7D Overheating

[Michael Nistler]

Hi Alan,

Curious - what memory card make/model/speed and what frame rate/resolution were you shooting. Also, were you using a charged factory Canon battery or something else? Lastly, I wonder about the lighting wattage (I assume tunsten) and distance from the camera.

Regards, Michael

[Daniel Weber]

I have had the camera overheat in Africa, Egypt and Israel while shooting.

I recently took it to Geneva and Istanbul to shoot and not overheating problems at all.

The difference was the temperature of the environment that I was shooting in. Geneva and Istanbul were much cooler than the others.

I really think that the 7D can't handle high temps or humidity. I think that humidity is worse than the ambient temperature.

Kind of wish that I had sprung for a 5D.

Daniel Weber

[John Mastrogiacomo]

Has anyone heard from Canon about a possible solution to the overheating?

[Brian Luce]

Someone here posted a link to an interesting cooling plate that required a little bit of electricity. It was inexpensive as I recall and small.

[John Mastrogiacomo]

Khoi Pham posted that a little while ago. I know there are a lot of workarounds, etc.

I live in Las Vegas so I'll have to be very careful in the summer. I've seen it get so hot out here that you couldn't even touch 35mm mags without burning your fingers.

I'll put the camera through the torture test as soon as it warms up here. :)

[John Mastrogiacomo]

Received this from Canon support:

We haven't found any issues with the Rebel T2i or 7D overheating. The
working temperature range for your camera is 32-104F. The working
humidity is 85% or less. Please be sure to only use the camera within
the specified range. If you are recording video in high temperatures
you should let the camera rest between recordings.

[John Mastrogiacomo]

I am willing to compile of list of overheating problems and send them to Canon but I need specific information to submit to them.

I will ask all users with overheating problems to provide the following information and then I will submit a summary to Canon and keep on top of them until we get this resolved.

I worked in computer tech support for a government contractor debugging computer programs for years and the best way to debug these problems is to be able to reproduce it, so the more detailed information we have the better chance we have to solve this problem.

As soon as Canon can repeatedly reproduce the problem the sooner we will have solution.

Here is the information I will need before I can submit it to Canon:

Camera Model
Serial Number
Firmware version
Your e-mail address and phone number so I can forward it to Canon in case they want to contact you.
Location: country, city, state, where you were shooting.
Were you shooting outside or inside?
Were you in the sun or shade?
Ambient temperature, estimated humidity.
What memory cards were you using, any additional devices attached, etc.
Handheld, tripod, steadicam, etc.
What modes were you shooting in, eg. 1920 30fps, 720 60fps, etc.
How long was the camera on, how were you using it.
Any other relevant information.

Hopefully, we can get this resolved in the near future.

[Sean Seah]

the heat issues comes when there is a change in env. Particularly from indoor to outdoor. Its simple to overcome by having 2 cams. Anyway 5D2 has 24P now so its no issue with 2x 5D2 for a wedding =)

[Geoff Brandon]

Just curious, when you guys are getting overheating, are you handholding the camera?

Mine overheated one time while shooting my childs play inside a school auditorium, which was a cool 65 degrees. The 5d worked flawless, but it was on a tripod. I was handholding the 7d and noticed my hand was getting very warm while holding the 7d and it was then I kept getting the overheat warning.

Would be interesting to know if anyone is getting it on a tripod, where your not transferring your body heat from your hand into the right side of the camera, right were the cpu's are.

[Andrew Dean]

hmm. I did a shoot yesterday and got the overheating icon after 10 minutes and had it pretty much remain through the shoot. (although it never shut off).

I read all the above posts and thought about my scenario:

on the bridge of a cruise ship in port. (no a/c). A mildly warm day, but not "hot". A tiny bit warm on the bridge, but not enough to make you sweat. Humidity seemed "normal".

The two variables that piqued my curiosity:

1. i was powering the 7d with a tekkeon battery via the canon dummy batt. I had the voltage set to 7.5v. The canon batteries are rated as 7.4v, but yield around 8.6v when fully charged. The camera itself lists the voltage as 8.2v... So i'm reluctant to jump up to my next voltage setting (9v) but curious if the 7.5v (or any canon batteries running low on voltage) can cause extra heating issues. is it possible thats why we get the "after 45 minutes of shooting" problems?

2. My subject was backlit, with totally blown out windows behind the subject. I wouldn't have thought that was an issue, but Emmanuel mentioned overexposure as a possible cause of overheating. Made me curious at least.

I really hope its not my battery solution, as i love being able to do a full days shoot without worrying about power. Not sure how to test it further... except for shooting a prolonged sequence without overexposure and see how that fares. hmm.

cheers!
-a

[Paul Joy]

I recently had this problem when shooting in an air conditioned building, not very hot at all. I was using a marshall HDMI monitor so the LCD wasn't on. I was shooting at 1080/25 and recording to a 32GB UDMA Sandisk Extreme card. After around 10 minutes of recording the temperature warning light came on. I had no choice but to leave the camera running but the footage looks fine.

It's a bit worrying that this happened in non-extreme temperatures though, I'm planning on using the 7D at an event in St Tropez in May and now I'm a little concerned about this issue.

The 5D was fine all day under the same conditions, does the 5d even have the same warning?

[Liam Hall]

Originally Posted by Sean Seah

the heat issues comes when there is a change in env. Particularly from indoor to outdoor. Its simple to overcome by having 2 cams. Anyway 5D2 has 24P now so its no issue with 2x 5D2 for a wedding =)

Moving from indoor to outdoor causes problems with humidity rather than heat. Though I agree, two cams is the way to go.

[George Sickler]

We are using Transcends 133x with the 7D and having the overheating indoor in air controlled rooms, 60-70 f - nice and cool. We taped for about 40 minutes, then the overheat icon came on.

Is it the write speed of my cards? I have no problems with the 5dMii.

I am wondering about trying a faster card before dumping camera.

George

[Bruce S. Yarock]

I've shot with it for hours with no overheating, and at times gotten the overheating icon within 30 minutes.

Today I shot some scenes for an indie feature out side in Miami. Within about 45 minutes, i started gettin the message. After reading Michael Nistlers post, I started thinking that it might be the direct hot sunlight, on the right side of the camera. Maybe an umbrella on the tripod, or some kind of cloth to shade the camera from hot sun?

Bruce Yarock

[George Sickler]

I am going to try to do some testing so I can understand this camera better.

If anyone has any other testing on the bench, it would be great to understand what exactly triggers this icon of disappointment.

It is really a challenge to use and trust this camera at an event. When you have to roll, you have to roll.

I guess it's off to buy a T2i as a spare.

George