When Your Camera stops focusing at a wedding!

Have you ever wondered the difference between an amateur photographer, and a seasoned professional? Being prepared for anything is only something that comes with experience! Let me tell you what recently happened to me with my camera equipment at a recent beach wedding I was photographing.

Towards the end of the ceremony, shortly after the exchange of rings and sand ceremony leading up to the moments of the magical kiss, my go-to Canon 28-300 zoom on my Canon Mark IV stopped focusing due to some sort of mysterious barrel mount malfunction! Yikes!! I quickly tried some adjustments to no avail. I guess for once my paranoia of my camera crapping out mid ceremony finally paid off. Thankfully, I had my Mark II 24-70 on my shoulder, which quickly came into action for the remainder of the ceremony and all the portraits that followed. Whew! I was so glad I always follow my instincts and have my backup camera on me with battery charged, good size memory card, and already preset for beach lighting.

If you don’t carry a back up camera ready to go, with back up flash, you can easily run into trouble. Keeping my composure when all this chaos went down, I didn’t want anyone to know what was happening. When prepping for any event, I tend to obsess about testing and packing up my gear, and for sure, I am glad I do just that, and will always do it!

I am hopeful it is a tiny screw that may have worked loose from the mount, but since this is my preferred beach lens (and I have quite a few beach weddings to photograph throughout the rest of the summer), that baby is heading to Canon for a full inspection! I never change a lens on a camera when outside, especially on the beach due to the inherent amount of dust and sand that can get on the camera sensor, so having multiple cameras with lens attached is a “Must DO” for any beach photographer!