My name is Scott Nickell. I am a forty-something photographer, living and shooting mainly in and around Bainbridge Island, Washington. Bainbridge is just across the Puget Sound from Seattle. My goals for this blog are simple, to share some of my thoughts with like-minded photographers around the world, and to share creative experience and ideas.

I recently had a learning experience and spoke of it briefly on my last PAD entry. In December I had a large bag of camera equipment stolen from the back of my car. It was a devastating loss, a Nikon D2x, fast lenses, SB800 flash, and a complete Pentax K10D system also with fast zooms, and flash, also a full collection of filters, chargers, memory cards. The hard part was I have been told by many of my friends that you NEVER should leave you gear in your car. I have also been told repeatedly to make sure I ahd adequate insurance to cover the replacement cost of the gear should I suffer a loss. On 7 December I realized that I had completely failed on both counts. My insurance only covers $2000 for camera gear. That barely covers the cost of the 70-200 2.8VR lens, let alone everything else.

So in this post I'll say: DON'T EVER LEAVE YOU GEAR in your car, and if it's unavoidable, make sure your covered with quality insurance that will cover the replacement costs. I wasn't and it hurt... a lot!

Talk soon, SWN