EX1 shooting in Hot Environmnet

F

FrankC

Well-known member
Be aware the EX1 runs hot. Feel the back of the camera sometime after shooting about an hour....real hot to the touch! I just returned from a week in South Padre Island, Texas, shooting a flyfishing movie. 98 degree heat with 95 percent humidity. After shooting all morning in an open boat (tryng to keep the camera covered as best we can), the EX1 would shut down about 1pm or 2pm. Screen just goes black... and there is no turning it back on. Sony confirmed it was probably the heat. The camera would re-boot about 9 or 10pm that night. Good thing I also carry my Canon HV-30 as a back-up to save the afternoon stuff.... Although you don't want to do an big scenic beauty shots with that smalll camera. I do mostly close-in action shots that might cut in OK with the EX1 footage. So for the big scenic stuff, I wait until the EX1 is working again.
And the "beauty shots" were indeed gorgeous!

Question: Anyone have similar experience with this? Would a raincover help (to keep the sun heat down) or would that act as an oven and accellerate the heat build-up? You don't want to get it too cool since that would generate condesation inside. Let us know your thoughts....
 
Well we have shot with EX1 and EX3 in blazing Arizona, Oklahoma, New Mexico, and Vegas, temps up to 120 degrees. What we do is have a shade made from C stands and 4x4 flags then use a highly reflective space blanket that reflect the heat away from the the camera when in open areas.
Small battery operated fans are an option as well, clamped on a C stand if needed as long as they run relatively quiet. The EX series do run hot, what firmware is your by the way.
Cheers
 
I've run my EX1 out on an air strip in the hot sun for 8 hours straight shooting air shows last summer. The camera was so hot that it could not be handled comfortably due to burning the fingertips, yet the camera never seemed to be affected by the heat. How hot was your EX1 when it shut down? It may have been the humidity not the heat that caused the shutdown.
 
Sorry Philip... I was out of town again. We just had the firmware updated to the latest, before the trip to So.Padre Isand. Another person also mentioned the idea of wrapping the EX1 in a space blanket when it's in a hot environment. That sounds like an idea worth trying sometime... Thanks!
 
Yeah Mark... I think it was the the combo of the heat AND the humidity. Temp was about 97 degress... so that's really not that hot by itself. But then add 95 percent humidity and there is absolutely no air cooling of the case. Actually the air becomes a thermal blanket keeping both the internally generated heat and and the external (sun) heat concentrated. Sony LA Repair emails to me said about the same thing (although they were leaning to the heat as the main culprit... and that's true, but it's increased by the humidity). My biggest gripe would be that there is no warning when it's about to shut down other than the tally lights are supposed to flash (but my eye is glued to the viewfinder!) and the alarm buzzer is supposed to sound (mine is turn off to not wreck a take). So I'm shooting and the camera just goes black and won't power back up. Rather disconcerting if you don't know what is really happening. Another reason you may be right about the humidity is we kept the camera in a Petrol case, out of the sun, most of the time when not shooting... Yet it would still shut down about the same time each day... about 1pm to 2pm. That says the humidity greatly contributed to the shut down.
 
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Thanks Perrone... It may have been a cumulative thing... especially with the humidity. Now we were spending 10 hour days out on the water in the heat and humidity. The first two days, everything was fine. It was the third day on through the seventh day, the camera regularly shut down in the afternoon. That may say the camera never really had a chance to cool down over night. We would not take the camera into any air conditioned room over night (fear of creating condensation the next day out), so the camera would stay in a garage overnight. But the night-time temps never dropped below 80-85 degress, nor did the humidity change much. So that's why I think it was a cumulative thing.
 
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Wow JD... That camRade Desert Suit would have been EXACTLY what I would have needed for this situation. Somebody was thinking there. Thank you for the great tip!
And thank you all for your responses !!!
 
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