This might be a great "learning curve" type of thing. What is the dumbest thing that you've ever done while photographing. I was reading a book by famous "LIFE" magazine photographer Alfred Eisenstaedt, and he had a short section featuring mistakes he has made in his many years. A lot of people think professionals are flawless, but he makes no bones about the times he screwed up. The chapter was meant not to laugh at, but to educate... let someone else do the dumb thing, and learn from their mistake. In that vein, with all of the experience we have in this forum, we should get some good stories... and ultimately prevent some of the other readers from emulating our errors.

My story: In the 1980's I was living in Anchorage, Alaska and was going to a winter carnival called Fur Rendezvous. It is a famous celebration from the old pioneer days, when trappers finished for the year and came to town to celebrate. I was using two cameras... one with a wide angle, and the other with a tele. I was preparing my gear when my shooting buddy knocked on the door, and off we went. It was February in Alaska... freezing; but our anticipation was high for good picture making.

The photo opportunities were excellent... sled dogs, sub zero sky divers, movie and TV stars... images still frozen in my mind. I was using my long lens most of the time and looked down...34 exposures. There was a loll in the action, so I decided to burn through the remaining couple of shots so I could get a fresh roll into the camera before things picked up. One shot, two, three... I anticipated the wind lever locking up. I've always got a shot or two past the normal thirty six, but this was amazing. I bragged to my friend... "man, I really loaded this this good!" After the frame counter stopped turning, and I was still going strong, a sick feeling settled as I turned the rewind crank which offered no resistance...AAAGGGHHH!!! Every shot lost! When my friend knocked on my door... he broke my though process. I loaded the wide angle camera... but not the tele.

To this day, Nikon or Leica, I am constantly turning the rewind crank to assure tension. I can still see those shots in my mind 17 years later. The worst thing was returning home to see the film I thought I'd loaded setting on the table... seemingly laughing at me.

-- Al Smith (smith58@msn.com), September 29, 2000

Answers

That's a pretty good anecdote, Al.

Off the top of my head, while not actually photographing, I once put Photo-Flo into my fixer thinking it was hardner (similar bottles). Really irked myself because I do all the mixing first, then start the development. So during development, I had to remix the fixer and I got all stressed out and well... needless to say, I pay attention to my chemical bottles. I wonder if it would have hurt anything? I can probably think of more things. Will be interesting to read further responses.

-- Tony Rowlett (rowlett@alaska.net), September 29, 2000.

I can't remember a particular award winning "the dumbest thing", but have probably done just about all the classic dumb things at one point or another. I have certainly shots a roll of air on several occasions. I have just plain forgot to focus the Leica numerous times, and of course I have a nice selection of photos of the inside of a lens caps from some of my range finder cameras. Lets see, can't forget to mention forgetting to set the correct ASA. One of my favorites still is not having the camera wound to the next frame, and going for the shutter during some perfect fleeting moment and getting zippo. See, this is why they now make these fool proof loading, auto DX indexing, auto focusing, built in winding, lens cap warning cameras. Dumbness inspired engineering.

-- Andrew Schank (aschank@flash.net), September 29, 2000.

The standard three LEICA disasters: 1)the horrible realization at about frame 42 that the film wasn't advancing on the most important roll you've ever taken, 2) The problem with collapible lenses is that one has to remember to extend them BEFORE making the pictures when your girlfriend finally agrees to a few nuddie shots, and 3) There is, unfortunately, not always someone around to ask "why didn't you take the lens cap off," making you feel like a total asshole, which at least is (usually) better than discovering a blank frame on the negative and you have no idea what you did wrong.

-- Bill Mitchell (bmitch@home.com), September 30, 2000.

How about the most recent thing? Last week on vacation I shot my last shot on a roll in a sunny spot, and immediately rewound the film, intending to change it when I got to shade. Forgot. Over the next two days I exposed about 50 more shots on the pressure plate. I don't think I've done that in about 20 years or so, by the way, so at least it's not habitual.

-- Michael Darnton (mdarnton@hotmail.com), September 30, 2000.

Michael, Maybe you could pop off the pressure plate and sent in for developing. Now if they could come out with a digital chip imbedded in the pressure plate that stores digital images if there is no film present...like a fail safe system on airplanes.

