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Advice required for shooting in heat

J

Joel Mielle

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I'm about to embark on a journey to Shanghai to shoot parts of a feature film, and the weather is very hot with very high humidity.
Can anyone shed some advise in regards to filming under these conditions? Will the camera shut down? Can the electronics get damaged?

Joel.
 
Joel Mielle said:
I'm about to embark on a journey to Shanghai to shoot parts of a feature film, and the weather is very hot with very high humidity.
Can anyone shed some advise in regards to filming under these conditions? Will the camera shut down? Can the electronics get damaged?
Click to expand...
I remember seeing pictures of RED's cameras used in deserts, our cams are pretty solid.
You can do only two or three things, keep an eye on the temps, leave the fan-setting @ auto and if possible place your cam in the shadow during pauses.

It will shutdown before it gets at really dangerous temps and before that it will increase the fan-speed, in rare-situations even during recording (thats a good sign, that things are getting to hot). The safety-mechanism will override manual settings too, if needed.

I don't remember what exactly the "signal-temps" are, but its something around 75C (fan-increase) and 90C (shutdown) i think, someone will correct me hopefully. ;)
 
There's mention in the warranty about overheating being a voiding factor, so I wouldn't rely on the camera shutting down as an absolute failsafe. There's also the consideration of corrupt footage if the camera is running above the operating range in the spec. There are threads about this very issue with operators who intentionally reduced the fan's efficacy in order to lower noise during long interviews. If you're in a position where you won't be able to let their fans do the job and/or you want a backup plan, you might consider cooling the brain with gel packs. You can keep a cooler of dry ice on hand and use that to quickly cool the gel packs.
 
There are so many stories out there...
But just to settle your nerves, I shot China roasting hot and freezing cold, Rainy, wet, humid and dry... Ive actually shot in most countries in some crazy hot situations. Dubai in summer was the worse ! 50 degrees! C. Not a single problem.
We have never had any issue at all with heat.

But food for thought, the BRAIN needs air... don't stop air flowing through the front and out the back, and secondly give it a but of shade. Sometimes when bodies are just sitting out in the blaring sun for hours on end, the metal case can get hot as hell, even when the camera is not even turned on.

In short, You'll be fine..
 
Yep. Shady umbrella or even just a big hat, without blocking airflow.

If using dry ice, be wary of shock cooling and keep it way from hot lenses lest some glass go "crack".

Do NOT make innovation and turn a can of lens spray upside down and direct liquid gas into bad places for a quick chill.
There will be dewing, even in fairly dry conditions and things will short and go phut and your warranty will be void.
 
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Mike Lary said:
There's mention in the warranty about overheating being a voiding factor, so I wouldn't rely on the camera shutting down as an absolute failsafe. There's also the consideration of corrupt footage if the camera is running above the operating range in the spec. There are threads about this very issue with operators who intentionally reduced the fan's efficacy in order to lower noise during long interviews. If you're in a position where you won't be able to let their fans do the job and/or you want a backup plan, you might consider cooling the brain with gel packs. You can keep a cooler of dry ice on hand and use that to quickly cool the gel packs.
Click to expand...

Great advice, I'll make sure the fan is set to max when outside, what about strong tropical humidity is that something to be concerned about?
 
I posted the same question a few months ago for a shoot in Arnham Land. Roasting hot, humid days, shooting 1hr long takes for 8 hours, recording to card and a pix240, only issue I had was the PIX's batteries only lasting 20 mins due to the humidity.

Think I had the fan set to 60, and kept and eye on the temp.

To quote Mr Toia "You'll be fine.."
 
On hot days I bring Ice packs, not for the camera but for the hard drives to download to and to cool my Anton Bauer batteries before charging. Anton Bauer chargers will not charge batteries that are too cold or too hot. When hard drives get too hot they do not work well or stop working.
 
Hi Joel!

I am in Shanghai at the moment..shooting for 5 days in a row now...not a single issue! Btw. we came from the Australien desert.
Night: -1° Day: 35° The Epic was rocksolid.

Bring an umbrella...and keep in mind that it takes about 30-45 minutes, if you change from Air Condition to outside, to get the
condensed water of your lenses. Humidity is about 90%.

Getting through customs into china was no issue. It's my first time here and everything is super relaxed!

...yesterday we had to shoot in a huge vegetable market - they turned on the light in the whole market place for us!
This would never happen in Germany...we didn't even have permit or whatever.

Go there and have good fun. Cool city and nice people!

Christian

PS: Get a good stringer / translator. PM me if you need one - our's is fantastic!
 

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Joel Mielle said:
I'm about to embark on a journey to Shanghai to shoot parts of a feature film, and the weather is very hot with very high humidity.
Can anyone shed some advise in regards to filming under these conditions? Will the camera shut down? Can the electronics get damaged?

Joel.
Click to expand...

Just came back from shooting in Shreveport LA. 100+ EXT in the Louisiana heat, and 90+ for INT. As long as your fan speed at a reasonable level (we had 50% EXT, 40% int), turn up the fan speed to 100% when not recording. You will be more then fine with the heat. Also with drastic changes lets say from a room with AC on, where the camera was stored overnight, to load out to a very humid, hot set. Don't forget to let your lenses and sensor get to temp before you roll.
 
Sergei Franklin said:
On hot days I bring Ice packs, not for the camera but for the hard drives to download to and to cool my Anton Bauer batteries before charging. Anton Bauer chargers will not charge batteries that are too cold or too hot. When hard drives get too hot they do not work well or stop working.
Click to expand...

Asked for ice packs on day one, day 2 rolls around and the best production gave me was ziplock bags. Gets the drives cool in minutes but watch out for condensation.
303538_3734704039541_18724656_n.jpg
 
I'd like to get a little camera umbrella ... like they use to use on jib's that were outside. Something a fairly small ... keep the heat off the camera, and glare away from the screen. Right now I'm setting up a 6 foot by 6 foot mesh screen that goes over the camera operator and setup ... but it's a bit of a hassle.
 
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Christian Felder said:
Hi Joel!

I am in Shanghai at the moment..shooting for 5 days in a row now...not a single issue! Btw. we came from the Australien desert.
Night: -1° Day: 35° The Epic was rocksolid.

Bring an umbrella...and keep in mind that it takes about 30-45 minutes, if you change from Air Condition to outside, to get the
condensed water of your lenses. Humidity is about 90%.

Getting through customs into china was no issue. It's my first time here and everything is super relaxed!

...yesterday we had to shoot in a huge vegetable market - they turned on the light in the whole market place for us!
This would never happen in Germany...we didn't even have permit or whatever.

Go there and have good fun. Cool city and nice people!

Christian

PS: Get a good stringer / translator. PM me if you need one - our's is fantastic!
Click to expand...

Thanks Christian, that's good to know that you found Shanghai relaxed, I imagined it quite different. Nice to hear that the REDs function so well under extreme conditions. So far my Scarlet has worked a treat, never an issue after nearly two feature films. But never tried it under these extreme conditions so it's reassuring. I have a local Chinese PA and PM that are organised to show us the ropes and translate, so it should be OK. PLus AC's etc. It will be interesting.
Cheers
 
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