Buy an Extra Battery or Battery Grip?

ijohn.8.80 said:

And yet another advantage of the battery grip is that you get faster frames per second with most cameras too! You would have to dig the net to find out exactly how much faster your camera gets and this is dependant on the transfer speed of your card also...

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We've past the film age Motordrives arent in grips anymore.
Only some(and by some i mean only one) of today's camera gets better fps with a grip, I believe.

D800 for example. Not in full frame though. And the D5000 definitely doesnt have that feature.

NZed said:

We've past the film age Motordrives arent in grips anymore.

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I can't resist. When I bought two of these Nikon F36 drives -- back in the 60s -- I had to send the drive and bodies out to be mated to each other. You couldn't do it yourself. Nikon would do it, and there was some famous guy in NYC whose name I can't remember, who was the preferred motor drive installer.

http://www.mir.com.my/michaeliu/cameras/nikonf/fmotors/f36/index.htm

If you wanted to revert to regular film advance you could. Take off the F36 and use your original back.

If you wanted 4 FPS you had to lock up the mirror. I don't remember how much an F36 cost, but I'm pretty sure it was more than the body.

NZed said:

Only some(and by some i mean only one) of today's camera gets better fps with a grip, I believe.

D800 for example. Not in full frame though. And the D5000 definitely doesnt have that feature.

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From a very quick google search a second ago I can find links to the D300S, D7000 and the 7D all claiming otherwise. That was just clicking on the third link suggested by google. Common thing is that the batteries used are slightly punchier than the originals. Whether that is safe or recommended for any camera is something I've never investigated as I am just using two stock batteries in my grip.

ijohn.8.80 said:

From a very quick google search a second ago I can find links to the D300S, D7000 and the 7D all claiming otherwise. That was just clicking on the third link suggested by google. Common thing is that the batteries used are slightly punchier than the originals. Whether that is safe or recommended for any camera is something I've never investigated as I am just using two stock batteries in my grip.

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My 7D doesnt seem to be that much faster with the grip at all! Just tried it out after reading your reply. Still the same. Two fully charged battery in one official grip. Oh well, i guess they're different.

And well, the rest are Nikons.

NZed said:

My 7D doesnt seem to be that much faster with the grip at all! Just tried it out after reading your reply. Still the same. Two fully charged battery in one official grip. Oh well, i guess they're different.

And well, the rest are Nikons.

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Just wondering if it only happens shooting Jpegs?

monokakata said:

...
Also, for use on AC they don't need a power cord (the prongs flip out). This makes them a lot easier to pack.

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That presumes they can find an outlet free enough of obstructions that they can plug the charger in. With a charger like that, you might want to carry an extension cord if needed.

ijohn.8.80 said:

Just wondering if it only happens shooting Jpegs?

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It shouldn't speed up at all, regardless of shooting mode, at least with Canon cameras certified to use battery grips.
Some Nikons, like the D700 as mentioned earlier by paolo, can overdrive itself using AA batteries, but those are hard to come by.
I think overdriving the shutter mechanism will reduce the shutter life of the camera as well, since it has to recock the shutter more rapidly. But that hardly matters if you take only 10,000 photos a year.

ijohn.8.80 said:

From a very quick google search a second ago I can find links to the D300S, D7000 and the 7D all claiming otherwise. That was just clicking on the third link suggested by google. Common thing is that the batteries used are slightly punchier than the originals. Whether that is safe or recommended for any camera is something I've never investigated as I am just using two stock batteries in my grip.

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From an extensive Google search I see that the 7D hits 8fps with the grip and standard batteries, and drops to ~7fps with unregulated AA batteries.
Again with the Nikons, you only get the fps boost with AA batteries. This applies to both D300s and D700. I am not aware of any other digital camera able to boost its burst rate with higher-than-rated voltages.

MBP13 said:

I have another question that doesn't relate to the topic, but since you all know what you're talking about, I'll go ahead and ask anyway.

Do you think I'll be able to get past the airport's TSA with a larger Gorilla Pod in my backpack without question? Thanks.

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Yes.

*shucking my teeth* I would like to agree too. Just too many TSA horror stories lacking common sense like the US Senator who had his Congressional Medal of Honor confiscated because it looked like a throwing star.

NZed said:

Yes.

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ctyhntr said:

*shucking my teeth* I would like to agree too. Just too many TSA horror stories lacking common sense like the US Senator who had his Congressional Medal of Honor confiscated because it looked like a throwing star.

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That's not quite the right story, if this is what you mean. It was a retired general, and while they were suspicious about it, he ended up being able to carry it with him.

http://www.snopes.com/military/medal.asp

ctyhntr said:

*shucking my teeth* I would like to agree too. Just too many TSA horror stories lacking common sense like the US Senator who had his Congressional Medal of Honor confiscated because it looked like a throwing star.

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I've been through the US/Canada and many other airports with the tripod carried on my shoulder many times. They go through the scan, they ask what it is, if its suspicious, they open it and probably rescan it. And after all that, its just a tripod.

These people have seen a lot of camera equipment and tripods, but the gorilla may peak some interest due to it's ability to twist and wrap around things. I looked it up at B&H and found THIS ONE. Maybe pack it in the box if you still have or at least take the manual or sales slip.

I flew to Michigan with a bag full of gear but no tripod with no questions asked.

Dale