Digital cameras in the Cold
A Li-Ion in Winter
Here are some tips for shooting outdoors in winter. Usually, I describe how to achieve maximum service life of the batteries at low temperature. The two things are beyond the scope of this article:
This article shall not enter into other aspects of outdoor photography, at least not by much.
The information contained in this section shall also apply to devices battery as other cameras only. (There is also a theme of your car!)
When IThe search for this article, I discovered something very interesting: nothing! I can not find something on the Internet that will give you advice support, and I have never read in printed sources. I can not believe I am the only one who knows, and this is certainly not a revolutionary discovery. And I can not believe I was the only one who has always tried to use a digital camera in temperatures below zero, but maybe we're a market so small that nobody has bothered to publishthis information. Frankly, I think it is unlikely that this has never been published, but can not find it.
So, let's go. You may need this more than a myth "view, but you can easily confirm this yourself.
Here's the thing. Electric batteries are a bit 'like the old, irritable travelers. They learn slowly and crankier when cold.
No matter what type of batteries have a primary or carbon or alkaline or rechargeable nickel metal hydrideIn other words, the lithium-ion batteries for cars, lead, or, dare, all the batteries to be invented, or probably ever invented in the near future. That all works much better at temperatures closer to the normal temperature of human body temperature of the ice.
Well, maybe there are exotic batteries that nobody has ever heard outside the secret laboratory, but all the batteries, probably for the consumer market, you find the love of summer. And perhaps one of the batteries work best in84.37 degrees Celsius, while the batteries prefer a different type of 88.64 degrees, but the fact remains that the cells work better near the body temperature.
You can use with ease. If the camera (or any other battery-powered devices to keep up) outside of extreme cold, you can see that the batteries are exhausted very quickly. Place the device with the jacket for a few minutes, the batteries have a much higher rate.
Each cell produces electricity by chemical meansReactions and a chemical reaction that takes place more efficiently at higher temperatures to begin to limit the temperature increase of chemical complexes to decompose. This reduction in temperatures well above body temperature, so do not worry. Just do not drop the batteries in a fire and expect them to work better.
What can you do? Two things, one simple and one with ramifications.
First, to take spare batteries in an inside pocket. (You dress in layers, whenYou go out in winter, is not it? Good!) Closer to the skin, the better. I usually wear my spare batteries in your shirt pocket, with at least a sweater and a jacket out of it. Enter your batteries in an outer bag or backpack. If this is your plan, you could save weight and simply does not bring extra batteries. Would not work anyway.
Second, keep the camera warm as possible, while not actually use. It is, as I said above,Ramifications. The problem is that if the device is always in your body temperature will cause condensation on the lens if you're out there and start to form.
And while the extra batteries to be held in body temperature, the camera itself has problems. Here are some techniques I use are to achieve a balance between these two requirements.
Hold the device at an average temperature and, if possible, keep the battery warm the lens. I thinkmy camera in the pocket of his jacket in the outermost regions, and I think this is the target-side-up. Usually, the outermost jacket is unzipped, so that the top of the pocket is only slightly warmer than room temperature. The end of the battery of my camera bag is basically a kind of heated, while the target is located outside the Cold White Mountain Wilderness.
Replace the batteries during the day, driving the wheels between the device and your pocket. If the battery of my camera showshe is "dead", I installed the extra battery and replace the "dead" in his shirt pocket. Then, when the second battery is "dead", I turn to the original battery, which is then heated, and as if by magic, no more "dead".
One final note: When I return home, are not cold to the charger. Let the batteries warm to room temperature for several hours before charging them. The sudden change in temperature of the ice cream fresh, and the sudden flow of electricityCurrent through a cold battery will almost certainly cause permanent damage.
Cameras
While the advice in this specific article on digital cameras, much of this information also applies to film cameras. Produced almost every camera in the last half century, the electronic control of exposure and an electric motor for the shutter. Many also have a film advance motor. The batteries that operate these functionsalso benefit, kept warm.