-- Andrew Schank (aschank@flash.net), September 30, 2000.

I'm new to the Leica M6, but unfortunately I can already contribute more than my fair share of film loading/unloading disasters. Just last weekend, for example, I was shooting my friend's band playing live. I took a couple of rolls worth of pictures and then loaded a third. I shot this roll, but was a little concerned when I got up into the 40's on the exposure counter and the advance lever just kept going. Being new to the M6, however, I didn't know that this meant the film was not advancing, so I freaked out and just rewound the film!

Later, I developed all three rolls. The first two came out great, but the third emerged from the tank with nothing on the film but the familiar "Kodak TMZ" markings--a telltale sign that the film had been developed correctly but that it had never been exposed in the camera. I guess that explained why the fixer looked so weird when I poured it out: I wasn't just taking some of the silver off of the film--I was taking all of it off!

Oh well, I learned my lesson: always watch that rewind crank to make sure it's turning when you advance!

Buzz

-- Buzz Andersen (landerse@du.edu), October 01, 2000.

If you all can put up with another boring story, this has application for rangefinder users. A friend couple of mine told me they were going to have photos taken of their cute little girl at a super- store studio. I convinced them to let me shoot her first, promising better results... not so much technically, but in capturing the girl's true personality. They have seen my equipment, and figuring "cameras equal talent", they agreed.

On the day of the shooting, they were shocked to see me with my toy- like M6 and 50mm Summicron. They expected one of my motor driven monster SLRs and long zoom, so I had to explain the "Leica Legend", and then proceeded. I spent a bit of time sitting on the floor playing with the kid until she was comfortable. I raised the M6, focused on the eye, and shot 36 pictures at f2.0... seeing many great expressions and smiles... I was totally confident in the results. What a shock.... every picture out of focus. I superimposed the left eye into the right eye, setting the focus for 25 feet rather than the correct 5 feet. I later complimented the couple on the K-Mart pictures that hung on the wall. Ouch!

The lesson: Watch out for repeated patterns, (chain links, vertical blinds... eyes!), when focusing. Check the distance scale if in doubt. adjusting the RF for an object only a couple of inches from the true subject means many feet on the focusing distance

-- Al Smith (smith58@msn.com), October 01, 2000.

I regularly break the law (generally b&e and trespassing) to get interesting photographs. This probably wouldn't be so dumb if I didn't have a family.

-- Jeff Spirer (jeff@spirer.com), October 01, 2000.

When I first start processing B&W film in my appartement, I cut corner on equipment. I use those big "Jurassic Parc" McDonal plastic glass to mix my chemicals (One for each). One major advice; dont watch TV at the same tim

-- Eric Laurence (Edgar1976@hotmail.com), October 01, 2000.

Ah, now funny memories. Geez, the stuff I used to say to people when after spending a half hour with them I realized there was no film in the camera, or the Leica didn't load properly. "You know that shot we did earlier, I think I'd really like to do it again in color." or "uh oh, I'm not sure that other camera was working right, we better do that ----- shot again. Here are two other mistakes that commonly happen in the heat of battle.

1. Always put your gear back in your bag when working on location. I've had to go back to peoples houses a few times because when I got to the next assignment I was missing a lens or flash. You sit, talk, shoot, talk, get up, move around, shoot, talk, shoot, say goodbye and leave without a lens. Embarasing, when you go back they usually have the item standing by at the door. "We thought you'd be coming back for this." I even had to call people from the office. 'Hi, you know, I'm missing a lens and I was wondering if...'

2. I never carry the 'bug eyes' for my 50 dual range, but I occassionaly take pictures on the macro setting anyway, I swear I must have some kind of block or something, but I always forget to set the damn thing back to normal. The really frustrating thing is that the rangefinder will continue to work 'normally' with the lens set in this position. I can't tell you the interesting pictures I've made with the lens set like this and oh the ones that were missed! Anybody got a simple reminder for this one?

-- Dennis Lee (captdennislee@earthlink.net), October 01, 2000.

Dennis, my DR can't be switched into close-up mode without the BE in place -- that's what the little spring-loaded ball is for. I think yours needs adjustment.

-- Bill Mitchell (bmitch@home.com), October 02, 2000.

