Keeping your digital camera warm in cold weather...

[ChristopherGrant]

Heyas...

Does anyone have any good suggestions for keeping digital cameras warm in cold weather? Most digital cameras have an operating temperature of 0 degrees (celcius) and above... any thoughts?

Thanks!

 

[GerryDavid]

Ive asked the same question, along with tricks to keeping the hands warm, and the majority says to keep the camera in your coat when your not using it, keep extra batteries in your inside coat pocket, and wear a baseball glove under normal gloves so when you take the glove off, its not exposed to the sub 0 air right away. :0). And be careful not to breath near the camera to fog up the lense or get humidity in the camera.

Also when you take the camera inside, put it in a bag outside and then put it by the window or something, so when it warms up, the condensation goes on teh bag, not on the camera and in the electronics, and it warms up slwoer by the window wsince its usually colder.

 

[GerryDavid]

Heyas...

Does anyone have any good suggestions for keeping digital cameras warm in cold weather? Most digital cameras have an operating temperature of 0 degrees (celcius) and above... any thoughts?

Thanks!

How's your digital holding up to the winter cold? :0).

 

[joseph]

See my Yellowstone gallery on my site under photo tips re: cold weather photo.

Digitals are good for extreme cold, batteries die out though. I do a lot of shoots off skis in the backcountry... I keep my D100 in a lowpro holster on my chest and put a hand warmer inside keeps batteries warmer a bit. Trick is not to breath on lens or view finder ices up.. camera is fine though.

 

[Dew]

im having a horrible time keeping my digital cam and batteries warm :? ... i keep the batteries wrapped up in a sock in my inside-coat pocket ... but my camera is too big to fit inside my coat ... i've had several dilemmas in the past two weeks with my camera dying

 

[GerryDavid]

See my Yellowstone gallery on my site under photo tips re: cold weather photo.

Digitals are good for extreme cold, batteries die out though. I do a lot of shoots off skis in the backcountry... I keep my D100 in a lowpro holster on my chest and put a hand warmer inside keeps batteries warmer a bit. Trick is not to breath on lens or view finder ices up.. camera is fine though.

Whats a lowpro holster? :0) Im picturing a camera bag that is the shape of an slr but im probably wrong.

And the handwarmer, is it something like an electric heater pouch thing for your hand when it gets cold? I could use something like that, I about froze my fingeres off when I was taking pics at -40F out. :0).

 

[joseph]

a holster, you know one of these camera bags shaped like an SLR go to lowepro web site they are all on there.I have a picture of it on me on my website go to Yellowstone..photo tips. Handwarmer, in Canada you need to know about it, small chemical pack you open it, chemical interacts with air stays warm for about 4 hours, about 50 cent to a dollar each.

 

[GerryDavid]

a holster, you know one of these camera bags shaped like an SLR go to lowepro web site they are all on there.I have a picture of it on me on my website go to Yellowstone..photo tips. Handwarmer, in Canada you need to know about it, small chemical pack you open it, chemical interacts with air stays warm for about 4 hours, about 50 cent to a dollar each.

Hehe, didnt know chemical packs were that cheap, I really need to get some of those. :0) I assume you get them at canadian tire? Not sure if Zellers would have it or walmart, then again they may. : 0). Thanks for the advice.

 

[joseph]

Try Mountain Equipmet Co op, a great Canadian outdoor gear store.

 

[GerryDavid]

Try Mountain Equipmet Co op, a great Canadian outdoor gear store.

Never heard of it. :0) Is it a Western Canada store? Theres not really any mountains over here, well there are but they would be speedbumps to those in the mountains. :0).

 

[joseph]

Never heard of MEC?? Their store is in Calgary but most of their business is cataloge and online, good stuff for the outdoor, check'em out.

 

[SandyS6]

I think Lowepro doesn't sell to Canadians from their website. Shame.

I think there's an online store called www.sweetdeal.ca that does, though.
They seem to have a pretty good Lowepro selection.

Never bought from them before, though.

Good luck!

 

[Big Mike]

Welcome to the forum SandyS6,

Wow this is an old thread.

Lowepro is readily available in Canada. Many camera stores carry it, even London Drugs has a good selection of smaller bags. Henry's out of T.O. sells a lot of Lowepro through their E-bay store...usually at pretty good prices.

 

[RickyN29]

Yeah, the biggest problem I have is we stay in a Canvas wall tent with a woodstove inside. The moment I take the camera outside into the cold, water condenses everywhere and all my pictures turn out foggy. Someone told me to keep the camera cold, as in, outside, so as to prevent the temp change....but this seems worse.

 

[Big Mike]

There will often be some fogging on the surface when you take the camera outside into the cold...but if you don't breathe on it...it should clear up. Cold air is dry.

The real problem is when you take a cold camera back inside where it's warm. This will cause condensation on and in the camera & lens. This can cause problems. As mentioned, sealing the camera in a bag before it comes inside is the way to combat this. Also, I like to keep packets of silica in my camera bags. They absorb moisture.