Time Lapse Photography w D80 & NikonCapture

Hi I was experimenting with Time Lapse photography with my Nikon D80 - which does not

provide that functionality. I'm using the Nikon Camera Capture software to control the camera.

 

I connect the camera to the computer and tried to take 48 pictures every half an hour, but after

taking about 8 pictures, the nikon camera battery DIED... I thought my camera drain very little

battery while it ON mode, is the USB connected to the camera drained the battery.

 

Any solutions, how to do this ... I do not have a external power cable for this camera.

 

Thanks

 

Sajid

Sajid, how long was the exposure for each of the 8 pictures? Long exposures will consume more power. I presume you started with a fully charged battery and known to be in good condition. Try turning off image review on-camera to save power (maybe it does this anyway when tethered).

Hi, I've setup external studio lights for the shots, when i kept on for the complete cycle for 24 hours. With

that light, my exposure for at 1/100s at f/5 in manual mode, and preview was off. So, i was taking 1 shot every 30

minutes, and this went for about 4 hours and the camera battery died and the process stopped.

 

Sajid

That's very odd. I can't think of a reason why the battery would drain under the circumstances described, and the USB connection should have no effect. Have you carefully checked the software settings, such as single (non-continuous) focus? These are things worth investigating. <br><br>

As unlikely as it seems, the battery can also be faulty (if you have another to try).

If you look at your camera while it's attached to Control, does it show the meter active on top? If so, you're constantly metering and will kill off your battery faster. I'm surprised it died that quick.

 

You can be the manual intervalometer and shoot it yourself, just set your watch timer to go off every X seconds. Since you're teathered to a laptop, I'm sure you won't be walking away from your shoot. You can get a pocketwizard with this functionality. Harbortronics makes little units just for this purpose. Otherwise, you're looking at a D200/D300.