cold weather lcd issues
 

it was about -30 this morning on the iditarod trail, and I noticed the LCD screen gets REALLY slow around that temp. if I panned, it would streak across the screen like I was shooting in the slow exposure mode. I the fix I came up with for now was taping a heat packet to it, and putting the rain cover on to help keep the heat in. it was a weird thing to watch, and made it REALLY tough to shoot.

I feel your pain Ian

I had a similar issue In St. Moritz, up on the Corvatch a few weeks ago, -22°c and howling winds.
Looked like there was a slow shutter turned on.
unfortunately for me, the guy who was shooting with my cam at the time (I was doing onboard stuff) also thought it´d be a good idea to use the rain cover, which promptly shattered into a thousand pieces (the clear view parts that is...)when he tried to put it on, a bit of a no-brainer at those temperatures if you ask me.
so 120€ down the toilet.
The LCD´s on my onboard cams were doing pretty much the same slow shutter look thing.

rain cover, good idea, but should be put on in warmer temps. so as to avoid the loss.
a polar bear would be even better.(does Porta Brace have one for the EX3 yet?)

we did the same thing with the warming pads, stuffed under a sweatband, which was surrounding the LCD, it did help, but not 100%

Funny thing, that after all the testing (EX1) in the North Pole, there was no mention of this problem.

My question is, is this issue only an EX3 Issue, or does the EX1 react the same way to the cold.
is it that the cam doesn´t like the "cold shock"(I had it in my hotel room overnight)
would it make a difference if the cam had been left outside overnight to acclimatise?

I have never run into this issue before, having only ever shot BETACAM at such low temperatures.

good thing the footage was all perfect..........

EX1 and EX3 both suffer from this as do most LCD's. The EX3 tends to suffer a little less as the LCD is a little more protected by the viewfinder assembly. A simple cover made from a fleece jumper would make a big difference once the camera has been switched on and warmed up for a bit. I used an EX1 down to -24 last year and while there was a small amount of smear didn't regard it as an issue as once the camera had been on for a while it settled down. I tend to leave the camera switched on continuously to prevent cold weather issues. This year even at -36c the LCD's were still perfectly useable once they had warmed up for 10 to 15 mins.

The howling winds is what really makes it cold. I have shot in less than -20, but protected from the wind and the LCD showed just a little lag.
When you are exposed to wind the "efficient" minus degrees is much less (as in colder) than what you read of the thermometer.

Kenny, sorry to har about your raincover loss. It´s very nice at Corvatch, I shot a commercial for Kjus clothing around there last year.

Wind chill only effects items that are moist or contain moisture. We humans being mostly water and many other objects are effected seriously by wind as the wind increases evaporation and evaporative cooling will reduce the temperature below the ambient temperature. Also the wind will carry body heat away quickly making it feel colder than it is. However no matter how hard the wind blows on a dry item the temperature of that item will not fall below the air temperature, it may cool to the ambient temperature quicker, but without evaporative cooling, it cannot go below the air temperature. Of course any heat generated within the camera will be carried away quicker which may lower the cameras temperature more than if there was no wind but if it's -20 that's as cold as the camera will get no matter how strong the wind blows.

I never thought it through. I just always assumed it was the same for objects as well as humans.
But of course Alister is correct.
The only thing the wind will do for an object i to cool it to the ambience temperature quicker than if it was no wind, maybe that´s why I have assumed the wind chill factor applied to objects as well.
Thanks for clearing that up

Kata should have some covers for the EX1 and EX3 available soon.

When I was in Iceland last week it was only -8 but we had 50 mph winds, it felt much colder than when I was at -36c. I'll take -30 with no wind over -20 with wind any day :0)

Agree. The wind is a killer.
Take your gloves off for a few seconds and it takes forever to get the heat back

As for the LCD, keep in mind, the L stands for "Liquid" it will start to gel up and be slower to change state from on to off as they get colder and closer to frozen. You may want to transition to a CRT solution (keeping weight considerations in mind if you're packing them in places) that you mount atop the camera and use to do the heavy lifting for keeping track of movement within the frame.