Forgetting my camera bag was not in the car, and reversing over it...Amazingly nothing was damaged, only the bag.

-- Robin Smith (rsmith@springer-ny.com), October 02, 2000.

Years ago I was shooting a friend's softball game with her K1000. I'd used that camera many times, but sure enough, the film was NOT going through the camera this time. I missed the entire game. Man, was she pissed.

I don't have a Leica, but I have forgotten about parallax while shooting with a rangefinder. I go back and forth between slr (35mm) and rangefinder (6x7), so I suspect I will make this mistake again. :^(

-- Steven Hupp (shupp@chicagobotanic.org), October 02, 2000.

...switching from 35mm to medium format, from Contax S2 to Pentax 67. It was a disaster for me, and I have spent the last year or so trying to get as comfortable, and then some, as I was with the S2. I would never buy another S2, though, in effort to rectify even that camera's shortcomings given my style of shooting. I have hardly shot in over a year, until I discovered a cheap little Olympus SP35. And now, hopefully, the addition of a Leica will restore my faith in photography...boo hoo...

-- shawn (shawngibson_prophoto@yahoo.com), October 02, 2000.

I already told my film loading mistakes. The good thing is that it does not happen again since then. The other dumb thing is that I try to use my Leica M6 like my previous Nikon F4 (I do not own now). I tried to focus with moving objects. Nothing works. I should prefocus or just set the distance and shoot.

-- kenny Chiu (amchiu@worldnet.att.net), October 02, 2000.

I forgot to mention that I shoot almost a roll in 'B' with flash on. Not to mention that many times not to set '1/50' for flash. My flash is not big but big enough to cover the speed dial.

-- Kenny Chiu (amchiu@worldnet.att.net), October 02, 2000.

Two years ago, start of the final leg of the Whitbread Around-The-World race in Annapolis. Three cameras with me.

I had a new Hexar loaded with ISO 800 print film. No way was this working out with a max shutter speed of 1/250. Then I remember that I read somewhere that you could rewind the Hexar with the leader out. No problem, I'll shoot the 800 film in one of the other cameras. Start the mid-role rewind, wait for it to finish, open the camera, the leader is rewound all the way into the casette. Strike one.

SLR with telephoto lens. Shooting the yachts at the starting line. Shooting the Concorde fly-over. Shooting the crowds on the bay bridge. Hmm I wonder why I'm past 36 on the frame counter. A few more frames later, the horrible truth dawns on me. Open the SLR, no film loaded. Strike two.

Thank god I had the M6. Congratulated myself on having rewound the film immediately after finishing the role so there'd be no chance of any screw-up. Opened the M6 to retrieve the film. Had NOT rewound the film! Strike three.

I got a few printable frames from the M6 anyway.

-- Joe Buechler (jbuechler@toad.net), October 02, 2000.

Okay. Here is my dumb story. After getting out of the Navy my friend and I (both 20 years old) decided to create a local Arts and Entertainment magazine. We would list concert dates, times, and ticket prices for musical artists coming into the area, amoung other things. We had decided to "cover" the Greg Allman concert as a feature article for the upcoming issue. The writer and I attended the concert and fought our way backstage telling the handlers how we needed to interview Greg Allman or our "boss" would fire us. Well, much to our surprise, all of our pleading worked. We were led back to Greg Allman's dressing room and started to do the "interview". As I thumbed the film advance I felt, much to my horror the film break loose from the end of the cassette. I had brought only two rolls of film (all I could afford) and this was the second roll and I had no unexposed frames available. I just continued to crank and click like there was nothing wrong all the time knowing there was no film. Since that day I always bring more film with me than I'll ever use whenever I shoot.

Regards,

Jim

-- J.L.Kuhn (james.kuhn-1@kmail.ksc.nasa.gov), October 03, 2000.

"Dumb" in my definition would mean to act against better judgment, or disregarding judgment altogether and hope for the best. So I guess I qualified when I rented a flash generator with two heads and umbrellas to photograph my sisters wedding. I decided that there was "no wind" outside and set up the flash heads on a lawn placed on rather flimsy light stands. Sure enough, after a while there was this horrible sound when the umbrella to the right of me were smashed against the ground. That was rather dumb of me but the really stupid decision was that "it will probably not happen to the other one, no one can be that unlucky". I was kind of blocked, photographing under stress just before the ceremony. Well of course the other umbrella crashed to the ground as well, making both $80 umbrella useless. Well, at least the umbrellas protected the flash heads...

-- Peter Olsson (peter.olsson@lulebo.se), October 06, 2000.

Well, It takes a wise man to leran from his mistakes, and a genius to learn from the mistakes of others. For you geniuses out there, I'll try and relate what things I've done that have hopefully made me wiser.

Make sure the lens on your Canon FD camera is carefully bayonetted to the camera. It's really easy to get it on there, but not have the diaphram pin engaged, which means the lens won't stop down.

It's easy to take a picuture of the inside of your lenscap with a Leica. This most wonderful of 35mm cameras is also the most unforgiving. It does exactly what you tell it to, including taking a picture of the inside of your lenscap.

ALWAYS check that the film is winding when you wind the camera. I once mis-loaded one of my Canons, and only realized my error when I was on about frame 50. Arrgggggg!

If you shoot ISO 50 film as if it were ISO 800, you'll have horrible results.

Focus carefully. My SLRs often let me down here. Focus twice, shoot once. I loathe autofocus for this. It's almost perfect 90% of the time, but it focuses on the wrong thing the other 10% of the time.

Never sell a good lens. I'm still kicking myself for parting with a 50mm f/1,9 macro-Switar on an Alpa 6C. It did something special with colors, they seemed more vibrant with that lens. You have to got to go through quite a few lenses before you figure this one out. My best current lens is a 90mm f/2.5 Vivitar in Canon FD mount. Who'd have suspected *Vivitar*? Yes the Leica lenses are also superb, but at that price, one expects perfection.

Try to have a camera with you any time you expect to see something worth seeing again. My dumbest errors are ones of omission, not having the Leica along for a decisive moment.

-- Tom Bryant (tbryant@wizard.net), October 06, 2000.

During one summer vacation during my university days, I travel to Shandong province to the famous Thai Mountain. I loaded up my Leica and climbed the stairs to the South Heaven Gate. The scenery along the way was excellent, I took many pictures along the way and stayed over night at a monastery at the peak of the mountain. The monks fed us with vegetarian noodles. The next morning, I arose early to get good spot to shoot sunrise on the Thai Mountain. I got many nice shots. I took the west route down, there were great scenes too. I took about thirty pictures. I boarded another train to Nanking, visited the famous Dr. Sun Yat Sen Tomb. Finised the rest To my horor, I found that the film was'nt advanced ! All my Mountain Thai pictures were never taken ! Yes, some day, I shall go back to the Thai Mountain with my Leica and wait for the sun rise over the "Ocean of Clouds"

-- martin tai (martin.tai@capcanada.com), October 07, 2000.

After the legs acking Thai Mountain 'aerial photography' expedition, I always make sure when loading film to see that the rewind film crank turns. And 'film not wound' incident never happens again. Hoever, many years later, in Canada, I took another 'aerial photo' trip to Algonquin Park. It as Autumn, great color foliage season. I captured many good shots. But.... the Leica was empty, there was no film in it. I fogot to check check the film window at the back !

-- martin tai (martin.tai@capcanada.com), October 07, 2000.

I take a picture for 3 years, using Nikon FM2, and traveled many places inside and outside my country,Thailand. The thing I've ever done the dumbest was not load the film in the camera and always forget to adjust the aperture.

-- Jane (janeporn007@hotmail.com), June 11, 2001.

Dumb Mistake #1: Take the film out after rewinding in midroll; reinsert later; on reloading it, overlook my notes slipped into the film can, and start shooting as if it were a fresh roll, from frame #1.

#2: At the completion of development, pop the top off the tank before the stop bath & fixer. In full roomlight.

#3: Experiment with a developer of my own concoction on a roll that had a shot I've never since been able to duplicate. Result: dramatic but too grainy.

-- Bob Fleischman (RFXMAIL@prodigy.net), June 13, 2001.

Open the paper box to count how many sheets are left. Then notice the lights are on...

-- John Hicks (jbh@magicnet.net), June 13, 2001.

1. Use an incident meter and forget to set the appropriate shutter speed in addition to aperture. Happens often :-(

2. Crank film wind lever, and fail to notice the film is not winding until frame 40.

3. Use the same, special purpose film (tungsten, high speed chrome) twice, because I rewound it in the middle and forgot later it was partially used.

4. Forget to focus.

All still happen occasionally with the Leica M6. And everytime I tell myself maybe I should switch to a modern, DX coding, autoload, auto everything SLR.

-- Mani Sitaraman (bindumani@pacific.net.sg), June 13, 2001.

You made me remember Mani, I had this in my subconcient, I was hire by a local museum to make some reproductions of a paint exposition that was set; I took my 6x6 and bougth the few rolls of chrome and color negative 120 film that I could find in town; my life as a profesional photographer has come so down that I belived 160T was a new kind of film, when I saw the blue slides, the exposition was a thousand miles from town, so getting slides from the original negatives cost as much as I was charging, after that I consider me an amatheur.

-- r watson (al1231234@hotmail.com), June 13, 2001.

I sold a Leica R4 to buy a Nikon F4 .BIGEST mistake I now have a R6 and M6

-- Tim (timphoto@ihug.com.au), August 17, 2001.

Back in the mid-60's my friend Bob & I got interested in photography. We didn't have a lot of money. We skimped on everything we could. In those days all Kodak 35mm canisters were re-usable, so it made great sense to buy bulk film and load our own. We saved our pennies and bought a 100' roll of Tri-X.

We didn't need a bulk loader (couldn't afford one anyway) We had a light-tight darkroom with a work bench. We worked out a plan, arranged the spools, canisters, caps, tape, scissors. We practiced with old film. We had it down cold.

First time thru we decided to load only four rolls then revisit the plan, tweek what needed tweeking, then do the 20 or so remaining rolls.

The "dress rehersal" was easy. Everything went perfectly. Only problem was we left one step out of the plan: PUT THE BULK ROLL BACK IN ITS CAN BEFORE TURNING ON THE LIGHT.

You've seen the movie "Dumb & Dumber"? Bob actually looks a little like Jim Carey, now that I think about it.

You'd be surprized how little light penetrates a tightly wound bulk roll of Tri-X. We had to use that film, and pretty quickly we learned to frame a little extra on the bottom/right so we could crop out the fog.

Bob went on the get an MFA and worked in the business ever since, far as I know. Last time I shot film with him (maybe 15 years ago) we both still had the urge to leave a little extra around the edges.

-- Jeff Stuart (jstuart1@tampabay.rr.com), August 17, 2001.

Drove over my camera bag. Crushed a lens shade and virtually powdered two Leitz filters. Fortunately, the cameras themselves were not damaged--I guess I backed off before it was too late.

I have been in photography for 40 years and yet I still occasionally forget to put film in the camera. I have had the top fall off a developing tank, put film in the developer only to realize that I had no fixer in the house, and once developed film in Dektol by mistake.

I have learned the hard way not to brag about my work until AFTER I see the negatives--and then only modestly.

http://www.ravenvision.com/peterhughes.htm

-- Peter Hughes (ravenart@pacbell.net), August 17, 2001.

I have done all of the above but this incident was kind of dumb. A few years ago I started to do wedding photography with heavy emphasis on a photojournalistic style. This was to be my first wedding job ever and needless to say I was scared. I must have visited the wedding location at least 6 times before the actual wedding. Anyway everything went well. I was feeling high as a kite with my success. When I developed the film I was pleased and relieved to see that all the exposures were good and I had captured lots of nice moments. The only problem was that there were hardly any photographs of the groom! I was a bit worried about the bride's reaction but she was very pleased with the results and just said that her husband was not really in a picture taking mood that day! (of all days). Anyway I learned a valuable lesson and somehow learning a lesson lessens the pain of stupidity!

Gail

-- Gail Hammer (gail@hammerphotography.com), August 22, 2001.

Trading an R4 for a Nikon may be bad but I traded an almost new M2 for an Ft. I've regretted it for decades. Funny thing is that not one of the four Nikon F's that I eventually owned ever had a viewfinder to match the Visoflex II that went with the M2.

A brand new SL/2 eased the pain!

-- Bud Cook (budcook@attglobal.net), August 22, 2001.