Moreover, the film itself is more efficient at warmer temperatures. In conditions of extreme cold, the photochemical reactions in the image film is not fast enough, and the image is underexposed. And do not even know she grows. The temperatures at which they are very sensitive, which is normally well below zero degrees Fahrenheit, but the phenomenon exists.
Thus, the filmswill benefit, kept warm, like a digital camera.
But it also has the same problem with condensation on the lens.
One trick I used was in extreme cold to keep the objective of my camera bag at room temperature, and the camera in a jacket pocket. He slowed me down a little 'me around a target before taking a picture, but it was better that the evidence only sustainable return home with a roll of underexposed images. E 'in condensationin the viewfinder, the lens and the mirror, but this is no condensation in the path between the lens and the film, this has no effect on the images.
Other Electronic Widgets
What other devices that use outdoors in winter conditions? If there is a battery, the battery works best when taking hot.
And condensation can not be a problem! A bit 'of moisture can condense on the circuit itself, although this is less a problem than you mightthink. Most consumer electronics have a covering to their circuitry to protect them from moisture and oxygen, and then get a little 'treat from condensation. When removing pocket gadgets are hot and keep cold air to be used for one or two minutes, only few drops of water condensed. Then, if you toasted him back in his pocket, the condensed water usually evaporates again.
GPS? Stay warm, but high enough that you can getgood satellite signal. Your body can not hide the satellite signal, especially when the vegetation cover is weakened signal. You can groped to keep the receiver on a ramp that will keep the back or shoulder, free from your backpack under his jacket.
Walkie-talkie? It should also fit in a pocket of the jacket that make it hot and ready.
Wireless phone? (Why did you bring in the desert?) I prefer it to me for my vacationFor when I travel. Then I put in a shirt pocket to warm when I start driving. At the time I returned to civilization and cellular coverage, is ready to receive this message of fear from my wife. If you are wearing a walk, please keep in a pocket. (And if you do not have cancer in rats concerns of radio energy, store in a bag that is at least an inch of skin, but strong enough to keep warm enough.)
Start your car inCold
Here's a bonus tip on the batteries cool. You have already heard and rejected as absurd, but it is absolutely right.
Only works if the car is quite old and feeble. If this trick will help you, your car, on a cold morning, to replace the battery as soon as possible.
But if you buy a new battery and drives six hours late for work and the car will not start here can save the day: Turn on the headlightsYou start the car.
Seems catchy, but it really works. What happens is that the electric current through the coil heats up in reality the battery. Once heated, the battery produces electricity more efficiently than when it is cold.
You must be very careful in this case. The idea is to use a portion of the battery power to the battery is not warm, but to lead the charge stored in the process. If you crank the last time an item that you wantThe battery is hot, and is sufficiently charged, have to start the engine cold.
So if the first attempt led to a slow crank, leave quickly. Turn off the lights for some time – a minute or so should do – then turns off the light and then try the starter.
Note that I said "disappeared." Parking lights do not draw enough current to heat the battery significantly from a very cold day.
So you might ask why not warm enough power to set the choke andBattery? In fact, it is, but at the same time, they are drawing so much charge the battery, allowing them to carry the load until the battery is sufficiently effective to heat the engine.
Turn on the headlights.
If you try for two or three cycles, and the engine will not start, give up and cancel the jumper cables. (This jumper cable to the hand, is not it?)
Want to use this trick again, you get a new battery. Today!
Examples
YouOne can find examples of my digital photos will be taken into account in cold conditions, often well below zero Fahrenheit http://www.HikingWithChuck.com/DownloadsPicsWinter.htm []. I wonder how many of these pictures I would do if I lost, my batteries are dead!
1.2 Wordpress.com – DiscPlayerBluRay 9.0 www.LCD-TV-for-Sale.com FR Blogger Video Game