The Case Relay Camera Power System from Tether Tools offers 'infinite camera power' for most DSLR and mirrorless cameras from Canon, Nikon, Sony and Panasonic. The system works via a DC coupler that plugs into both the camera’s battery port and the Case Relay. The Relay plugs into either a 5V USB external battery or a wall outlet.
Tether Tools says Case Relay, which includes a secondary 1200mAh battery, is a solution for time-lapse photography and other tasks that require uninterrupted, long-lasting power. External battery packs can be swapped without interrupting power, as the Relay's battery will continue to power the camera while the external source is unplugged.
The Relay Camera Coupler is available from $29.99 to $34.99, depending on camera, and the Case Relay is available now for $99.99. Tether Tools also offers an external 5V USB battery for $49.99 USD. Many Nikon and Canon DSLRs are compatible, as well as mirrorless models from Fujifilm, Sony, Olympus and Panasonic. For a full list of compatible cameras check tethertools.com/relay.
I wish all camera AND flash brands would just add a USB port so we can use external battles to power our equipment without having to buy special devices like this. No offense Tether Tools.
Do they really make THAT much money from their battery sales? Heck, just also offer USB type batteries or rebrand a current external battery. It would be nice to not have to replace batteries during a long days shoot. Especially if the trend is going to the mirrorless system which eats up batteries.
USB in is not nearly as efficient as having a DC-IN that works at the native voltage of the camera, which most flagship Nikon and Pentax (and Canon?) bodies do offer. Converting a 5V USB bank to 7-9V is not as productive as just getting a 7-9V battery and going straight into the camera.
But you'd be surprised how much money these companies make selling batteries. I mean Nikon's D810 / D750 battery is $60, and they probably make it for pennies or a few bucks.
Honestly though, if I'm jus having a long day of regular shooting, it's far far less annoying to have to swap a ~2000 mAh battery once, than to bother plugging in a camera all throughout the day.
Trust me, I've tried it with the Sonys. Unless you shoot video from a tripod 100% of the time, (and can gafff tape the battery to the tripod leg) ...having a battery pack in your pocket and a USB cable going from your pocket to your camera is NOT as practical as just swapping your battery out once or twice.
The outdated USB standard is the problem. Low current 5V was adequate way back when USB 1 and 2 were created. The connector has become so ubiquitous, it's just something we deal with. We need a new standard to take hold, and we will have something more capable of modern power requirements. Alot of the modern phones and their charges are already side stepping the issue with fast charge modes, that don't adhere to the USB2.0 standard, but allow much faster charging, due to not being limited in current delivery.
Yeah, I really hope the next generation of USB cable becomes ubiquitous for both connecting and charging soon. Even the newest Sony bodies that can shoot while plugged in to 5V USB power, can't get their current fast enough to shoot 4K video without the internal battery slowly draining. Whoops.
For now, I'll stick with dummy batteries and ~7.4 V LiPO batteries I guess. Works well enough for my timelapse needs.
Is there anything out there ( battery pack ) that can power both camera and flash at the same time for extended flash shooting like on fashion shows where there is no time to swap and fast recycle times are needed ?
It's giving 8 volts(buried on their website). It makes good sense, since a vast majority of modern cams are using li-ion cells in a 2 cell serial configuration. 8 volts is right in the sweet spot, and should power anything from cams with tiny cells labeled 7.2 volts, to large ones with 7.6 volt batts(these batts will all be over 8 volts fully charged).
It seems the battery in the Case Relay is fortunately not being stepped up(another 2 cell serial configuration, with a voltage regulating circuit to keep it at 8 volts), so there is no loss there. I suspect the USB battery you plug in only supplies the charge circuit for the Case Relay battery, so there's only one place you're losing power to stepping up voltage, and that is inherent to USB battery packs anyways. It seems like a pretty smart system.
