cold weather photography

[Stefen]

any experiences to speak of?

I realise that my contax t3 is made of titanium. At extreme temperatures, this is actually slightly dangerous when you have direct skin contact.

However, I feel that its a waste to paste duct tape all over the camera.

any tips?

 

[kingpin]

Should not be a problem. There are titanium watches with titanium straps and I have worn them to below zero before. I have an F5 with a titanium view finder and have used it in environment below zero before.

 

[berryhappy]

when it get so cold, won't your hands need gloves?

 

[A70]

Just to add on to the discussion about cold weather photography, what's the coldest weather you have exposed your cameras (esp digital) and got it to work? My friend who's going to Europe to work for a year, wanted to buy the Olympus all-weather digital camera, in order to survive the cold. It turns out that the "all-weather" only refers to splash-proof, and nothing was mentioned about the lowest possible operating temperature.

Also, the salesman from the shop mentioned that AA rechargables can't work in extreme cold, but Li-Ion rechargable packs can. How true is this?

By the way, the coldest place I have brought my A70 was to Mt Buller in Australia, when it was snowing, about -5 to -10 degrees, and everything still worked.

 

[Diablo]

Iv exposed my EOS5 at temperatures below -10degC.

If I remember correctly, -15degC at hokkaido and abt -18 at canadian rockies. AF got problem, but exposure is ok. Was using Li batt.

 

[yeocolin]

if I'm not wrong, it also depends on how warm you've kept your camera when you are not using it. If you are hanging it outside say with your hand or something like that, your camera will surely face the brunt of the cold. Condensation, battery, AF etc will be affected, if they are indeed susceptible.

In contrast, if you've kept your camera with you under your jacket when not using it, then I guess your camera will be pretty alright.

 

[dampeoples]

Just be sure that if you leave your camera in the house, car, or under a jacket (film cameras), that it has time to adjust so you won't get fog on the lens or film.

 

[A70]

So both Li-Ion and NiMH batteries are equally susceptible to "freeze" and refuse to work under the same cold conditions?

 

[Stefen]

My experience was that I kept my Contax T3 undr my jacket at all times on a climb to a himalayan mountain (around -10 to -20 degrees), and the lithium batt froze up on me at the summit! luckily I always keep a spare in my jacket, or I would have missed the shot.

My concern for this thread is not so much on power consumption, but rather on the dangers with skin contact with metal parts. As my contact t3 is primarily made of titanium, I am concern about facial contact during the viewfinder process. Just wanna check that my face don't kanna stick to the camera

I wear gloves and thick overmitts all the time, so the only potential skin contact is through my face.

 

[steely]

Lowest for me was -32C at night in the windy outdoors of a Korean ski-resort.
The Oly C-3020 was working ok but maybe my mind wasn't....

Perhaps you should wear a ski-mask and gloves on all times, cold burns can happen with metal tripods too