How to get more Battery Time from your Digital Camera Battery

  When it comes to power consumption not all digital camera features are equal. Some of the digital camera greatest features are high energy consumers. By knowing which features consume the most energy you will be able to avoid or minimize using those features save energy and get more life time from your batteries?

  Turn off the LCD and use the viewfinder: Use the optical viewfinder instead of the LCD for composing your photos. Using the camera menus disable the LCD by turning it off. Since the LCD consumes a lot of energy every time you are using it to take a photo or to look at your objects and compose a photo you are wasting energy. Only use the LCD when you must for example when taking an overhead photo when the optical viewfinder is not usable.

  Do not use continuous focus when not necessary: Every time your camera focuses it consumer's energy. The motors that move the optical components in order to focus consume a lot of energy. You can not avoid focusing of course but you can avoid focusing that is not necessary. For example your digital camera can be set to continuous or single focus. For moving objects such as in sport events continuous focus is used so your can stay focused on the object until you are ready to take the photo. In those cases as long as you press the shutter button half way down the camera will continue to focusing on the object. To save energy minimize that time to the minimum necessary. For example if you plan to shoot a photo of a runner at point A only presses the shutter when he gets close to that point. Holding the shutter button down and following the runner for a longer time than needed to capture him at point A wastes a lot of energy .  

  Carry another battery: Two batteries have twice the energy as one. Carry an extra battery if you are planning for a long shooting session or if you are not sure how many photos you will shoot and how long you will be away from your charger. Some photographers always carry an extra battery with them - batteries are very small and light and carrying an extra one is really not a burden. One thing to remember when carrying an extra battery is to always make sure that you are carrying an extra battery that is fully charged there is no use in carrying an empty battery. Batteries tend to lose their charge even if they are not used so if you are carrying an extra battery for a few days or more remember to recharge it even if you did not use it.

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