Sorry for the Group Email

Here is what may be a little-known fact about cameras.

Apart from Ferraris from forecourts, champagne into ocean liners, and Edwardian furniture off buildings, very few commodities lose their value faster. A second little-known fact about DSLRs is that, despite their promisingly-mechanical nature, economically repairing them is next to impossible. Indeed, ruin a DSLR comprehensively enough (easily done), and repairing it and buying a new one take on similar fiscal proportions.

So it was that I was morose in Kuala Lumpur. My beloved 350D was dead. Even worse, it wasn’t even my fault. If I had, say, killed it trying to get a Pulitzer-winning shot of a tiger in a jungle, it would have been fine. I could have lived with it. (Just.) As it was, a murderous freak wave took it between Thailand and Malaysia. It worked now and again for about four days, but with each frame the power switch became more and more temperamental. By the time we reached Kuala Lumpur it was finished, possibly helped on its way by the repeated stress of moving between the extreme heat and humidity of outdoors, and the chilled dryness of air-conditioned shopping malls.

In desperation, we visited Canon’s EOS Pro Center in the Berjaya Times Square Mall.

There, something remarkable happened. The Canon Pro Center is a Canon franchise dedicated to selling the company’s higher-end kit. The shelves were collapsing under a few hundred thousand pounds’ worth of professional lenses, DSLR bodies and lighting equipment. You had to ring a doorbell just to get them to unlock the plate glass door. I wanted one of everything they sold, but, they apologised, they didn’t do repairs.

But, even though I wasn’t about to buy anything, or indeed, spend any money at all, the chap behind the counter went out of his way. He fiddled about for a bit and confirmed that the camera did indeed appear fine, bar the power switch. Then, he called Canon’s service centre. By the time I left I had an appointment for the next morning, a signed note from the Pro Centre explaining that I was leaving the country in two days and needed a fix as soon as possible, and even the name of an engineer to ask for.

We arrived in the morning of the next day after a 45-minute taxi journey. The Canon service centre in Kuala Lumpur is a kind of hospital for sick kit. In the hour and a half we were there we saw people wander in cradling fax machines, scanners, printers, and one chap who brought in a rucksack full of what had to be about £10,000 worth of professional photography gear. We were seen immediately by a sympathetic-looking engineer who toted my camera behind the scenes. After a few minutes he emerged: it was the power switch. We bade him fix it and he vanished again.

Half an hour later he was back. The power switch in a 350D (you’ll doubtless be fascinated to learn) sits on an electronic assembly that also comprises the shutter switch, mode dial and auto-exposure lock and focus zone buttons. He replaced the entire thing, and brought the original, knackered one out with him.

It was certainly dead. The gold contact where the power switch did its business was a lumpy, corroded mess, further mangled by my repeated attempts to get the switch to work again.

But he had fixed it. Not only that, but, sweetly, he had cleaned the body, managing to remove a few scratches on the built-in flash that I had long presumed permanent. Even better: in a world in which consumer DSLRs are commodities, the entire fix – from broken lump of plastic and optics to fully-working tool – cost about £40.

Not cheap by Asian standards, but less than a new camera. Even if I was eyeing up 40Ds only half-reluctantly.

Dave should point out that at some point in the misadventure the dioptre got broken, but that is splitting hairs.

A list

Travelling – the kind with a capital ‘T’ – is unkind to cameras, yet even a low-end consumer model fares extraordinarily well. The following are a few of the things my 350D survived.

Manual “This camera is a precision instrument. Do not drop it or subject it to physical shock.”
Reality Dropped with significant bangs in Mongolia, China, and France. Bashed against countless walls, trapped in doors, and carried on to dozens of aircraft. It’s also a veteran of more than a few press conferences, in which shiny pieces of kit are routinely surrounded by fat, jostling hacks.

Manual
“This camera is not waterproof and cannot be used underwater.”
Reality
Thoroughly soaked in Thailand/Malaysia.
Snowed on in Russia.
Snowed on in Mongolia.
Rained on (torrentially) in Laos.

Manual
“If the camera is suddenly brought in from the cold into a warm room, condensation may form on the camera and internal parts.”
Reality
Every time we entered a building in Russia, Mongolia and Beijing.

Manual
“Working temperature range: 0°C - 40°C/32°F - 104°F.”
Reality
-20°C in Russia. -32°C in Mongolia. -5°C in China.
45°C in Vietnam.

This is all to say nothing of dozens (possibly hundreds) of cack-handed lens changes in idiotic locations (on boats, beaches, etc) and generally unsympathetic treatment. My camera has proved astonishingly robust, and the freak wave incident was the first time that my fears that it was badly hurt were actually realised. Even then, it limped on for a few days, producing no fewer than 340 exposures, before it gave up the ghost entirely. So, we say, “bravo” to Canon.