Quiet shutter still too loud?

[avro707]

I was doing photos yesterday at a presentation with an audience and video being shot in a small auditorium. We also had people watching remotely through video-conference.

The photos were fine, but even using the quiet shutter mode of my Nikon, I was still worried about the noise - and someone else was concerned about it too. It makes a pretty heavy clunk, even with the quiet shutter mode. The video people didn't care, it was more someone worried about the audience being distracted - even though there was a big sound-system in place to make the speech very clearly heard by everyone.

Has anyone else been there and what would you do?

I've heard of other people setting up the camera on a tripod and sticking it in padded box with a hole cut into it for the lens to stick out of (and other needed stuff), and controlling it remotely with Camera Control Pro, but that's not practical in my case.

What else can I do?

I'd thought about using live view (locks the mirror up), but it is not as natural as using the view finder for me.

 

[r.j.s]

It's a camera, the shutter clunks, not much you can do.

 

[puckhead193]

I could see the video people getting annoyed..(i do) when a still photographer fires off 1,000s of photos and i hear the shutter in my video.. a few times - ok but if your next to me... not gonna fly...
But if they are not concerned who cares, your doing your job.

 

[avro707]

I could see the video people getting annoyed..(i do) when a still photographer fires off 1,000s of photos and i hear the shutter in my video.. a few times - ok but if your next to me... not gonna fly...
But if they are not concerned who cares, your doing your job.

Checked with them first because of that - and kept well away from them too. Been in that position you describe as well, but when I'm doing audio.

It was mainly only one person worried. Nobody else seemed to care. I could try a rain-cover next time, that might muffle the sound.

Edit: This might do the trick:

http://www.robgalbraith.com/bins/content_page.asp?cid=7-3408-3436

Edit 2: Found what I need, but the price isn't so nice!

 

[LumbermanSVO]

I've heard Alex Lindsay refer to a device that keeps a camera quiet as a "blimp"

Maybe some time on Google with that in mind might help ya out some

 

[jabbott]

I've heard Alex Lindsay refer to a device that keeps a camera quiet as a "blimp"

Maybe some time on Google with that in mind might help ya out some

That's the "Sound Blimp" by Aquatech... it's supposed to reduce 98% of camera noise:
http://www.aquatech.net/sound-blimps.php

 

[snberk103]

...
It was mainly only one person worried...

If you were there officially, and if only one person was "worried" - which is a notch or two below "complain" then I wouldn't worry.

I found an internet statistic - so may or may not be true - that I've pretty much confirmed through personal experience, however. Basically - regardless of what you do at least 14% of the people are going to disagree. It's just the background noise, and you will never get below that figure.

One person out of a room is just the baseline. If you had spent $1000 on muffling the camera, someone would have complained about the size, or the colour, or that they could still hear it.

Luck.

 

[neutrino23]

It's a camera, the shutter clunks, not much you can do.

Seems the camera companies like this. They could make it much quieter if they wanted to.

 

[iTiki]

My Fuji X100 is much more quiet than my D90.

 

[Laird Knox]

If it was just one person out of a roomful that was concerned: