Phew

Phew, originally uploaded by See Shel's Photography.

There is so much I love about being a photographer - meeting new people, snuggling itty bitty babies, doing something I totally adore - and then there's that little evil side of it.

Technology.

Along with all the great things digital photography has brought us comes with it some nastiness - which I got to witness first hand this week-end. Unfortunately with any digital device it isn't "if" it fails - it's when it fails. Because of this I take precautions daily to help minimize the damage.

I back everything up to not one but 2 external hard drives as well as DVDS (which are stored off site), I maintain my PC in good health, I have a backup camera and lenses, I keep my main camera and lenses clean and in great working condition, I am always careful with my memory cards, reformatting them to all specifications, replacing them yearly -----

And even with all of this I had an incredibly stressful 48 hours. On Monday I went to download the week-end's sessions like I do every week- the first few went as they normally do - then I popped in the next card and the dreaded words came up "Corrupt file" - 262 corrupted file. (turned out it was my new card reader. It has since met with the head of my hammer in the garage)

That's not good.

So off to my favorite store - Don's Photo to emplore the help of my friends there. No promises, but they were going to try their best.

I got back home and took the memory card from the last session - and received a HORRIBLE error message (didn't use the card reader this time!) - the card DIED. My barely 3 month old memory card did what is like a 1 in 200,000 chance - all less than 30 minutes of the other card! Totally fluke that it happened - and that it happened on the same day? I should have bought a lottery ticket.

Off to Don's I went again - and just 30 minutes ago I returned back with every single photo retrieved - thank the good Lord!

Even though it was un-preventable on my part, I do everything I can, technology fails and I'm just hoping I've had my failure for the year and will be good to go now. ;0

And while we're on it - please, PLEASE go and back up your photos to a disc or external hard drive today - set it up to run during diner or a television show tonight - nothing is more heartbreaking than losing months (or years!) of photos!