Cold weather
 

We use our camera outdoors quite often and I have been running into problems. At times it wont record or won't read the cassette, tells you to clean heads, remove cassette and so on. Is this just a commom problem caused by the cold ? ????

Opps it's a GL2

Sounds like it may be condensation happening somewhere in the camera. It's pretty common when going from one warm to cold or vice versa.

Condensation is most likely to happen when a camcorder is taken from a colder place to a warmer place, especially if it has relatively high humidity.

Cold weather can have the effect of reducing available battery charge.

The GL camcorders are rated for operation between 32 and 104 F. Outside this temperature range performance is not assured.

Would it also cause the "remove cassette" message do you think?

I have 'enjoyed' this message a number of times when rewinding but never when recording - until Saturday.

I was filming racing cars at a track in Bedford (UK) in cold and drizzly conditions and I was horrified to see the message appear halfway through the tape containing footage of me being driven round the track in a Caterham 7!!

The odd thing was it only happened to one tape. All other tapes were fine.

Cleaning the heads seemed to solve the problem and I was able to recover the data, albeit very messed up at the point where the message had appeared.

On the assumption that taking the camera into cold and damp/wet conditions is going to cause problems, what precautions should one take?

> On the assumption that taking the camera into cold and damp/wet conditions is going to cause problems, what precautions should one take?<

Short of moving to a warn, dry climate, best to keep it dry. If you are going to be in a very wet environment where the camcorder is likley to receive excessive exposure to rain/condensing fog, try a rain cover.

Best advice yet. I'm packing my bags as I write this.

I had actually wrapped the camera in a transparent polythene cape and I thought it was pretty well covered. I'll take your advice though, and look into getting a proper rain jacket.

Thanks Don.

also cold to hot and hot to cold environments can do this - camera warm<>air cold and damp = condensation - G

That was what I had said in my post...And I still stand by it. Condensation is the most likely problem.

Just one additional observation.

I had been taking the camera in and out of hot/dry and cold/damp conditions from 8am until around 3pm when this problem kicked in. At the time it happened I had been outside for almost an hour.

Not questioning condensation as a cause, just thinking that it would have happened sooner in the day.

I'm guessing that a rain jacket won't prevent condensation problems?

Ian, what type of rain jacket? Is it purely a plastic bag? I've got a Port-A-Brace thin felt lined jacket for my XM2. Now this has some kinda of "heat" insulation properties - yeah? It is this heat exchange COMBINED with the ambient relative humidity that is going on that produces condensation. Taking a COLD camera into a warm "moist" interior will result in moisture being deposited on any cold dry surface. I wear glasses .. plastic . . but lenses . . yeah? If come rushing in from a cold dry day into the kitchen where cooking has been going on, warm+moist, I go completely blind! Well fogged up at least!

So, you com in from a cold dry environment, maybe even WITH a rain jacket ( rain jacket if even plastic will be AT the same temp as the camera ) the moisture will condense on anything that is both colder and dryer than the atmosphere it is coming from! So, any surface will be prone to moisture PLUS any moisture collecting internally on the INNER surface of the rain jacket will then drop nicely onto the surfaces of the camera . . ughhh...

Hope this helps.

Grazie

Hey Grazie, how are ya?

Looks like I need to invest in a proper insulating device like yours - in advance of this "coldest winter for forty years" we've been promised. Out of interest, being London-based, where do you get your gear? Or do you buy on line mainly.

Am I right in thinking you live in the Kensington area?

Cheers.

Ian . . .

Yo Starky!

PEC/Optex/ASK/Pricebusters/T2/ . . er . .s/w online ; Kensington?!? You Are having a larf aint yah?

Grazie

Oh sorry! I thought I recalled you telling me that was where you were from! Reason I mention it is that I have good reason to be in a pub near Olympia several times a week and thought you might like to pop in for a pint!

Better abandon this line of discussion though in case we get told off for hijacking the thread!

Cheers.

Ian . . .

Hey I would like to stop in for a BEVY! But Ilive in the US and would be more than a trip down to the corner pub. Sounds like fun tho! Steve