The other day I was trying to take photos with my Nikon D4, and it would just not focus. There was a delay when I pushed the shutter until the camera fired. 

I looked to see if I had set the timer. I didn’t select it. So now I am telling myself, what the &#%!@?!? 

I had put the Pocketwizard TT1 on the camera and was attempting to fire off the camera flash.  

I can report that this took a couple of days to figure out. Not proud of how long this took. 

The problem was the flash control on the Nikon D4 was set to Red-eye reduction. To change those settings, you push the flash button on the top of the camera and turn the main command dial. See the illustration here. 

  Here are the choices on the camera for you.

I do not remember ever changing this, so this is why I had a tough time isolating this problem.

Quick solution 

Most all cameras have a way to reset the camera to factory settings. However, the time it takes to figure out what setting the camera changed may take longer than just a quick reset. On the Nikon D4, you find the two buttons with the green ●. You can find them by the ISO and WB buttons on the back of the camera. 

Just push these two buttons, which will likely solve most of your problems.

One more way on the Nikon D4 camera [most cameras have this function] is to find all your current settings and change that one item.

I am writing this blog as much for myself as anyone else.  

Here is an interesting factoid: When you take good notes, you will remember things well enough that you rarely have to look at their notes again.

It seems that writing anything down makes us remember it better. But, on the other hand, not writing things down is just asking to forget. So it’s a kind of mental Catch-22: the only way not to have to write things down is to write them down so you remember them well enough not to have written them down.

Now you may know another reason I do a blog. It helps me to go through the process of writing something down, and in the process, I have discovered I remember more things. Another thing is I now have an online database of topics I can find later when I am having trouble remembering or I want to share with someone who asks me a question.