I recently went to Brands Hatch to do some motorsport photography. It happened on numerous occasions that my camera did not want to trigger. I had to press the trigger button twice to take a photo. I missed great picture opportunities because most of the pictures are blank. I used a Sigma 75-300mm lens and the setting on the camera was on the sport setting. Sometimes I even had problems with the auto-focusing. Any help will be appreciated. Thanks

-- Theunis du Plessis (tjdoep@meganmary.freeserve.co.uk), April 03, 2002

Answers

Do you mean that the camera wouldn't fire at all? (no clicking and whirring) Perhaps it hadn't achieved focus and you were in one-shot mode.

But then you say that most of the pictures were "blank". Do you mean that the camera clicked and the motor drive whirred, but the photos turned out black? If so, perhaps you have oil on your shutter curtain - have a look inside the camera.

-- NK Guy (tela@tela.bc.ca), April 03, 2002.

I've set my camera on servo mode. Sometimes I had to press the trigger twice before I could hear it trigger. It was as if it was working in slow-motion.It definitely advanced to the next frame on the film and that was why I thought that it did take the photo. I did look for oil but could not find any.

-- Theunis du plessis (tjdoep@meganmary.freeserve.co.uk), April 04, 2002.

I had the same problem. Shutter one. On to Canon lab (150$ - ouch...) and it was fixed. Also, compatibility problem may be raising it's ugly head. Sigma is especially notorious in this field.

-- Yakim Peled (yakim.peled@orange.co.il), May 14, 2002.