Back-up, Back-up...its a must!

So I kind of had a bit of a nightmare with some equipment here in the past few weeks. Actually, I had two pieces of equipment go down on me within 2 days of each other. The first to go was my workhorse....my Canon 70-200mm f/2.8 IS USM lens. I was shooting a portrait session on a Saturday, and just didn't have much choice for background, so I decided to grab this out of my bag so I could blur the background really nice. I attached it and no response! I grabbed my second back-up camera body and attached it to that one just to rule out the chance that my camera had gone down. No deal either. Of course, I always carry as many as 7-8 lenses with me at all times...so 1 lens going down won't cause anything but a bit of inconvienience. Back-ups are an absolute must with any photographer no matter what.

We'll there is a little story behind this specific lens. You see...about a month prior, and without going into detail as to were, how and who...the lens took a pretty nasty fall....straight onto the concrete...from about 3 feet. OUCH!! Needless to say...it worked fine after the crash.......until that ill fated Saturday one month later! :)

All was well, except that I had a wedding to shoot the very next Monday and I really wanted that lens with me. Well the good news is there are plenty of options. 1rst...I know lots of great photographers in my area and borrowing one, wasn't an issue. But, Canon takes typically 1-2 weeks to repair. So I thought the 2nd best route would be to rent one in the mean time. This is where Borrow Lenses comes in handy. They ship the lens directly to your home, and then you just ship back in the same box provided with the pre-paid shipping label when finished. Quick easy and I didn't have to drive anywhere. So we did this to make sure I had this lens for my next wedding on the following Saturday, and borrowed another photographer's 70-200mm for the Monday wedding. Actually...it was the grooms....he's an awesome photographer too. Thanks Eddie!

So Monday comes and to make things so much better, right in the middle of the ceremony, just as the dad arrived to the groom with his daughter in hand, I glance down at my LCD screen on my Canon 1d Mark IIn and I catch a bright white line across the last image I took. I thought perhaps I was catching a glare from somewhere but couldn't see anything that would cause a glare. So without skipping a beat, I throw that camera down over my right shoulder and swing up my BACK-UP camera from my left shoulder because I like to be prepared. Turns out...the shutter on the camera was leaking light. Canon guarentee's that this particular camera's shutter is good for 200,000 clicks. Mine only had 54,000 clicks.

So with one camera and one lens down....we decided to purchase another camera. So the next day I ordered the new Canon 1d Mark III and had it shipped overnight to me as I had another wedding the following Saturday in Sonoma, CA. So far this camera is amazingly fast, the picture quality is just simply stunning. In fact the imges in the previous post from Sonoma, Ca were all taken with this camera.

Needless to say, Canon service in Irvine, CA came through with amazment. They tested, inspected, repaired, calibrated and clean my camera and lens all in 5 business days. Plus, they replaced my shutter free of charge since my original shutter had not made its expected life, and the camera was not under warranty either! How nice was that!.

The good news....all gear and camera's are operating wonderfully. We've built our arsenol over time and that is mainly for the protection of our clients. With now 4 camera bodies and another expected to be purchased in the next year, we feel we are servicing our clientele with the best security. No what unexpected problem occur we are ready and able to continue performing for our clients.

The same goes for our digital files. We use nothing but the best pro compact flash cards in the industry, and carry an Epson P-3000 storage device with us. This allows us to back-up your photos immediately after we fill a card, during your wedding. This way we have two copies of your images at all times. Our rule of thumb...once I arrive back at the office after your wedding, the files are then off loaded from the cards to an internal hard drive, and then backed-up on to a Mirrored RAID system. Now your photos are in 4 different places and we do not ease or format any Compact flash cards until your images are back-up.

So, if you are a photographer....make sure you have back-up...you just can't afford not to. If you are a potential client looking for a wedding photographer, do not hesitate to asking your photographer about his or her's photo equipment, and what measures they take to protect you from any unexpected problems. If you need a wedding photographer visit our website http://www.hiscreations.com/