How do you charge your device while camping?
It’s early morning here in Denmark and I’ve just started my photo trip to the meadow. My plan is to go out this morning, and in the evening as well, to look for deer and birds and maybe foxes if I’m very lucky.
But this video is not about that trip. if I find something that’ll be another video. Right now I just thought I wanted to share this whole setup like, how do I power my batteries – camera batteries, drone batteries, laptop and stuff when I’m on my shorter or longer trips.
Because actually, after Ellesmere Island, the expedition, I’ve been so happy with this setup that I’m having it in my photo bag almost all the time not because I think I’ll need more batteries this morning than I have brought but just because sometimes things just kind of go different than I’ve planned.
I might find something really nice like let’s say I find some fox pops or I find the the cranes or something, then and I might spent the whole day out and with the vlogging camera, and that camera, and drone and stuff, and the sound equipment, like, I mean batteries and power very, very easily run out.
And then it’s just nice to be able to have a cup of coffee at the middle of the day set up my portable solar charging system and then power everything up within quite a short time. So yeah let me just quickly go through.
I know I did this in the preparation video for Ellesmere Island but I just want to share a few more experiences with you. So yeah. Let’s have a have a look. Before I get started I just want to say I think all of this is quite affordable equipment.
I’ve tried to, I’ve just looked on Amazon for the things that, in my opinion, adds the best… has the best value, like the some quite cheap things that got good reviews. And yeah now I have tested all of this on my expedition on Ellesmere Island.
It has been in windy conditions, down to a minus 35 degrees Celsius and everything has turned out to be just perfect. But let’s start with this one which is probably the most important. This is my 24-watt, three ports, portable solar panel.
And the good thing about it is it folds very nicely together which, lets see if I can do it, even with a string on like this. And then it goes down in my bag. It has three USB outports here which is very nice because I can charge, let’s say, two camera batteries, a power bank and a phone at the same time.
The best effect is when I’m using two ports because it outputs like maximum, this amount of of watt and I figured out that if I put just one port in I’m not getting all the power it can produce.
If I put two I get the maximum output. If I put three it kind of divides the max output to one more than it actually has power for. So if I want to power something up fast, the fastest is from two. The the weak thing about these ones is the connection cables here.
I have broken two on the Ellesmere expedition but what I used to do is just try to avoid faffing too much around when it’s cold. I use two different power banks for this one. Normally I basically just bring one but let me just explain why I’m using two different.
This is an Anker power bank and it has two USB out. And the reason why I use this is because it has the USB-C and I just love that connection. I use this for almost everything, like phone batteries and, and everything basically I can power from USB.
I also have this XT power. It’s because I need to be able to charge my drone and it has this other cable that I don’t know what’s called, but you know the the round one. And this one unfortunately only charges via the micro USB and I find that connection a little more fragile.
But this one I can charge with a micro USB directly from this panel. And then I can, as the same as on this one, use two USB ports or I can use the output with a much higher watts. So this one goes for phones, camera batteries, everything like that.
This one the beauty of this one is when you press on the side here you can actually choose how many volts it has to output so by holding and pressing the button on the side I can choose between 15 volt 16.
5, 19, 20, 24 and 12. and that is brilliant because I can charge my laptop with this one. I can also charge my laptop with this one. This one is just, it just charges it faster. I can charge my drone batteries by plugging in a converter that goes from this one.
(I’ll put a link below the video for that one) that goes from this little thing to a cigar thing a female cigar thing and then the the the the car charger for the drone can go into that socket and then I’ll charge these batteries.
And I can charge, like for the Mavic Air, I can charge (laughs) I would say 2.9 batteries in one full battery – almost three full batteries I can make from this power bank. So that is pretty nice. I would say when I go on my trips and if I’m bringing my drone I would rather have two of these then one or two of these, because this one can do the USB and at the same time output the higher voltage and more watts.
Plus when I charge this one from the solar panel, even though I’m using my 100 watt it will only charge through USB. That means that I can maximum get between 10 and 11 watt on this one regardless how strong the solar panel is.
But, with this one, because I can charge through this cable, I can get like 40 or 50 watt from the other one. That was what I got on Ellesmere at least, 40 or 50 watt. So then this one can charge up within a few hours where this one takes like, you know, some more hours, it takes almost a day to fully charge.
So that was it. Another very important thing is these, I love these battery chargers. Let me just show you. These battery chargers are just incredibly good because I put Velcro here so in my Peli case I have them sitting up there.
But when I go on a photo trip like this they’re just really, really good. They make them for all these small batteries, for like Canon, Nikon, Sony and stuff. They have indicators with channel one and two.
And then the important thing, it has micro USB and USB-C meaning that, regardless what cable I have brought by mistake, I’ll always be able to find a a cable, or if I’m traveling or if I, yeah.
.. I’ll always be able to find a cable. Plus if one of these connectors goes bad I can use the other one. But the setup – let’s say, now I’m out photographing at least I’ll be when I’m done talking.
I will be having a break at some point before I go out in the evening again. Then I guess put this up pointing towards the sun in as good angle as possible, meaning that I can then charge four batteries.
And then I’ll leave it there, find a good place and go photographing and then come back pick it up and then, within a few hours, I should have four charged batteries. and that is extremely helpful.
Then, usually if I have more time I’ll put a power bank in as well so that I have a power bank that is fully charged. Of course these these are fully charged from home but let’s just say I’m out on more trips.
I would just maintain the power on these. On the last of these output or just on the second of them because then I have for my microphones, for my phone for my computer and stuff like that. I have charged my MacBook Pro with these two batteries.
And I was getting a little greedy because I thought I could plug in two batteries to the MacBook Pro and charge it faster but in the last moment I was told not to do that because some people have blown up their, the input by doing that.
So it’s probably not a good idea. If anyone has experience with it I would love to hear it. So yeah. That was actually my power setup. So just to sum up on it, I will put links to everything in the below the video.
But the, these camera battery chargers are really good. The power banks, like if I didn’t have a drone and I didn’t have a bigger solar panel I think that this would be my favourite, the Anker power bank.
It’s very nice. But because I have a drone because I have laptops and stuff I would like to charge faster, and because I do have 100 watt solar panel I would like to be able to charge this one, the power bank faster.
I think the XT Power is my favorite. Only thing I would wish was that there was at least also a USB-C because it’s just a pain in the… yeah to have so many different cables. I wish I could just stick to the USB-C.
But yeah that was it. I think for me now it’s time to get a cup of coffee, get my things together and then get out on the photo trip this morning. If I’m lucky to find something I’ll definitely share it with you in an upcoming video.
But yeah. Let me just show you how nicely it all fits into the bag. So it’s time for me to get to the meadow. I heard some cranes actually down there but I don’t know if I’m that lucky that I can photograph them.
I haven’t photographed them yet up here but we’ll see. I think I’m going to put a little camouflage on the lens and maybe take my 3D camouflage on and go to the meadow now, look down there, just get a little feeling of how everything is And yeah hopefully I can make a video in a few days so that I can share that trip with you.
I’m going out now then I’m going home to do a little work in the middle of today when the light is flat. And then I will go out in the evening as well, maybe to the meadow, maybe up to the forest.
I don’t know if you remember where I was sitting last year looking for the badger. I might give it a go tonight, sit up there for some hours just to wait with the binoculars, see if I can see badgers or foxes up there.
And you know maybe get a few photos as well. Yeah. I think that’s it. I hope you could use a little tip. I’ll put links to the different things in the description. Remember as always don’t just buy what I use.
Go and find the best thing yourself. Go and check for prices, reviews and find the things that fit your need. This was just meant as a little inspiration but yeah. See you out there.
