.

Second experience was my D700 with 24-70 falling off my tripod due to a screw that had loosened in the head, complete loss on the 24-70 as it landed on the lens barrel, but the camera was fine, insurance again to the rescue - made me very wary of tripods and encouraged me to change over my tripod head for something rock solid. Not a mistake Ill be making again.

Oh and a fun few with Sony videos: Was chasing storms with my buddy one night in Oklahoma, we both have Sony CX150 HD Videos, and use them regularly. Anyway, his classic was leaving the camera on the roof of the car, and then driving off at full speed - the camera went flying - drove back, picked it up, no worse for wear! Thought...jeez these things are tough. Later that night we were videoing hail falling under a service station roof, (8cm stones), I put mine in the alcove between the bonnet and the windscreen - sure enough a big gust of wind came through and blew it out. End result was mine ended up still working fine and being functional, besides the lens cap no longer closing. Toughest little cameras I have ever seen!

Edit: And despite the situations I use them in I have yet to have had a water incident with my camera, but have had hailstones bouncing off.

[JoPho]

Poor OP, what a photo that would have made as it plummetted over the edge, as would a close up of your expression.
I suppose the worst part would be losing the days worth of images. Good to hear insurance is softening the pain of the possible financial agony.

I have a story or two to share, hope it's ok.
Travelling to WA on the train with my two little girls, my husband who had just scored a job had to fly over before hand. I was 8 months pregnant and we were a family struggling financially. I had a Canon that I bought second hand and had taken photos of the girls and my pregnancy during our last month east. While I was asleep on the floor with the two girls on either side of me who were also asleep but on the seats, someone stole my camera and bag from beside me. It took a long time to be able to afford another camera and they took with it those final treasured shots. I still feel very sad because of those memories they stole that were in that camera and that I could have had for the birth of our last child.

When I finally got another DSLR we went outback. I was out running in the bush, following roo tracks, trying hard to get to the salt flats before sunrise. I had my camera,unprotected, in my hands. Those massive spiders were everywhere and I was focusing on not destroying their webs.
Well I tripped on ? and felt myself start to fall. Instead of protecting myself I wrapped my camera in my arms and tumbled head first into a tree. It hurt with sickening intensity but the camera was ok so I staggered up and kept running. The last words of my husband and son-in-law were "you can't go out there alone, what happens if you break an ankle?"
"Ha, they will never know how close I came to being hurt", I thought.

Well when they came to pick me up the first thing they asked was "What happened?"
"Nothing!" was my response.
But when I checked myself over, I had put quite a gash in my head and my face was covered in blood. Fortunately it looked worse than it was and only took a week or two to heal. Truth is, if I could do it again, I'd still take the gash and protect my camera.

[dodgyexposure]

I can't top that story.

I was sitting on a low bench with my 600D beside me, ready to shoot, so no lens cap on. I got up, something caught the strap and, in a piece of perfect synchronisation, the camera met my foot as it swung forward, propelling the camera and lens 6 feet across the gravel.

Cosmetic damage only, luckily.

[MissionMan]

Had a fail over the weekend. Left my D700 with 24-70 on the dining room table. Was busy getting dinner for our toddler who promptly climbed onto the chair next to the table (while my back was turned) and pulled it off the table. Nice crack in the front ring that the filter screws into. Fortunately the lens and camera are fine (extremely relieved), check the autofocus and everything is great but a little crack is obviously annoying. will probably take it to Nikon at some point, get the camera checked over and get it fixed but for now I've just put a fine piece of tape over it.

Never turn your back on a toddler, even for a second.

[Duane Pipe]

Had a fail over the weekend. Left my D700 with 24-70 on the dining room table. Was busy getting dinner for our toddler who promptly climbed onto the chair next to the table (while my back was turned) and pulled it off the table. Nice crack in the front ring that the filter screws into. Fortunately the lens and camera are fine (extremely relieved), check the autofocus and everything is great but a little crack is obviously annoying. will probably take it to Nikon at some point, get the camera checked over and get it fixed but for now I've just put a fine piece of tape over it.

Never turn your back on a toddler, even for a second.

Bummer I am always aware of my camera strap hanging over bench tops and so forth and hopefully I never forget MM

[MissionMan]

Bummer I am always aware of my camera strap hanging over bench tops and so forth and hopefully I never forget MM

No strap attached, she grabbed the actual camera.

[znelbok]

While cruising back from Hawaii, I was packing up all the gear from a day out. I had the camera bag on the top bunk while the kids were on the bottom beds watching TV. Put it up there to get it out of their way (or them out of its way).

They asked me to do something so I got distracted briefly and while my back was turned my son climbed up onto the top bunk (which was his bed for the cruise) and moved the bag. The zip was not done up ['cause I was in and out of the bag packing] and he inadvertantly tipped the camera out.

Well it bounced off the bunk on the other side of the room and then hit the floor and broke the bayonet fitting of the lens. Luckily I had brough about four P&S cameras along as well so we could still take photos for the rest of the trip.

Fortunately I had travel insurance and after Nikon has looked at it, the repair cost is almost the price of a new D7000 body.

So as of yesterday [insurance company rang to tell me they have approved the claim], I am on the hunt for a D7000 body. The lens only requires a bayonet fitting which is cheap and easy to replace. At least some good comes from the bad.

