hey joey helms here and this weekend we're shooting a commercial project
for ant empower batteries and i already regret pitching this idea to them but let me take you
behind the scenes and show you how rugged these batteries are even in the most extreme weather
well we cannot visit iceland or the arctic we have kindly the arctic
visiting us here in chicago introducing the polar vortex
these conditions are a constant fight a fight against the elements and
also a fight of human versus gear who gives up first who lasts longer me or the batteries
to give myself a fighting chance i tested out a few clothing options over the past couple of
days outside leading up to this crazy weather and layers are absolutely essential and also
hand warmers become your best friends it quickly became obvious to me that the hands are absolutely
the weak spot in this layers festival because you need to maintain some dexterity to control and
hold your camera i got these gloves sent from valerae they're actually good medium between
warmth and dexterity and if it's getting really cold or if i'm just hiking and i don't need to
use my hands so if i'm just waiting around for something to happen i put them in these
mittens they're kind of the sleeping bag for my gloves and that keeps my hand really cozy
now on the gear side most of you ah
oh no it's cracked that's fast shitty gear now on the gear side most of your equipment if you
look at the specs comes at a recommended operating temperatures and frankly most gear is not rated to
work at sub-zero temperatures neither in celsius nor in fahrenheit the red komodo for example is
rated at 0 to 40 degrees celsius something like that in put it here in fahrenheit though the titan
micros they are supposed to go from -15 to plus 40 degrees and actually i've been told that they
held up even at way lower temperatures like we have right now so let's see who gives in first
flavor flavor of temperature or gear let's check it out one way to up your production value is
having a friend who has a car rig that allows your crew to stay warm inside the car and just your
talent basically to freeze off their ass my crew today is patrick harney and his fiancee
hi they're both moving to arizona next week so this is our last hurrah but if you need
a dp or a friend with a car right in arizona hit up patrick but for now it's ciao bye bye
so you may ask yourself why switch from camera native batteries like in the case
of the commodore the bp batteries to a v-mount or goldmine battery the bp batteries are lightweight
and compact but they were just not cutting it for me on the commodore anymore for two reasons
first of all they are draining incredibly fast in even milder to cold conditions when
i was shooting with a commodore in summer where there was no problem with the batteries but when
the temperatures dropped in fall and it was like just like a little below room temperature outside
they were just like cutting out and they were just not delivering as much juice as they
were supposed to do and second i almost run always the komodo with a monitor which needs
to be powered as well so instead of lugging around npf batteries and additional charges
i can power now everything from one source it's warming up now right am i is it just me
the titan microscope has both a v-mount and a gold mount version and in three different sizes 45
90 and 150 ranging from 47 to 140 watt hours on a commodore that gives you around either two hours
almost four or almost six hours of juice six hours of juice and double that if you have the anthem
power dual battery plate on it and you can just mount two batteries at the same time and hot swap
okay we are now here with our second ac to just give you a quick update on how the gear
is holding up so my phone died just like at minus 22 degrees this morning just decided to pass out
even though it was fully charged oh well the small hd monitors they had some weird jitter effect i
guess they are liquid crystal displays and i guess these liquid crystals got a little bit slower and
so it was juttery but it's still workable komodo is holding up fine the focus gears of the lenses
are just a little bit stiffer but no problem and the batteries just holding up like a champ
yeah high five
neither bau has been around for over 50 years by now and can be found on many major productions
like even imax movies like tennis and yes the quality comes at a premium the titan
micros range from 240 to 380 dollars a piece but if you look at the lifetime value how
many charges you can get out of this battery over time reliably this is where these premium
batteries really justify its higher pricing they advertise more efficiently over time
so as most of your professional filmmaking gear is made out of metal you definitely want to
use gloves even afterwards when you're inside this
stuff stays cold for quite a while and definitely don't start licking it
oh ow ow definitely ripped off some skin that was really stupid this is my skin on the global
dynamics handle just wanted to show you this is a warning don't do that first of all v and goldman
batteries provide you with more versatility what do i mean by that well as mentioned before thanks
to the p-tap and the usb port on your battery you can power all kinds of accessories on your rig
the monitor's focus our zoom motors on camera lighting a phone or your gimbal like a whole
lot heck v and g-mount batteries are even used on powerful portable lights so again versatility and
you only need one type of charger the micros are the smallest siblings of the popular titan
series by anthem bauer and are designed to fit smaller cinema cameras like the komodo
and lastly the ruggedness by now i can reliably say through own experience that
they hold up extreme temperatures like minus 22 degrees celsius and they just keep going
to check the battery level you cannot actually see it on your commodore there's no information
flow between battery status and the komodo so you have to just like press
the button here to check regularly make it a habit check your battery levels regularly
definitely one of the downsides the indicators cannot only show you the current charge but if
you tap the power button four times it shows you the relative battery health compared to a
new battery so you can get a good idea of like how your battery is doing over its lifetime
so on that note i guess i'm running out of power and admittedly we warmed up a couple of times
inside the car so i guess the gear one could have done this youtube video inside my cozy apartment
yes but where's the fun in that so if you enjoyed this video warm up your finger by hitting the
thumbs up button consider subscribing if you haven't done so already join the notification crew
and as always thanks so much for watching have a good night have a good morning
whenever and wherever you are around this beautiful planet oh my thermometer dropped
sorry
i i usually source my stories on the go traveling our magnificent planet
the abrupt stop of all global travel changed us though and forced an unforeseen opportunity
upon us the opportunity to go out and tell stories from our own backyards
my stomping ground chicago gets really really rough in winter and transforms into this this
really beautiful place with temperatures dropping down well below zero at times it's a true test
for both body and equipment thanks to the rugged nature of the antennbauer titan micros i have a
reliable power source for my redcomodo and other sensor gear even in the most extreme conditions
having one battery to power camera monitor and accessories keeps gives the charges i have to
carry on an expedition to a minimum and heck i can even charge my phone or gimbal with the micros
moreover this small build and lightweight matches the komodo and enables my
run and gun often handheld style of shooting no matter if i'm
out in my proverbial backyard or in the most stunning locations around the globe
my name is joey helms i'm a filmmaker and video creator and i cannot wait to explore the world
with the titan micros in my back and i had the great idea of putting the drop in nd in my mouth
to hold it so i can swap them out and touch my tongue and my tongue throws through it for a
split second but it froze to it now on the gear side flavor flav says i think my nose is frozen