Just buy a usb to 9v dc cable. Then dummy battery with dc input and a usb powerbank. Xiaomi's 16000mah powerbank is around 25bucks. The cable 5 bucks. Dummy battery 5-8 bucks
It actually is since people also start lamenting when cameras get "too big". But bigger batteries need more space...in a camera grip...
For the other part: Sigma was smart enough to offer an AC adapter for the DP Merrills. Even smarter was to make it possible to connect other energy sources than the AC adapter to the battery dummy. That way I could use a portable battery to power my particularly energy hungry DP Merrills...
A bigger Sony mirrorless battery wouldn't solve the problem that this thing solves. It is a tool for being able to shoot for many, many hours on end without interruption, for overnight timelapses or in-studio projects or something.
Even a high-capacity flagship DSLR battery such as a Nikon D4 or Canon 1D can only last a few hours on a single battery, and lots of astro-landscape / night-timelapse photographers want to do multiple 3-5 hour timelapses during a road trip, sometimes multiple timelapses per night.
This is where 5000, 10,000, and even 20,000 mAh battery packs come into play. I've used everything from 7.4V LiPO batteries to 5V USB batteries, and this type of tool is definitely an interesting, useful option.
not 100% about this but: doesn't dslr cameras power to circiut sensor only while taking picture? so in time, between the shot, power is use only for stanb, by, so mulitple timelapse (each shot for let say falf of minute or so) is not such a big deal? mirrorles cameras power the sensor all the time, hence the bigger drainenage of the battery, heating, noise etc.
and i was also mentioned option for ac/dc cable for studio work etc. would be really that big problem for campanies to make additinal plug for ac power and put that 5 dolar cable along with it?
My apologies, I forgot to specify: For a nightscape timelape, I'mdoing back-to-back 30 second exposures quite often. the camera is essentially exposing its sensor for 90-95% of the time.
So, that is why it is such a shame that mirrorless cameras have such dinky batteries, and also require that the LCD or EVF at least be "on" as well, even if they're displaying black the whole time. D'oh!
But, I agree, I do wish that more cameras had a direct DC-in port, and/or an included converter cable so that you could plug in any 5V power source, or at least a 9V power source... That would be really awesome.
Thanks for the link, I was looking at a different Lanparte product I guess. Still, $97 is far more than $40, and I don't see a mAh rating on this item, just a promise of 4X the battery life of an EN-EL15.
No doubt the Case Relay has the advantage of being a power buffer. But case Relay costs $(99+29+40) ie the CR, the coupler and the battery bank = at least $168. If you already have the battery bank, still need to spend $128.
Indeed; personally I'd probably just buy the $99 device and splice my own "dummy battery", in fact some of the $9 dummy batteries out there might already have the same type of jack / port, it seems.
But, not everybody is willing to take wire cutters and a soldering iron to something that is going to be plugged into their $3K camera, which I understand. ;-)
warning: try at your own risk. large Lipos are not toys. having gotten that out of the way, i have been using battery-slot-adapters - original or knockoffs - with 2S Lipos and RC connectors with great success. and those lipos come in sizes even pro-camera-batteries can only dream of.
Glad to hear that other folks have figured out this little secret. As far as I'm concerned, there's nothing better than being able to power a DSLR for ~20 hours on a single <1lb battery that costs <$30... But yeah, use at your own risk. Those things can indeed explode...
Well, your camera is most probably made in china... The difference is mostly quality control. For example, multiple cheap chinese battery chargers I used died after few months. Others work for years...
This is what I want. Except... it only does one of my cameras, and not any of the cameras I'm thinking of buying this summer. I'll wait and see reviews. If the coupler is hackable to add unsupported cameras, or if they expand the supported cameras, I'll get one + two couplers (and maybe complete two sets later on).
My adventure astro-landscape / timelapse friends and I have been splicing 7.4V LiPo batteries directly to cheap-o third-party dummy camera batteries for years now, and they work just fine. But, try that at your own risk LOL, doing so would technically void the crap out of your warranty. ;-)
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