The weather sealing fantasy

Jamie123 said:
Ah, now I get your point. Yes, there are quite a few people who have this ''macho'' attitude towards their gear. They think not taking care of their equipment show's that they're serious about photography and it makes them feel like they're tough war photographers.
Personally, I take care of my equipment as much as I can. I might want or have to sell something down the line and the better it looks the more I can get for it. Of course I would never compromise the integrity of my work when I'm on a job just to pamper my gear but, as I usually work in very friendly environments, that's hardly ever a concern.

Now as for weathersealing, I do think that it's a reasonable concern with electronic devices. Corrosion occurs much faster than you'd think. Often the device continues working but in time it adds up.
Let's take mobile phones as an example. A while back I saw a news segment about how Apple in my country refused to repair iPhones under warranty due to water damage even though they were fully functional had been sent in for other reasons like a loose button on the side. Apparently almost every mobile phone that has ever been used outside on a rainy day (even if it didn't get wet) has minor corrosion inside due to humidity. Most people get a new mobile phone every two years so it probably never gets to a point where it's a problem but cameras are a different matter as we'd all like them to last for a long time.
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Now, the mobile 'phone story is intriguing, and probably accounts for the increasingly erratic behaviour of my own mobile 'phone -- though it is a good few years old now, as I bought it before I left the UK in 2002. What we need now is a camera repairer to tell us if the same thing is true of digital cameras - and if so, of which digital cameras. I wonder, too, if the humidity may not be the result of 'phones being kept in humid pockets.

It also occurs to me that actually, many autofocus film SLRs had a truly impressive amount of electronics inside them, as do light meters, and that the only problem I've personally encountered is bad switches: if the SLR or meter wasn't used for several months, you might have to operate the release or reading button several times before it worked reliably. This leaves me somewhat less convinced that digital cameras really are all that different from film cameras. Sure, they may be; but I'd be interested to hear more evidence of their actually dying, rather than 'fear factor'.

Cheers,

R.
 
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rxmd said:
What, that soaked electronics may be beyond recovery? This is definitely not the fear factor. I've lost a Leica digital compact and several other pieces of electronics that way over the years.

Often it's not really frying itself as much as having conductive residues in the water that are left after drying, leaving conductive paths on the circuit boards in places where they shouldn't be. Sometimes I got things back to work by cleaning them using alcohol etc., but not always.
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No, I know that's the case. But there's a big difference between soaking a camera and using it in the rain, which was the original question: has anyone actually had an M8/M9 or other good-quality professional camera die from being used (sensibly) in the rain?

Cheers,

R.
 
Unsealed....

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Years ago I moved an old CPM computer into the basement, a Xerox 820-II. The basement was pretty much the cat's domain. Nina asked a technical question that could only be explained by wiring up two computers with an O-Scope between them. The cat, Nina's favorite, vied for her attention- was annoyed that the computer was getting it.

Later that night, as we were sleeping, the cat peed into the keyboard. I cleaned it out with alchohol, it worked fine after that. Try not to let cats pee into your electronics, but if they do- clean them as quickly as you can.
 
I am confused..... weather sealing that stops dust is valid and not in fantasy land, but the ones that stops water is a macho fantasy thing we do not need?

I have had 2 cameras that have been affected by dust/sand, 1 died the other one needed to have the lens or the sensor replaced. But since it was not water or rain I guess that does not count, still confused
 
Got dust into the lens of a Pentax MZ-5 some years back and ruined it. Went all graunchy and crunched when focusing, seized... all sorts.

Its real. Only a tiny minority really put cameras through serious weather tests on a regular basis but for pros working in rain, sleet, snow, dust and heavy rain regularly i dont think there is any substitute. There i no comparison between most amateur users and the requirements of pros who, for example, would regularly photograph while helicopters are moving and vehicles kicking up dust (gets into everything) and standing in pouring rain.
 
I'm reasonably careful to protect my cameras from rain, but not to the extent that I will miss a shot. My K10 pentax has been hit by beer and sweat more than once when shooting in the pit at concerts I wipe it down and keep shooting. If I was lucky enough to own an M9 it wouldn't be my concert camera though.
as for resilience of the old cameras my first camera was a Zenit. I shot ski racing with it in the middle of Blizzards, Football from the bench in the rain and mud (dropped it in puddle more than once after dodging being hit by a running player) and it never failed surprisingly enough
I doubt i would risk any camera i couldn't replace easily in the same scenarios though
 
Not a camera but... about 14 years ago I blew a sizeable chunk of a book advance on a laptop computer which, back in those pioneering days, was about £2000. I'd been happily using it for a few months and was actually sitting on a sofa in my living room downloading emails on the impressive, built-in, 28.8kbps modem, when my two year old son spilled most of his plastic beaker of Ribena into it. It stopped working with an audible 'pffst' sound. Undaunted, I took the battery out and set the computer to dry in an airing cupboard for 48 hours, and it worked fine afterwards particularly after I'd got a technician to clean up the keyboard properly.

Which proves... not very much. Except that I would suggest that consumer electronics are often more robust than we would usually give them credit for, and that if you look after them, environmental factors shouldn't be too much of an issue.
 
