Mistakes.

[miketoll]

Took a few shots at the weekend and forgot to reset my ISO speed from 800 to a lower setting so lost quality which had me thinking of all the many mistakes I've made over the years from leaving lens caps on to opening the back of the camera to take the film out before rewinding the film. If there is a mistake I've probably had a go at it - anybody else learnt the hard way and would like to share?

[Christine]

Mike,twice I have accidentally turned down the exposure/compensation setting down to zero.It is usally kept at 0ne third of a stop down.My own fault as I never check histograms etc.All the images came out so dark.But I did manage to rescue several each time using Picasa.The last time it happened I had been photographing the local mink in the river.The first time I have actually seen them,I took over 100 shots.Not a mistake I will make again-hopefully not.

[Saphire]

My biggest mistake was erasing all the images on the card and not just the one that was blurred, fortunately I realised what I had done and was able to get most of the images back with sandisks recovery software. I now double check as I delete any photo's in the camera that I haven't moved onto the all button.

[robski]

My trick has been to leave the camera still set for indoor lighting and then do a whole days shooting outdoors before I notice. A few times gone for a walk around my local patch without a memory card or forget to check the battery level to see if freshly charged battery needs fitting.

[Leif]

About 10 years go I was photographing dragonflies and ran out of film. So I took out the exposed film, and walked away from the tripod. However the tripod was embedded in the silt of a stream, and my walking away through the squelchy sediment unbalanced the tripod, tipping the camera and lens into the stream. Goodbye camera (Nikon F90X) and hello big lens cleaning bill. On another occasion I dropped an exposed film into a bog. And there's a free like new Nikon DR3 right angle finder in the New Forest for anyone who can find it, after I put it down, and promptly lost it. I had a film lost in the post, and another turned out blue when the Kodak development machine broke. I sent my best two slides to a well known printer, who returned them by normal post (I had paid for recorded) and that was the last I saw of the slides and I never saw the prints. Touchwood, my recent antics have been less costly. Thus far.

I suppose I now count my mistakes as learning experiences and I try not to make the same mistake again e.g. inappropriate shutter speed or aperture, unstable support, wrong location, wrong time of day etc. If this lark was easy, it wouldn't be challenging and fun. Would it?

[yelvertoft]

The most common mistake I make is to switch to (for example) aperture priority for a particular subject and forget to switch back to program/shutter priority/manual as needed for the next subject. I'll usually twig what I've done if the light changes and the readings don't move as I expect them to but not always.

Sometimes leave the exposure compensation dialled in to a particular figure and forget to move it back after I've finished with the subject that needed it.

[Snowyowl]

Took a bunch of dragonfly shots yesterday before realizing that the compactflash card was back in the house.

[Canis Vulpes]

I mainly shoot aviation so my camera remains setup more or less for that where little deviation is required. I normally clean lenses and pack a camera bag to evening before its needed and I set the camera to what I believe will be close to whats needed, shutter and aperture along with ISO.

Past mistakes:-

Going out forgetting a spare battery with only 10% remaining on the fitted battery - DOH!

Going out forgetting a CF card case leaving only CF card in camera - DOH!

At Southend openday, first real outing of this year and being used to shooting portraits and still life using flash I figured 1/60th was fast to I would be able to shoot moving objects 100m away at 1/60 - 1/125 using a focal length of upto 340mm - Nah!!

[Wheeler]

One of my howlers has been nudging the exposure compensation wheel whilst shooting air to air and not realising until I'd taken a further 20-30 shots. It gets pretty frantic in an open cockpit and it's easily done.

[Canis Vulpes]

Originally Posted by Wheeler

One of my howlers has been nudging the exposure compensation wheel whilst shooting air to air and not realising until I'd taken a further 20-30 shots. It gets pretty frantic in an open cockpit and it's easily done.

Not to mention tight confined space, fantastic opportunity you had there, was one of your photos used on the cover of Shuttleworth programme last weekend?