Coldest/hottest you have photographed in?

[Dakotah Jackson]

In checking over the minimal field notes I take at times from past years I checked the temps I know I shot in. I have a thermometer and humidity guage with me much of the time. Extremes have been 43 below zero and 128 above.(farenheit) Wind chill in the coldest was 93 below zero per the weather folks who publish these things. Coldest real temp(not photographing) was 63 below zero.

On the other extreme the 128 was in Death Valley during the summer. Still day with no wind. Have been in that area in low 120's with major windstorm and it sucks the life out of you fast. Like standing in front of a blast furnace.

The gear held up OK through it all. No shutter freezing or broken anything.

I don't make a point of going out during the extremes but sometimes the only way to get the photo is to venture out when it is difficult. Just can't get blizzard photos without going out in a blizzard. Yep, I own major league cold weather gear so I don't popsickleize myself when shooting and limit the exposed skin.

I have had a few exposures come out with nice frost dendritic type patterns on the film from time to time when really cold. Sure doesn't help an image.

[Vaughn]

Only down to 18F (no wind) up in Spokane. Might have photographed in colder temps in Lava Beds Nat. Monument (CA) in December, but I don't keep a thermometer in my gear...don't need one to know it is TFC. Unknown high temperature, but probably down in the Grand Canyon.

Vaughn

[William McEwen]

Coldest -- near zero in Michigan. Warmest -- 110 or so in Texas.

[Dakotah Jackson]

For clarification... I don't seek out the extremes but do love living where they tend to happen. Whenever a storm is forecast or I see one moving in I try to get out to photograph. Most head inside and miss some great opportunities trying to stay out of the extremes. Lightning is the one I avoid as it gets close.(got hit once and don't want a repeat) Tornadoes I avoid if they are too close and coming my way.

Generally though few photograph in weather extremes and that is when some interesting stuff happens.

[Vaughn]

Generally though few photograph in weather extremes and that is when some interesting stuff happens.

Not saying you do it, but I am a bit wary (and weary) of images of interesting weather conditions -- taken just for the "Oh, wow!" factor. One benefit of digital cameras is that we are now flooded with such images and there is less need for others to photograph them.

However, many do use the light of those conditions to make great images.

Vaughn

[John Kasaian]

The coldest would have to have been at 14,000+' over Mt Shasta in the winter, shooting out the open window of a Cessna 182 with a Gowland 8x10 aerial camera I have no idea what the temperature was.

The hottest? Well I shot some over 100 deg F. After it gets past 100 degrees I stop looking at the temperature and start trying to figure out ways to keep the metal tabs on the darkslide from getting too hot to touch!

[Michael Graves]

6 below here in Vermont. And 110 in Death Valley. The Vermont picture actually came out. I never did see the Death Valley one. So I don't know if the film melted or if I shot with empty film holders, or if I was actually just shooting a mirage.

[Michael Graves]

I have had a few exposures come out with nice frost dendritic type patterns on the film from time to time when really cold. Sure doesn't help an image.

Print it at 20x24 and attach a little note about the effort you put into getting that effect. Price it at $250.00 more than your usual print price. Who know? Isn't there a sucker born every day?

[AFSmithphoto]

My coldest was also Vermont. Last Christmas Eve, pre-dawn. Thermometer said -10. Cold enough to freeze the greese in my tripod head.

This Feb I hope to be on the summit of Mt Washington. Lots of potential for a new personal record there.

[Brian Ellis]

Coldest for me was about 15 degrees farenheit. Hottest was about 105. I've never found a photograph that had to be made in colder or hotter conditions than those.

[D. Bryant]

Coldest real temp(not photographing) was 63 below zero.

On the other extreme the 128 was in Death Valley

Coldest: About -30F: Niagara Falls, Canada, mid January. It was cold but weather conditions weren't extremely bad. The visitor areas around the falls looked like they had been coated with sugar.

Warmest: About 113F: Death Valley, CA, mid September. It didn't seem that hot really with such low humidity. Being from the SE US, 105F on the coast of Georgia or Florida is brutal when the humidity is extremely high.

[Jeffrey Sipress]

I was in Sequoia National Park two days ago after a nice snowstorm and cold front, temp was -4 deg F. I was in Death Valley one sept, and it was 114 F. What was I thinking?

[Bosaiya]

Hottest so far has been 300F+ and lasted for a few sessions of about fifteen minutes each.

