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Sony A850 mirror got loose during wedding shoot!

& Wedding photographer became unglued….

Maybe I should say that my Sony DSLR camera mirror got unglued during the last weekend while I was shooting a wedding at the White Chapel Estate in North Richland Hills, TX and it was really a no issue at all.

As a professional wedding photographer I have had my fair share of equipment malfunctions and mishaps during the last couple of years, but this one was a new one for me.

While I was taking the formal group portraits of the families and the wedding party, my camera view finder got completely dark, I thought for a second that I had engaged the mirror lock up or bumped some settings, but I realized very quickly that the camera had malfunctioned. It was now time to put my back up camera to work, I don't think the party noticed that something went wrong when I had to change the camera body, so I was back in business in an instant! This is why professional wedding photographers carry back up equipment. It’s just a matter of time before a piece of your equipment decides to "take a break". I can't understand how some "budget photographers" shoots weddings with only one camera and flash, what a foolish and an irresponsible gamble!

Now I have to send in my camera to Sony for repair in a hurry and get it back in time for next wedding. I never shoot a wedding without at least 3 camera bodies, 3 flashes, several lenses and countless of backups. Call me paranoid but I have learned from experience and from my former job as an airline pilot to always plan for worst case scenarios and have a solid back up plan if "something hits the fan", so to speak.

Below you can see how the camera mirror has separated from the mirror box, it's only attached with a few points of glue, doesn't seem to me a like a very solid solution for a pro camera, but it's not only Sony that has this kind of problems, the Canon 5D Mark II has been recalled in the past for this type of problem, I guess it's a cost cutting issue.

I was tempted to glue it back myself and save some serious time and "mula", but I will leave it to the Sony repair center to use the right glue, adjustments and cleaning equipment to get it done right.

Sony A850 mirror wedding malfunction

One Response to “Sony A850 mirror got loose during wedding shoot!”

  1. Kim Pham says:

    Hi! I just read your post about your mirror coming loose on your Sony A850. I have the same camera and the same thing happened to me on my Quinceanera Ceremony shoot. I wanted to ask how much did Sony charge you for fixing it? And did your camera come back in good condition?

    Thanks!

Leave a Reply to Kim Pham