You ever have one of those days? One where everything seems to be going wrong and nothing is going right? I had one of those today and on top of it all I think I have ANOTHER broken digital camera.
The first digital camera I had was a Kodak Easy Share. An old one, like 1.5MP. That thing was indestructable. It went everywhere, on the four wheeler, in the truck, everywhere. Then one day I decided to upgrade. Bought a newer Kodak, 2.5MP or so. Worked great until I tried to stick it under the seat on my ATV. The screen cracked. I used it for a while longer, but it was a pain.
So a couple years ago for Christmas I received a Canon Coolpix. Nice camera, shutter lag wasn’t bad, nice pictures. That was great until we went snow bashing earlier this year and I neglected to put it in it’s case. It fell from the seat to the floor of the truck and cracked another LCD screen. Tried to order a replacement off ebay and fix it, but after that it didn’t work at all.
Fortunately my Brother In Law bought my sister a new camera for Christmas and she didn’t need her old one. It’s a Kodak C763, and never was a very good camera. Pictures are good, but it is horribly slow and has the worst control panel on the back. There is this dial to select the mode, and it’s always in the wrong place. Anyway, she generously gave me this camera since I had broken mine and I’ve been using it. Last night I noticed that the flash wasn’t working. I charged the battery, checked the settings and looked for information on the Internet. It appears that I’m once again screwed. I couldn’t find any fixes for a bad flash, and I’m not going to take it apart to see if I can fix it. Of course, I’m in the middle of several projects and want to take pics for my offroad blog (http://www.bobsbadbinder.com) and now have no camera.
What’s needed is a ‘rugged’ camera like a Canon D10 or Olympus W90. These are a relatively new phenomenon, probably because it’s only been in the last few years that digital cameras have become so pathetic that they won’t stand up to the rigors of the real world. It’s a conspiracy, they all made flimsy cameras so they can come out with ‘rugged’ models and charge and extra $100.