Working with technology is not without its challenges, and photography is no different. Sometimes things go wrong and there is nothing you can do about it. So it does pay to be prepared for eventualities and have backups of just about everything on hand.

Recently, I was in the studio with a client. We were having such a lovely morning, chatting through hair and makeup, while I set everything up in the studio. We had been shooting for about 30 minutes and suddenly I could not get the camera to tether to my laptop.

I turned the camera off, unplugged the tethering cable and turn the camera back on. Now I had no Live View and I could not access playback. I had a weird error message on every function saying that function was disabled. Fantastic! Right in the middle of the client portrait session.

I thought that maybe my SD card was the issue, so I put in a spare SD card. But it made no difference. I turned the camera on and off, removed the battery and put it back in. Nothing. Did I panic? No. I simply grabbed my backup camera and told my client that everything was fine and that I was switching cameras and lenses to get some slightly different angles. Which was partially true, as I often shoot with two cameras and two different lenses.

I went back to tethering and finished the shoot. Did I have the first half of the session on the memory card? I wasn’t sure, but as I was tethered to Capture One, I still had the images on my laptop anyway.

Having backups is ALWAYS a great idea. The fact that I did not panic and acted like this was a perfectly normal morning, meaning the client had no real idea. Although she did make a small joke about “I told you my looks might break your camera,” we all laughed and moved on.

Internally I was silently screaming. These days I am not emotionally attached to my camera (not like my first DSLR, which I treated like a baby). But I have had some previous experience with a camera that completely malfunctioned and needed major repairs four times. So I was not really happy about having another camera die.

I figured a good old factory reset might do the trick. However, ALL functions on the camera were greyed out. NOTHING would work. So I turned to my local Sony Brains Trust group, described what had happened and asked the question — did anyone have any ideas?

Obviously, a few asked the run-of-the-mill which I had done to avail. Turn the camera on and off, and take the SD card and the battery in and out. Unplug the tethering cable. Try a factory reset, and reinstall the software, however when NONE of the camera’s functions work, the last two cannot be done.

Then someone asked if I had tried a different battery altogether. So I turned the camera off and took out the battery (which still had charge), left it for five minutes and put in a fresh battery. I crossed my fingers and turned the camera back on. Now it kept asking for the SD card to finish re-writing the last image. I had swapped out the memory card several times, as I had taken what images I did have from the memory and backed them up on my PC. But once I had located the correct card, the camera finished writing the image and VOILA! Everything was working again.

It’s not always you or your camera that trip you up. Previously, any time I had an issue I used to think I had done something wrong (and sometimes I did). But I did go directly to a camera issue, while all along it was a battery.

Apparently, if your battery has degraded and not delivering enough current, this issue can happen. It was a first for me and the battery now won’t even charge. So off to buy a new backup battery!

Firstly Don’t panic — that never helps. If you plan on being a super keen hobbyist through to a professional photographer, it pays to have backups on hand for everything. SD cards, batteries, lenses, speedlights and even a backup camera.

Remember — as much as you might love your gear, technology can and will fail, usually when you least expect it. So having the ability to grab a spare anything while keeping your cool will always save the day.

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Julie Powell is a passionate photographer and educator, running online classes and workshops for still life, macro, food and portraits, based in Melbourne, Australia. Julie is also an award-winning digital artist and photographer who has a deep passion for fine art and conceptual photography, having exhibited in galleries in Europe, USA and Australia. See more of her work on her Website Juliepowellphotography.com or on social media.

I probably shouldn’t admit this – but panic set in on the first full day of African safari when the camera wouldn’t shoot any images and appeared locked up. I made some rookie mistakes with the 256GB SD card resulting in it’s total failure (completely non-recoverable by any software). NOW I’m completely versed in buffering while shooting multiple FPS, but it cost me a whole day’s photos, a 256GB memory card, $100+ for recovery software, and probably 40 hours running various recovery programs. Lesson learned: DON’T PANIC! (Fortunately I had a half dozen 64GB and a couple of 128GB cards…  Read more »

Panic is always the worst course of action, but sadly often our first. Thanks for sharing. So glad you had backups

On my first day in Namibia I climbed into the back seat of the 4 x 4 that was taking me to our first location I placed my main camera with the 70-200mm on the seat next to me and took out the second camera to attach the wide angle lens. As I had the wide lens in one hand and the second camera in the other, the driver slammed his brakes on suddenly and the camera on the seat flew forward. The lens hit the bar between the front seats and the camera landed on the floor. I retrieved…  Read more »

Oh no….at least you had a second camera. I had something similar happen, but only had the one. Nothing major on that shoot, but it was a lesson learned

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