[redrockcoulee]

The coldest would have been in the -40C and that would have been many times over the years but only with either 35mm or a Rolleichord. Coldest place I have ever lived got to -51 C but stayed in the house most of those days. Hottest I had thought was Valley of Fire and it was 112F and we were camping in a tent. Hottest in Canada would have been southern Saskatchwan at 43C (only 109F) and me with no air conditioning in the car and I guess the hottest place I ever lived would have been the same temps and we had that for two three day periods the one summer.

[Eric James]

Some darn impressive extremes here! For me the coldest (4X5) was minus single digits F in Southcentral Alaska, and the warmest was in the upper 70s F in Washington State.

[William McEwen]

Some darn impressive extremes here! For me the coldest (4X5) was minus single digits F in Southcentral Alaska, and the warmest was in the upper 70s F in Washington State.

Eric! Upper 70s????? We'll invite you to Texas in August...

[Eric Rose]

-30C and up to 110F. Both times with LF. The heat wasn't much of a problem except the sweating under the dark cloth but the cold was a bugger. You have to use a snorkel that extends out from under your dark cloth or you will instantly fog up your GG. You must also pull the dark slides very slowly or you get static marks.

[William McEwen]

-30C and up to 110F. Both times with LF. The heat wasn't much of a problem except the sweating under the dark cloth but the cold was a bugger. You have to use a snorkel that extends out from under your dark cloth or you will instantly fog up your GG. You must also pull the dark slides very slowly or you get static marks.

-30 C

is

-87 F

Do you live at the North Pole or the South Pole? Russia, maybe? :)

[redrockcoulee]

-30 C

is

-87 F

Do you live at the North Pole or the South Pole? Russia, maybe? :)

Your calculation is incorrect. Minus 40 is the same for both scales. Minus 22 is the correct value.

By the way it has gotten -87F in the southern Yulon once

[Kirk Gittings]

Not THE coldest but I was shooting in -5 yesterday in Taos. Felt pretty damn cold.

[William McEwen]

Your calculation is incorrect. Minus 40 is the same for both scales. Minus 22 is the correct value.

By the way it has gotten -87F in the southern Yulon once

Jeez, there I go trusting the Internet again! Sassafrassin Wikipedia.

:(

[Andrew O'Neill]

-40 Celcius in Saskatchewan winter. Plus 40 Celcius in Saskatchewan summer. Both seasons very dry. Lots of static electricity!

[Harold_4074]

Coldest: five below zero, but it was in Alabama, so that must count for something. The camera was on a tripod, and eventually the shutter froze open during a time exposure. So I went on with the lenscap and my wristwatch. When my watch froze on my wrist I decided it was time to go in.

[redrockcoulee]

-40 Celcius in Saskatchewan winter. Plus 40 Celcius in Saskatchewan summer. Both seasons very dry. Lots of static electricity!

In Southern Alberta that can be just a single day's range... actually that is not true but have seen -20 to +22 in a couple of hours due to the Chinook.

[Daniel Grenier]

Coldest ? High Arctic a few hundred miles from the North Pole -40C and lower.
Hottest ? In Florida in the dead of summer 100F +

[Wallace_Billingham]

last winter it was around zero when my tripod froze to the chest waders I was wearing while doing a shot in the middle of a small river.

BTW when it is that cold the air bubbles that form just downstream from a boulder make snow underwater. I had never seen or heard anything like that until I saw it for myself

[Vaughn]

Hottest ? In Florida in the dead of summer 100F +

I believe that would be in the dread of summer...:D

[Steve M Hostetter]

Ive been poured rain on in mild weather temps and (thx f64 pack) I used to shoot a lot of water fowl on eagle creek resvouir in single digits.. Although I can't tell you in what instance i was the coldest..
and like a dumb cluck i've tried to shoot in 90-100 degrees w/ 98% humidity

[mcfactor]

Thailand in April was probably the hottest for me (shooting 4x5), it was easily 100+ with 99% humidity. The problem was the sweat under the darkcloth, and loading film in the changing bag, the film kept sticking to everything. But the pics came out great, www.noahmclaurine.com (travel, thailand).

[lenicolas]

i think this topic would be much funnier if we showed the images resulting...

[r.e.]

Hottest so far has been 300F+ and lasted for a few sessions of about fifteen minutes each.

You can't make a statement like that and fail to provide details :)

[jp498]

I went out before sunrise once to photograph sea smoke. It was -22f. That's about as cold as it gets on the coast of Maine. My dslr was good for two photos and the battery went dead in the cold. I went out again another morning like that, but maybe -15f, but kept the battery warm till I was ready to shoot, and things worked much better. It's not LF, so I won't post it.

I have photographed out of a supercub in freezing weather with the window folded out of the way. Pilot didn't like that, but I didn't mind.

