The camera is alive!!
How? We´re not quite sure.
Glad? Yes we are.
Ok so after Angel falls we still could not get the camera to work. The tried and trusted approach of banging it on the side just wasn´t working, after that we were pretty stuffed on ideas. I know! Thump harder. STILL DIDN`T WORK.
The problem was that the lense would not stay open. This allowed us to view pictures that we had already taken but would not allow us to take new pictures. Only good if you wanted to live in the past, ha ha,,,,,ha. I´ve spent 3 of the last 4 days on busses ok people, bear with me!
So at our first attempts of fixing it resulted in the shutter then being stuck open as opposed to opening and then closing again. Hmm progress, I don´t think so. The resulting two days of banging and trying to move the shutter with our fingers didn´t work also. NASA would of been stuffed as well!
On to the internet and a bit of research revealed that this problem was common for our camera but no one had figured out how to fix it, ¨Don´t bother buy a new one¨ seemed to be the only response. Further research also revealed that the camera was no longer in warranty. Hmm not looking good.
Fortunately, or unfortunately depending on your view of the current situation and our handling of the affair so far, there was a hardware store right next door. Uh huh i´m sure you can guess what i was thinking. LETS PULL THIS SUCKER APART! The camera has a front plate seperate from the main body which i figured would give us a better view of the whole shutter mechanism. With the use of some dodgy allen keys we had managed to unscrew two of the three screws holding it down but the third one would not budge. SO CLOSE!
At this stage we had completely given up hope on the camera and it was pretty much taking a beating as when we were in doubt we would refer back to step one of our fixing electronic devices and smash the crap out of it. Hmm, still not working?? With two of the screws off we´ve pretty much bent the front plate up to give us a view of the insides. Unfortunately all that has been revealed is one screw holding the shutter in place. All the mechanical thingy ma bobbies (technical term, look it up!) are inside the camera further. Aargh. Oh well at least there is one screw we can play around with. Out comes this screw and off comes the shutter and another little bent piece metal that looked like it belonged. Still the camera would not work though. Wonder if we should try banging it!?! Nope still doesn´t work.
Giving up hope we connect the shutter and the little other piece of metal which we straightened out and put it all back together again. Working? Nope! How about if we bang it some more? Nope, still not working.
So arrive in Manaus we do and start the long and sad process of spending our precious money (which given the Aussie dollar at the moment is getting pretty thin) on a new camera. An afternoons research complete and with our brains full of useless info like megapixels and ISO noise and zoom ratios we wander back to our dungeon hostal ( more on that later) to rest and think things through.
Just to be a masochist like i am i take the camera out one more time and give it a bash, cause that should fix it! But it doesn´t and i start playing around with some other buttons on the camera. Holding it down i press and hold down the menu key. All of a sudden i feel a bit of whirring inside the camera and spinning it around i´m gobsmacked by the fact that the shutter is now closed. Trembling in anticipation i press the on button, IT`S ALIVE!! With Ange snoozing beside me i take a flash photo and she´s up in an instant in disbelief. Turning it on and off and it still works. With all our pulling it apart and super scientific repai methods of banging the crap out of it, IT STILL WORKS!
So that is the greatest story of resurrection ever told, Biblical figures? Bah! They got nothing on our camera. So with our fingers crossed we trek towards our final destnation with our trusty camera still at hand :)
