I am yet to tell about my worst photographic session as a amateur enthusiastic with new Pentax gear. I am way over my head in learning a difficult lesson that there is seldom a second chance in photography. It was about three weeks ago with National Night Out event in my neighborhood in which I volunteered to be the main photographer. Everyone of my neighbors is very supportive of each other and they all cheer me up for my love of photography. I was tireless that night preparing 2 main dishes after work for pot-luck dinner in front of a beautiful antique house and I shot 40+ pictures on a band playing jazz music and the gathering of 50+ people and with firefighter engine visit from the city of Fremont.

I skipped dinner in the event for the wonderful sunset shots with my Pentax K100D and Pentax DA 50-200. In every shot with my Pentax, I could see the success and hear the lovely shutter snap echoed in my K100D. The light was perfect on the front porch of a 180 years antique house with a wonderful jazz band and torch lights lid up in front of the cheerful and lovely audience. And the party includes all neighbors from my kid aged at 3 to graceful neighbor over 80+ years old. The scenes were more than perfect for photographic sessions that an amateur like me could have ever asked for.

I trust my camera completely as I have always had. It was not until intermission that I had to change to my kit's lens for faster speed into the darker evening. My FA 50 f/1.4 had not arrived that time, I was devastated to find out that I HAD NO MEMORY CARD in the camera. How could this happen! I did not get a 'no disk error' at all in all those 40+ shots. I was naive and stupid enough not to have a backup camera or any playback of the wonderful shots made in the better and brighter half of the event. I was devastated and I told my neighbor right after the event. My face was dark and red and many negative thoughts ran through my mind and I felt for ages in that minute of discovery. My neighbors sure cheered me up with 'no worry' and I had not told anyone except my friends in dpreview forum for the first time with this blog post. My first hardest learned lesson in photography -- always check photo with playback and never ever carry a camera without a memory card.

I did not take any pictures with my Pentax in the rest of the event. I was plainly devastated for my mistakes and I kept myself in solitude and despair. After taking some food from the pot luck, I gathered myself for the last minutes' photo opportunity time using my Fuji F30 to photograph the band in the dark trying to salvage the memory for the wonderful evening of music, food, fun, friendship, and good neighbors.