Turtle said:
Its real. Only a tiny minority really put cameras through serious weather tests on a regular basis but for pros working in rain, sleet, snow, dust and heavy rain regularly i dont think there is any substitute.
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Even for pros there is no substitute for rain covers unless the job is so well paid that it covers sending in the inundated gear for service right after the event.
 
Here in the U.S. and elsewhere, four-wheel drive vehicles are sold on TV with video of them racing over wild hills and canyons, miles from the nearest road. Almost no one who buys the things ever takes them off the highway. But the fantasy commercials sell them.

Yet, for people who need them, they are indispensable.

As an amateur, I wouldn't mind if my cameras were really weather sealed, but it is not at all indispensable. Unless I'm caught in a sudden storm, I'm simply not going to be out in weather bad enough to threaten a camera. Perhaps I'm a weather wimp, but there you go.

So, I wouldn't avoid a camera because it is sealed, but I would not buy one for that reason, either.

Professionals and others who cannot, or will not, simply decide to stay indoors need weather sealing.

Bob's comment about sweat damaging the shutter mechanism on his Zeiss Ikon makes me wonder if humidity is more of a potential threat than we might imagine. After all, most cameras are made in countries that are not known for being muggy. [EDIT: On second thought, that's doubtful. But, the point remains. Protecting a camera from rain and dust is not the same as protecting a camera from humidity.] I wonder about the long-term impact of alternating a camera between a warm humid environment and a cool dry air conditioned environment.

As for dust storms, unless you are a pro on an assignment, if you are outside in a dust storm taking pictures, someone should probably take the camera away from you. 🙂
 
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For those who still don't get it, or are 'confused', here is the original question:

How many M8/M9 users have had their cameras written off by rain? Or, indeed, any other camera written off by rain or spray?

And from post 51:

The point about dust is entirely reasonable, which is why I specifically referred to rain; the thread was prompted by the thread asking who uses their cameras in the rain.

No-one denies that weather sealing is a good idea. Nor does anyone deny that for a war reporter photographing a helicopter taking off in the desert, it is pretty much essential. I'm just trying to find it if it is quite as important as some people seem to think in normal use, or whether they're buying into a fantasy.

Bill's comment about fantasy selling 4WDs is a good illustration of the same thing. Personally I can't quite see the point of running a serious 4WD unless you go off road sometimes, but even if you do, it's mostly still fantasy: I don't need to go exploring abandoned Spanish villages accessible only via washed-out roads, or driving on Hungarian logging roads, but it's something I do from time to time.

My suspicion is that many people buy weather-sealed cameras on the basis of pure fantasy. Some buy them 'just in case' (which is fine), but others, frightened that their 'non-weather-sealed' cameras wouldn't stand up to perfectly normal usage, are scared out of using those cameras because they think that only 'weather-sealed' cameras can be used in the rain.

And, to repeat, some buy weather sealed cameras because they really need them, just as some people really need Land Rovers. But quite a lot of people are either buying a fantasy, or are scared off using other cameras because of that fantasy.

No-one has yet answered (or indeed attempted to answer) the original, very clear question: How many M8/M9 users have had their cameras written off by rain? Or, indeed, any other camera written off by rain or spray?

Cheers,

R.
 
do you have a snorkel on your landrover? When I bought mine the salesman tried to sell me one. I made him give me me a better discounted price on the landy just for the insult or I'd go buy it somewhere else.
 
No-one has yet answered (or indeed attempted to answer) the original, very clear question: How many M8/M9 users have had their cameras written off by rain? Or, indeed, any other camera written off by rain or spray?
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Because it is a huge minority of people, even member here, who actually have these cameras, never mind as you imply, members with them who actually use them in conditions where it actually matters if they are sealed or not.
 
tlitody said:
do you have a snorkel on your landrover? When I bought mine the salesman tried to sell me one. I made him give me me a better discounted price on the landy just for the insult or I'd go buy it somewhere else.
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You should have asked him to allow you to test drive it with the snorkel under water and then go to another dealer to buy the vehicle.
 
tlitody said:
do you have a snorkel on your landrover? When I bought mine the salesman tried to sell me one. I made him give me me a better discounted price on the landy just for the insult or I'd go buy it somewhere else.
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Quite. As you might guess, no, I don't. Yes, I ford rivers occasionally (there's supposed to be a piece scheduled in a couple of months in Land Rover World called 'Fords and Land Rovers'). But to need a snorkel, you've got to be doing something pretty extreme -- the Land Rover equivalent of photographing helicopers landing in a desert, from close up.

Cheers,

R.
 
But sealed lenses and camera body seem like a good idea to me. The only disadvantage I see is cost. Do I need it? Mostly not. Might it occasionally save my equipment from water damage? Yes. Is it worth having? Probably. What else is there to say? My guess is a lot. Will it be worth hearing? We'll see....
 
To be frank, I don't use my M9 under conditions which require me to worry about weather sealing. It's more of a "people-shooter" camera for me.

If I'm going to be shooting landscapes, etc, outdoors, I grab my E-3, sorry to say. For one, I prefer the more precise framing of an SLR when I'm doing this kind of work. And yes, the E-3's weather sealing comes in very handy at times.

And let's face it: I'm not comfortable with possibly destroying a $7,000 camera, when I have a cheaper SLR that will do the job better, under the circumstances...
 
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