Like a desert mirage , revolutionary new battery technologies always seem to be just beyond the celestial horizon . Modern materials , nanotube , and fuel cells all offer the hope of dramatically longer runtime and myopic ( or nonexistent ) recharges . But until that elusive day comes , we ’re going to have to contend with our existing battery technology . late , I offered some tips for dealing with your memory menu , so this calendar week I thought we should grow our aid to batteries . Here are a few tips for getting the most out of your camera batteries .
Check your batteries before hitting the road
Batteries lose their charge continuously , not just when in utilisation . That signify you should n’t charge up a battery , put it in your photographic camera , and then let it set in the closet for three month . When you eventually do reach for your camera , you might feel that the electric battery is already bushed , or near so — and you have n’t taken a single motion-picture show .
If you ’ve already had this happen to you , do n’t occupy — it ’s the direction that battery figure out . All assault and battery slowly lose their energy when they ’re sitting out of work , but how slowly depends upon the kind of battery . Alkaline stamp battery are extremely stable — they’ll only lose 1 or 2 percent of their total mental ability over an intact yr . And that ’s a good thing , because they require to work well after sit on a store ledge for a long time .
Rechargeable batteries , however , are far more volatile . distinctive NiMH batteries , for example , can suffer about 1 percent per day — so a fully charged battery will be eat up after 3 or 4 month just by sitting idle in your camera . Keep that in mind when you snap up your camera cup of tea before your next trip .
Store batteries in the fridge
You might have heard that batteries stay “ fresh ” longer when lay in in the refrigerator or freezer . That ’s not a myth : It ’s absolutely truthful , but there are some caution .
freeze down your stamp battery works because the chemical reactions that generate electrical energy are temperature dependent . When you put a battery in inhuman storage , you jam the process , so the battery loses its charge more slowly . But remember how I suppose that alkaline batteries suffer their capacity very slowly ? That means there ’s fundamentally no reward to putting store - buy barrage fire in the freezer . The salutary you could hope to recover is some fraction of a per centum of its overall charge over the row of a class . The freezer outer space is better dedicated to frozen custard . ( I recommend a deal fromShake Shack in New York . )
There ’s a bunch of note value in freezing rechargeable battery , though . harmonize toGreenbatteries.com , rechargeable batteries stored in a freezer will retain over 90 percent of their charge for a full calendar month .
Warm your batteries for better performance
flash alfresco in the winter ? Your shelling might give up fairly quickly , leave you with a television camera - shape paperweight . That happens for the same cause that freeze out batteries make them keep their charge longer — the stale impedes the electricity - generate chemical substance response . Batteries discharge better when they ’re tender . So if your electric battery does quickly die due to the dusty , polish off it from the camera and warm up it up using your hands inside your jacket . If you may raise the battery ’s temperature , it ’ll rebound back to life history and allow you to take a few more characterisation .
Use your camera to shoot pictures—and that’s all
Here ’s some advice that seems obvious , but still handle to on a regular basis put off folk . Everything you do with your camera utilize barrage fire power , so if you have only one battery and have no ability to charge up , do n’t habituate all the extra features on your camera . Specifically , do n’t employ your camera to survey photos , delete images from the retention card , or record audio annotations about each exposure . Stick to the basics : hire pictures .
Similarly , it ’s deserving pointing out that longsighted vulnerability — like you ’d take to capture light trail in night photos and fuzzy waterfall — use significantly more power than faster , average shot . If you are trying to take special effects shots like those , know that you wo n’t be able-bodied to capture as many picture as common , and load down a spare assault and battery .