Its not the first incident with this camera. My wife gave it back to me one day (in its bag) and when I pulled it out the filter was smashed???? Of course no one knoew what had happened.

I wont be letting anyone use my new D600 at all (mine mine mine). Suffice it to say, its insured for theft and accidental damage both inside and outside the home.

Mick

[Xenedis]

On 16/05/2010 my photography mate Peter and I headed down to Kiama for some dawn seascape photography.

Beyond the famous Kiama blow hole is a basalt rock headland extending a fair way out and affording some spectacular views from a reasonably high distance from the water.

The conditions that morning were somewhat deceptive.

That weekend, the swell had been quite large, and it had been reported on the news the previous day that teen solo sailor Jessica Watson had returned to Sydney in big seas. Her little boat was being thrown around even in calmer waters.

On the morning of our shoot, the tide was nearly in. The swell was a good three metres by my very rough estimate.

I photographed this image from the headland past the blow hole:




It was mere moments after the capture of this image that a very large wave pounded the side of the cliff below and sent a positively huge surge of water up and completely over me.

At the time of impact I was changing a filter, and the ocean was in my sights. All of a sudden, I saw what was coming, and within seconds I recall a wall of water descending upon me from a great height, almost as if I had stood under a waterfall. The force of the water was so strong that it nearly knocked me over.

The filter went flying, and both me and my camera rig got completely drenched. There wasn't a dry inch on me, and I was stunned by what had just happened.

I was completely caught out by the ocean, and it was an exercise that essentially cost me $4,000 in destroyed equipment, and could have cost me a whole lot more than money.

I earlier said that the conditions were deceptive. We had been shooting on that cliff for a while, and had seen the ocean and the sets of waves rolling in. In my image, a look at the rocks on which I was standing shows that there had been no recent contact with water. We were reasonably high up from the water (10-15 metres by my estimate), so the conditions, despite the large swell and near-full tide, seemed safe. I spend a lot of time by the ocean, and I certainly didn't feel I was taking a risk being where I was at that moment.

I sure got it terribly wrong!

I think I was hit by what people call a 'rogue wave'. The ocean's waves have typical cycles, with a larger set of waves coming in every so often. Every 30-40 minutes or so, there can be a much larger wave. Possibly a combination of a reasonably large wave and a faster-moving large wave converged and produced the 'rogue' wave which hit me. My recollection was that I was not directly hit by the wave; rather that the cliff face sustained the impact and what hit me was the splash. Certainly it had a lot of force, as it nearly threw me off balance.

Such is the power of the ocean, and every now and then it decides to show us humans how small we really are. Peter was quite lucky, as he was also on the cliff, but was around 10-15 metres back from where I was standing. He was going to head over to where I was; what great fortune that he didn't!

After the incident, I decided to get the hell out of there. The gravity of the situation didn't really dawn on me (pardon the pun) at first, and my concern was for my gear rather than the fact that I could have been swept off the cliff and down into the tumultuous conditions below, where being pounded against sharp rocks by a large swell was a very real possibility.

Within a short period of time, I knew my camera was written off, and my iPhone, which was on my belt and obscured by the jumper I was wearing, was also written off. Miraculously my lens survived, and I also found my neutral-density filter which had gone flying out of my hands when I was struck. It was on the rocks in the receding water a short distance away.

I was cold, wet, tired, shocked, and had a 90-minute drive home knowing that I would be up for around $4,000 to replace my dead camera and phone.

To give you an idea of the conditions that existed that day, here is another image taken earlier, looking out past the location at which I was standing when I was hit.




To give a sense of scale and location, the place where I was located when I was hit was just behind the part of the cliff on the left side of the frame, much closer to the splashing water than the edge of the image.

By my estimate, the height of the rocks on the left from which the which the water cascades, is a good four metres.

That small, vertical protrusion from the distance cliff, silhouetted against the clouds, is a beacon, about the height of a human, if not taller. It's been years since I've been out there, so I'm only going by memory. Suffice it to say, the splashes from the ocean were large!

It was quite a dramatic morning that could have been a whole lot worse.

Fatalities:

1. Canon EOS 5D
2. Apple iPhone 3GS 32GB

Survivors:

1. Me
2. Canon EF 16-35mm f/2.8L II USM
3. Lee filters and filter holder
4. Flash card with images to tell the story

I came out on top after all, but it forced some thinking, and I was inspired to write an article on tips for safe seascape photography.

Hopefully my experience will also be beneficial to the people who read about it, and will remind them that the ocean is very big, and we humans are very small.

[MI5]

On our honeymoon, I had a nikonos (underwater nikon) and canon t90 with me. By end of trip, just the nikonos left. Our tour guide took us to a very nice coral cove. I jumped into the water and wife stayed on the boat. My better half passed me the Canon. You can guess what happened to it.

[Mark L]

^ what happened to the wife?

[MI5]

Thnaks Xenedis for sharing that experience. I sometime get myself into places probably are unsafe i.e very possible rogue waves. Your post has made me more mindful of that. Thanks again.

- - - Updated - - -

^ what happened to the wife?

I did get. I shouldn't have, it's only a camera. Great reason for upgrade though!!