Shooting in the Snow - A Painful Experience

Finally, we got some of that white stuff yesterday evening. It was long overdue. So, being from the South, my wife and I thought we would celebrate by going to Dairy Queen and get a blizzard. As I left for work last night, I thought it would be a good idea to grab my camera to take some night shots of the snow after work. Well, the experience was a painful one to say the least. Here's the reason why. First, I forgot my tripod. Nothing is more frustrating than trying to capture a magical moment which demands long exposure without a tripod. I was forced to shoot at 1600 ISO which wasn't desirable, and I was holding my breath in hopes I could keep myself from shivering and shaking the camera. To add to the fun, I had low-ankle socks on, so it proved to be a very "cool" experience (sorry, I couldn't help it). After several attempts, I was able to get some great images (so I thought). Giddy as I was to post some images of my first real attempt to shoot snow, I hurried into the house and threw the CF card in my computer. Usually, a pop-up window appears giving options as to how you want to view the images. However, this did not happen. I repeat, this did not happen! So I rebooted the computer several times to no avail. I took the card and tried it back in the camera only to read "CF ERROR" on the LED and that all my images were corrupted and irretrievable. AAAARRRRGGGGHHHH!. With an ache in my heart, I had to reformat the card and delete all the photos. So sorry. Nothing to show of for my efforts today. Those 50+ images will have to been seen only in my memory. Oh well. I was told by an expert photographer that the problem occurred when I tried to take the card from sub-freezing temps to room temperature causing condensation on the card. I should have let the card adapt to the temperature and settle its contents. I didn't, and I paid the price. So there are four lessons I learned today: 1. Never leave without your tripod. 2. Never wear short socks while running through the snow. 3. Never try to load a CF card immediately after shooting in freezing temps. 4. Never let this bother me again. Just thought I'd post a random moment of my life - back to the regular stuff. Oh, my buddy Dan Canales was with me and will be posting some pics of the morning. I will refer to them when he posts them online.