karn@mouton.UUCP (06/05/84)
Recently, my 6-month-old Pentax Super Program failed in a subtle and bizarre (well, at least to me) manner. I didn't detect the failure until I had ruined about 2 rolls of slides. The shutter suddenly decided that it was going to take every picture at some high speed (1/1000 sec? 1/2000 sec?) despite what the meter and displays said (they operated normally). This was true in any shutter speed mode, even B! Automatic aperture control worked fine, however. The failure was "hard", in that taking out the batteries for a few minutes did not fix the problem. I mention this here because my local friendly neighborhood camera shop owner said he'd heard of the same thing happening to other Super Programs. It would probably be a good idea to check your camera's shutter for proper functioning, particularly when loading a new roll of film. Just set it to a slow speed (1 second, say) and make sure that the shutter really stays open this long. Also be alert to sudden changes in the "feel" of the shutter when taking pictures at relatively slow speeds. If I had paid attention to this, I would have found the problem much sooner. Phil