Late June I was taking photos at the Pride Parade in Toronto. It was raining prior to the parade, but I was still taking photos in the rain with my K20D and Pentax DA* 16-50mm. After about 2 hours in the rain the camera started showing some small signs of trouble - camera taking at the moment it is turned on, and unresponsive buttons and autofocus. I was frantically drying the camera because the parade would be starting in 30 min. Fortunately for me, just as the rain stopped, the parade started, and my camera suddenly started working again. Too bad I don't have any photos that showed how wet the camera got or how heavy the rain was.
Now just three days ago I was taking photos for school's frosh week, and one of the traditions that we do is a downtown walkaround and having a water fight in the water fountain at Nathan Phillips Square in front of Toronto Citty Hall. I thought I would use my backup K10D, and the Pentax DA* 16-50mm combo, this way if anything happens to the K10D I still have my main camera.
Here is the intensity of the water fight (this was shot in the middle of the fountain at 16mm and cropped to around 5.5mp, so I was actually close to the water fight, not staying on the side of the fountain):
You can also check out the rest of the photos here:
F!rosh Week 0T9 - a set on Flickr
Basically, the combo lasted a good 10 minutes before it started showing some signs of trouble - camera constantly on (whether switch ON or OFF), and unresponsive buttons. I quickly got out of the water and dried my equipment with a dry towel. The camera was still showing signs of trouble for the next 2 days, including constant ON (still), and camera date reset everytime it's turned on. By the end of the 2 days, all these problems finally went away. The lens suffered a bit of condensation just inside the front elements, but I put it under the sun and now all the fogginess is gone and no signs of mold or anything.
CONCLUSION
- Pentax system is very water-resistant - or at least you should be confident enough. Most people in the last two situations (actually, no one for the second situation) would even take out their DSLRs. And if they did, chances are, they might die pretty pretty fast.
- Still need to be very careful and watch out for how wet your environment is to adjust how long you should stay in there. It will still fail when the threshold is reached.
- Dry the camera whenever you have the chance, to make it last even longer.
- Taking photos at a water fight = bad idea. Not that the camera might fail, but I choked on water too many times
- It feels good to walkaround in the rain or a water fight and have people look at you unbelievably
Just to share my stories
Last edited by DroolingCrow; 09-08-2009 at 04:04 PM.
Reason: typos