What is the worst thing you've done to your S2?

[Tom V]

I treat my cameras well, and I respect their delicate nature. However, I know accidents happen.

I had a tripod that had a leg that give way - twice. Both times with a Tamron 70-220 ƒ4 lens on a Minolta SRT-102. Once onto a hard floor from 5 feet. Once into Lake Superior to a depth of 5 feet. Both instances ruined the camera, but the lens was unscathed. I saw y friend dropped two Canon F1 bodies onto concrete in one swift move - ruining both. I have had ants crawling around in my Minolta XK (what's in the viewfinder?). I saw a guy knock over an 8x10 camera with a 90mm Super-Angulon ($$$$) lens when it was 12' up on a camera stand ($$$$$).

I have seen an Fuji S2 get dropped 2 feet onto rough gravel - without a scratch.

I have dropped my 1 G MicroDrive 4 feet onto a rubber floor mat - unscathed.

What is the worst thing that you've witnessed happening to camera equipment?

[Swampy]

Worst, I would say my brothers Cannon A1. Laying on the front seat with a 28-80mm attached, no case, just laying there. He was drunk and driving on the right side of the street at about 50mph. Too bad he was in Gaum. They drive on the left side. BAM. The camera appeared to have hit the dash at the tip of the lens and the side of the body (shutter release side) at about the same time. Snapped the lens off. I believe it was a Tamron lens. Replaced the mount on the camera and the lens and everything worked fine- believe it or not. Brother ended up with plates in his upper right leg, traction for 5 1/2 months and a wife (Proposed after a few months in traction).

My boss had his S1 in his trunk out of the case and not too secure. Guess he stopped too quick and hit flew forward and cracked the LCD by the shutter release. 1/4 of the screen is messed up, but you can still see the shutter speed and the aperture and the camera still works and hasn't been fixed yet...

Bryan

[Wichita Wayne]

However, I have dropped at least half-a-dozen Hasselblad lenses and cameras over the last 15 years. All were repaired and are still earning their keep.

[lightwrangler]

Early in my career I assisted a photographer shooting a sailing regatta. In order to get a fresh perspective, he hired a plane with a side door that was used by sky divers. Off we went, with safety harnesses holding us in place as we sat on the floor. The deal was that I held the gear and he shot out of the door. I reloaded and traded cameras as he needed different lenses (no zooms - only primes). Everything was going well until I reloaded a Nikon F2 (Photomic?) with a lovely 200mm lens on it and placed it on the floor while I stashed the film. The plane banked and the two of us watched the camera slide across the floor and out the door. Neither one of us made a move to stop it, and we both agreed later that it seemed to happen in slo-mo. So to this day there is a nice F2 and lens on the bottom ofLake Ontario, just off the shores of Kingston.

Funny, I didn't get another call from the photographer after that. I wonder why?

In later years I have bashed a Pentax Spotmatic, while climbing, the camera was fine - I cracked two ribs. Dropped a Hassie back 20 feet to a concrete floor - minor fix and it worked just fine. And most recently I bounced a Profoto head and umbrella on to a stone floor - the umbrella took the fall, the head is now noisy but otherwise works fine.

But the S2 hasn't been dropped. (He says knocking on wood!)

[Wichita Wayne]

I was in Vietnam, happy with my Nikkormat and three Nokkor lenses that I ordered from the Navy Exchange. The Navy Exchange sold Nikon and the Army Exchange sold Canon. I knew several guys that purchased the Canon F-1s from the Army Exchange before it was sold in the US. They were all unhappy, and the warrenty work took many weeks. That experience has always soured me on Canon cameras. Even though I know that once the bugs were worked out the F-1 was a pretty good camera. My Nikkormat and all three lenses are still working fine.

[Iain]

Nothing to do with an S2, but I had a Fuji ST SLR. There was a bug lived in the viewfinder for about 2 years. It eventually died and still remains there!!

Iain

[Duck]

I was in the market to purchase a medium format camera... the local camera store had a used Mamiya 645 1000s on display. The owner said I could take the camera for the weekend on a rental base of $40 that would go toward the purchase of the camera if I decided to buy. I took the camera up to the mountains of North Carolina to take some pictures of some waterfalls. I had it mounted on my Manfrotto tripod, set up to take a few shots of some ferns near a waterfall. As I moved around the tripod, the camera strap got caught on my jacket and I pulled the camera over... oh no! The camera slammed against the rocks, the crank popped off. I noticed a nice indention in the side of the camera housing... I could no longer wind the film, end of photo shoot. I knew I couldn’t take the camera back, so I purchased the camera and immediately took the camera to a repair shop... final cost to repair came to $250... lesson learned!

