Considering the great reliability of modern cameras, I am curious how many of you make use of the backups?
For anyone who shoots professionally no matter how modest their customer is a backup is required. This is particularly true of any event where you have only one chance. This is very true where there is great expense in bringing together the subject and props or rental of a location. A backup is an imperative.
On probably my first paying gig I brought a new Nikon F2 with a standard prism. I had owned and used the camera for a few weeks and experienced no problems. Probably as a manufacturing error the base plate of the camera was depressed where it was stamped to accept the O/C key. There were no problems using the camera with Kodak film cassettes. I loaded this camera with Ilford HP-5. The Ilford cassette was taller than a Kodak cassette. Film advance was extremely stiff and I was afraid of damaging the film advance mechanism. I was green. I had no backup. I owned a Nikon F as a second camera but did not bring it on this shoot.
This was a PR gig for a modest customer. The only film I had with me was HP-5 and the cassettes all fit very tight. I took a cassette and scraped the plastic end of the cassette on the cement curb. I heard my editor say to someone, "Does he know what he is doing?" I deburred the plastic lower end of the cassette with a key. I reloaded my F2 and it performed perfectly. My customer was very pleased with my work and I continued to work for this customer for about 15 years. If I had failed this shoot I would have lost not only this customer but several other associated customers.
I took this Nikon F2 to ACS (Authorized Camera Service) in Woodland Hills, CA and they tested with a Kodak cassette and said nothing was wrong. I then took it to Mel Pierce Camera and they tested it with a well worn Kodak cassette and they said it was fine. Having had two official Nikon repair shops deny that there was a problem I removed the base plate myself. I placed the base plate on a kitchen towel on a hard surface. I used a long socket for auto repair placing the flat end on inside of the base plate. I used a large screw driver handle as a mallet and tapped the base plate at the O/C key opening. I check the base plate each time with a drafting triangle. When the base plate was perfectly flat I reassembled the camera. This Nikon F2 never cause any problems again for as long as I owned it.
I had a Pentax Digital Spotmeter fail on a PR shoot for a hospital. It had a cold solder joint that I later repaired. I was carrying a Minolta Flash Meter III as a backup. I recently had a Wattson EN-EL15 battery fail. It came "free" with my D800. One day it worked fine. The next it did not. Always carry spare batteries.
Many professional photographers refuse to use a digital camera that does not have two memory card slots and they have the camera save duplicate images to each memory card. I've never had a memory card failure but others have. I would not use a digital camera on a paying gig or any important event without a second memory card slot. It's like going out into the outback without a spare tire. In the day better wedding photographers would carried not only a second body but also a backup of each lens as the lenses had in lens shutters that could fail. You take every reasonable precaution so as not to fail a customer or any non-paying important shoot.
That's my 2 cents and a personal story about carrying backups on any paying or otherwise important photo shoot.
Dave
