Photo Equipment Disasters!

Here is a vacation photo tip that I had almost forgotten about - buying new photo equipment! Are you planning to upgrade your photography equipment before you go on vacation? That can be either good or bad.

Let me tell you a story...

A few years ago I met a really nice lady whose dream was to go on a photo safari in Africa.

Actually I may have understated that. It wasn't just a dream, it was literally an obsession. It was the first thing she thought about in the morning and the last thing she thought about at night.

She worked hard and made daily sacrifices so she could save enough money to not only go on her safari, but to do it right!

In the meantime, she studied every animal photography book and took every wildlife photo course she could find! (BTW - If you are REALLY going to master photography, you WILL study everything you can find. EVERY course - even the most basic - has at least one good idea that can change EVERYTHING!

Finally, she reached her financial goals, bought the tickets, made the reservations and packed her bags.

The last step in the plan was to buy a new camera. Her old one was seriously out of date so she bought herself a top of the line, best of the best camera.

This story takes place in the age of film. Digital cameras were out there but this was at a time when people were still agonizing over which way to go.

She bought a film camera costing a couple thousand dollars. Remember, she wanted the best.

Next she bought literally hundreds of rolls of film...for her, this was a once in a lifetime opportunity and she planned to shoot everything! I'm not talking about some teenager here; she had saved over thirty years for this trip!

She went on her trip, had the time of her life, shot everything, she even met a nice gentleman.

When she got back, she turned her rolls of film into the local developers. Several thousand dollars later she got back stacks and stacks of envelopes full of photos.

Almost ALL of them were ruined. She wound up with only a handful of useable prints.

Her mistake?

She bought all this new equipment and didn't know how to properly use it! Or even check to see if it worked at all!

I didn't get into what went wrong in her situation (it was a very touchy, emotional subject), but I can say that if she had just taken the time to thoroughly go through the equipment manuals (and used the mnemonic I teach in my free "On Target Photo Training" volume) she would have had no problems. And would have saved her trip!

She would have discovered the problem and had time to fix it.

So here is the lesson...always get completely familiar with your equipment before you use it in an important situation.

This isn't just for African photo safaris! It's kind of scary how many photographers buy new photo equipment just before shooting an important wedding.

To learn more check out the resource box...