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A few images I took in Lapland, Northern Finland a couple of weeks ago. I was there mainly to shot rime iced trees but I also ran into some interesting places (in national parks I originally didn't plan on going to) like those with small huts next to the river. I had lots of problems with my gear at low temps. It looks like Nikon's mirrorless cameras aren't designed to anything below zero C.
Some of those shots were taken at close to -20C/-4F and my Nikon Z7's back screen stopped working after about 2 minutes of shooting, so the only way to focus and preview my images was the viewfinder, which is monitor based. Fortunately it continued to work. I had two WR-R10s with me to remotely trigger the shutter. Both died completely after about 10 minutes. I can't fix them since I got them in Japan and don't have receipts anymore. The snow was quite deep in some places, and next to a tree maybe even 4 feet deep. I fell into it multiple times and had a hard time getting out
I could go on for hours but why bother? Enjoy the shots. I believe they came out great, but most were nuts difficult to take.
Very gorgeous set! True fruits of labor. Shooting in extreme cold weather seems like a completely different proposition. 1st and 3rd are my favorites. Actual ice disks in the foregroud..wow!
While I love mirrorless those heavy professional SLR's are hard to beat in the nasty cold. 4th and last are my favs - they really look like people. Dave
Dave. Yes and no. The new Panasonic mirrorless SR1 is much better in this respect. If you look at its dedicated website it's rated -10C. Nikon rated its Z6/Z7 to only 0C. It sucks. But Nikon is overall great camera and if not used in such harsh conditions it'll work just fine. I'm not switching to Panasonic because of this one reason
First of all, fantastic images Greg! And great job handling the coldness! Not everyone arrive there sufficiently prepared. Snowshoes are very useful there.
I don't want to hijack your thread, but I was in the same place two weeks ago with my Leica Q and Fujifilm GFX50S. No problems whatsoever, despite the temperatures going down as low as -33°C one night. Only my drone had some hiccups, but after disabling all the safety sensor then it handled it pretty well.
Now I can't comment on the Nikon, as I don't have it. But I don't think Mirrorless cameras handle the coldness any worse than DSLRs. There are some camera specific differences, like the Leica Q clearly handled it bit worse. Maybe because it is made from a solic block of Aluminium, which might not be such a good thing in the coldness. Another trick is to always keep spare batteries in warm pocket, so they warm up there.
Look like you were there at the same time I was....
The problem was they didn't have good weather conditions this year (second or third year in a row, actually) and most trees weren't covered nicely, or were just partially covered. I didn't like that look. Some of your images have that "partially covered" depicted. I wanted to capture trees that are fully covered without any branches/blackness sticking out of them. To get that I had to go all the way to the top of a hill, high up there and I hiked sometimes 3 or 4 Km. Hiking wasn't that bad, what was hard to take was the wind. Up there at -10C felt like -30C because of the wind. I think this is what killed Nikon's WR-R10s and the monitor. The camera is working just fine now, and it was as soon as I took it back to my rental car, or hotel room. But WR-R10 are a history now, completely broken.
Anyway, I like those trees looking like snow ghosts (or whatever your imagination brings to your head) and not trees.
Gregg B. wrote:
Look like you were there at the same time I was....
The problem was they didn't have good weather conditions this year (second or third year in a row, actually) and most trees weren't covered nicely, or were just partially covered. I didn't like that look. Some of your images have that "partially covered" depicted. I wanted to capture trees that are fully covered without any branches/blackness sticking out of them. To get that I had to go all the way to the top of a hill, high up there and I hiked sometimes 3 or 4 Km. Hiking wasn't that bad, what was hard to take was the wind. Up there at -10C felt like -30C because of the wind. I think this is what killed Nikon's WR-R10s and the monitor. The camera is working just fine now, and it was as soon as I took it back to my rental car, or hotel room. But WR-R10 are a history now, completely broken.
Anyway, I like those trees looking like snow ghosts (or whatever your imagination brings to your head) and not trees. ...Show more →
I know exactly what you mean. That is also what I wanted (the fully covered snow in trees). These days going to Lapland and even snow on can not be taken for granted. Last year the same happened to me, the snow arrived record late. This year there was nice snow cover on trees late December, but then one storm blew it all off.. Unfortunately bad timing for both your and my trips..
All very nice as always. Interesting facts about camera trouble. I have not shot in temps that low, is it typical to have camera failures at those temps?