Can't claim any super hot weather, as I'm not much of a sport for hard work when temps climb above 90f.

[Robert Hughes]

I once took a photograph lit by the surface of the sun. It was 5500 degrees! :p

[Bosaiya]

You can't make a statement like that and fail to provide details :)

I wrote a little about it on APUG (http://www.apug.org/forums/forum147/69167-burning-down-house-trial-fire.html).

[Heroique]

Quite a sizzling APUG post…

But why not share your story & photos in our forum?

I don’t think it would melt anyone...

(Teaser quote from APUG: “If the gear and film were exposed to direct flame I'd have a lot more than my exposure to worry about! As it is I nearly broke my neck trying to climb down the stairs to exit when the fire got too hot.”)

[Bosaiya]

It wasn't that I didn't want to share, after all many of the photos were made on large format and I'll jabber on as much as the next eccentric given the chance, I just didn't want to be seen as clogging the forums with duplicate posts.

[Heroique]

Clogging the forums?

I think you’d be running the risk burning them down! ;)

[Bosaiya]

If I were the man I was five years ago I'd take a flamethrower to this place.

[lenicolas]

For exemple :
this morning in Paris, -3° celsius

http://i46.tinypic.com/v42avt.jpg

http://i47.tinypic.com/m7w8b4.jpg

(i'm not posting straight on the board cause it's not LF ; Nikon F100 + 35mm @ f/5.6 on trix-400)

[George Stewart]

The coldest was -24F, flying a glider over the Sierras, in winter. I was mountain wave soaring and reached about 17,000 feet. The camera was a Nikon F4 with Ektar 25.

The hottest was 117F shooting in Death Valley, in summer. I was using a Wisner 4x5 Pocket Expedition with Kodak 100 ISO color and B&W.

[jon.oman]

The coldest was -32 degress F., in Michigan's Upper Penn., in January. Warmest was a bit over 100 degrees F. in South Carolina.

[Eirik Berger]

The coldest day of large format photography was last winter, -43°C (-45,4°F according to a converting website) here on Spitsbergen. It was on the sea ice near Pyramiden. It was no wind to speak of so photography was possible but really uncomfortable. Fingers became cold quickly and the heat from my eye made the loupe full of ice in seconds.

My record though is -47°C (-52,6°F) in northern Norway 8 or 9 years ago. It was not LF but I used my Mamiya Pro TL. The winder worked really hard but it did the job for 40-45 minutes before the battery lost to much power due to the cold, and I had to mount the crank. It is really the best cold weather camera I have ever used.

Hottest? Not much to speak of. Maybe as hot as 20°C (68°F). And I might be stretching it a bit here...

[Jim Jones]

Coldest? Almost -60F at Thule Air Force Base in Greenland. Humidity was also very low. Nearly new Leica rangefinder and Nikon SLR gear worked well with no special lubrication. Film had to be advanced and rewound slowly to prevent static electricity. Film was also quite brittle.

[bbarna]

In Bolivia... It was around -4 F

[Drew Bedo]

In the sixties, I took snapshote with a Kodak Brownie in -20 in Michigan. In the eighties I shot Kodachromes with a Canon AE-1 in 120+ in the Saudi desert.

So: from -20 degrees F to over 120 degrees F

[Noeyedear]

I did a job in a blast freezer -17c some years ago with a hassy swc, I also had to light it with 3 elincrom flash lights. When I came out the camera, tripod etc coated itself with a heavy frost, i had to wait over an hour before I could use the camera again.
Try that with a Phaseone!
Kevin.

[William McEwen]

I once took a photograph lit by the surface of the sun. It was 5500 degrees! :p

During the day, or night?

Actually, I tried that, too. Even my best holders showed a little light leak.

[Don Dudenbostel]

On a couple of occasions I've shot in -25F not counting chill factor and 117F. Neither were much fun.

Like John K I've shot many assignments from a plane or helicopter with the window open or door off. A 65 to 140 knot wind at -20f is tough.

[Sean Galbraith]

-30C with windchill in an abandoned steel mill near Buffalo.

[Saulius]

Coldest was about -60F (without windchill) when I lived in Chicago,IL. Drove down to the lakefront and dragged my then girlfriend with me. I said when will we experience this again!? I shot it with 35mm slide film, still have the images somewhere. Lake Michigan seemed like a giant bowl of steaming soup, very interesting. I didn't last very long and made the mistake of taking my gloves off to take the photographs. Needless to say I only did a few as my fingers started tingling pretty quickly. Hottest would be a guess in the low 100's F.