[Wichita Wayne]

I have had assistants drop Hasselblads at weddings. And they all look at me with horror in their eyes. Like the next shot was going to come from a hidden .45 Cal. that I pulled from behind my back. The reality is that I never really cared to much how it happened nor did I blame the assistant. My main concern was to get another camera set up as quick as I could so that shooting was not interrupted. All the cameras were either repaired or they did not suffer during the fall. I still did not use them during the remainder of that wedding because I did not want to take a chance. We have 6 Hasselblads and never go to a wedding without at least 3. I have always believed the triple redundancy was best at weddings. If we shoot digital weddings we will probably take 2 S2s and back them up with Hasselblads. We may also double shoot the formal shots with digital and film.

[rbeckerelite]

I was shooting with my Hasselblad gear about 2 years ago and was changing lenses from a 40mm ($4000) to another focal length. Not being a terribly coordinated person to begin with, the 40 slipped out of my hands, fell to the pavement (about 4 1/2 feet). I caught it on the first bounce and actually teared up! After cursing myself for about a minute, I gingerly opened up my hands to find a perfectly fine lens looking back at me. I had it checked by my service guy who told me that there was absolutely nothing wrong with the lens!!!

I have successfully used it since then with no problems at all.

Like I said, they bounce!

Randy

[The']

Worst thing I've done to my S2 is taking a blower to the CCD--cleaning it. When the blower did not do the job, I used Johnson cotton swabs w/out any cleaning solution--just use it dry as it comes out of the box. The key thing is make sure you don't even touch the cotton itself. Touching it may leave hand oil on the cotton, and in turn, that might leave streak on your CDD. So far, I have been able to get all the dust of in 3 different cleanings.
I am thinking really hard if I would need a $30 Eclipse cleaning swab ???

The key things here is to clean it as soon as you see any dust on your CDD. The longer you leave the dust the more chance it will set in w/ moiture and would be harder to clean.

The'

[Jess]

My F4 saved my face (just a split lip) when I collected a cricket ball bowled by Richard Hadley on the front of my new 2.8 400mm lens...........no damage to either camera or lens..ahhhhh

[MrFish]

Lent it to my wife and she won't give it back!!

[X-Sync]

A few years ago I dropped my Nikon FM2 down a rocky mountain track, it bumped and bobbled it way for about 10-15 metres. Said camera suffered no ill affects and is still working to this day. I would not be so confident about dropping my S2 in the same manor, however for some reason I keep dropping CF cards including microdrives so far I have been lucky, but it is a habit I need to break.

Happy Shooting

Simon

[PauHana]

I regularly beat up my speedotron flash equipment and wear out a tripod every other year or so. The worst equipment abuse was when riding a motorcycle in Thailand - fell off with an F3 around my neck. I had an SLR shaped bruise on my side for a month. It didn't work too well after that. I've only had the Fuji S2 for less than a year - give me time - I'll manage something!

[memobug]

The second worst thing:

I tried to pull off a "stubborn" flash unit without fully retracting the engagement pin. Not all flashes have this, but if you have a dial that locks the flash down, and a little pin that drops into the camera's hotshoe, you better be sure it's fully retracted.

(No damage done)

The worst thing I've done to my S2 so far:

I installed a proper screwlock pc cable, and inadvertently unscrewed the PC connector part way when I removed it. (Tom's been here too)

Regards,

Matt

[steve bingham]

Once had a Nikon N90 with a 300mm f4 tip over onto the dirt while photographing elk. Lost one very minor function, added a small crack in the case and the lens was fine. Continued for years after with no problems. I can only hope that the S2 is as solid!!!!!!!!

Oh yeah, dropped a Minolta over a waterfall when I was 20. And that was that.

[Tom V]

While traversing slippery water-slicked rocks near a babbling creek/waterfall in the Blue Ridge Mountains (North Carolina), I offered to carry my wife's camera bag so she wouldn't drop it.

She didn't drop it - I did. Right in the creek, and the fast-running water carried several of the lenses up to 100 feet downstream. It took about 20 minutes to recover everything.

It took some time to get the soaked lenses serviced, so it did not surprise when they slowly died a few years later.