Turn off monitor/EVF during time lapse Oympus E-M10 Mk II

vidrazor said:

Hi folks, does anyone know if it's possible to turn off the monitor and/or EVF while using the intervalometer on the Olympus E-M10 Mk II? I would like to try this camera out for some astrophotography, but the tests I've performed leaves the monitor continuously on. Even though it "blacks out", I can still see that the illuminator is still on. Needless to say, this is a huge drain on the battery and greatly limits the amount of time you can shoot. It will also generate lots of heat which will pass on to the sensor and increase image noise. So if there's a way to turn off the monitor and EVF, please let me know.
Thanks for any info on this.

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My understanding with Oly cameras, even with the monitor turned "off", the back light is still on. (I don't have one, though).

And while having both monitor and EVF off would help battery-wise, it's not as much as you'd expect. Mirrorless cameras main power drain is the sensor, since it's always on (unlike DSLRs, whose main drain is the normally monitor, since the sensor is normally off most of the lime). Not that ~25% battery time increase isn't anything, but it's not the 80-100% increase you see from DSLRs. I haven't done a scientific comparison, but the G9 turns off the monitor when it's turned in, and I don't seem to get very much more battery time turned in vs not. (not that I've left it on until battery dies, like I did with my GX7).

At least the E-M10.2, you have a Sony sensor, which is much better at long exposures noise-wise than my GX7's panasonic sensor.

Still, I do wish Oly would let you (or automatically) turn off the monitor and EVF while doing timelapse.

Thanks for your reply. I also have a Panasonic GM5 that I've considered for astro work, as it's size is ideal for tracking, and was wondering if the screen/EVF would be turned off during time lapse. A quick test showed the monitor stays on. I was also wondering if forcing the EVF on would save any power. I don't know if the power consumption is lower or not for the EVFs.

In either case heat is still generated by both the monitor or the EVF. Shooting in cold weather may not pose a problem, but in warmer weather it will heat up the body unnecessarily, adding noise in the images created. At least I could lift the monitor out on the E-M10 to let it dissipate heat I suppose.

Still, it's frustrating. Thanks again for your reply.

Not possible on Olympus E-M10 II.

It is a slight questioning why didn't Olympus design the timelapse mode better, or the sleep modes and the automatic sequence mode better.

Example there is no way to have a Custom timer to release shutter 10 times without 1 second delay between finishing the writing to card and then releasing the shutter again. This means if you have slow card, it takes longer than 1 second between frames. And even if you have fast, it is writing + 1 second and then capture. When limited to capture 10 frames at max, why not allow them all go to the buffer and have then that 1 second between frames or even better, allow even no any delay?

The same goes for a timelapse, after the frame is taken, the timer starts after finishing the writing on card. And if the timer is shorter than the camera sleep period, the camera doesn't never go to sleep but keep the screens On. IIRC the camera will wake 10 seconds before the frame is to be taken, so it has time to wake etc, and this means less than 10 second period runs are as well impossible.

It would be nice that there is option to turn all the screens off, set the camera sleep straight after taking the shot and writing to card even if it is just a 10 second sleep. But that likely consumes more power than saves as all the operations to wake from sleep takes power too.

Best option is simply the external power plug... Not nice but only way. Somepeople has done a empty shell batteries that has cable to a big battery pack that then hangs on tripod.

While I don't know if it is possible to turn off the monitor/EVF completely, if you need longer power, you might want to order the dummy BLS-5 batteries I bought from alibaba and power it from a larger battery or A/C current. As I recall on the E-m10 mark II, you can't take off the battery door, so it limits things somewhat. I've tried it for a few minutes on both my Stylus-1 and E-m10 mark II, but I haven't done a long test using external power.

I talked about the batteries here in conjunction with the Stylus-1 that uses the same battery:

• https://www.dpreview.com/forums/post/61753012

I believe Amazon is now selling the dummy battery (though somewhat more expensive than the Alibaba battery):

• https://smile.amazon.com/Xennos-PS-...47510401&sr=8-99&keywords=olympus+bls+battery

Thanks for your reply.

"As I recall on the E-m10 mark II, you can't take off the battery door, so it limits things somewhat."
Actually, you can. It pops right off. The two little nubs you see outlined with the small arrows popped right out of the clips the larger arrows point to. I discovered this by accident one day when the camera tipped on it's side and popped the door off. I thought I had broken it! :-D However that still doesn't address the heat issues of having the back-light illumination constantly on, which would work it's way to the sensor, adding noise. On the E-M10 I can always pull the screen out so it's not against the body. On my Pana GM5 I've wondered if forcing the EVF on would make for less heat.

vidrazor said:

Thanks for your reply. I also have a Panasonic GM5 that I've considered for astro work, as it's size is ideal for tracking, and was wondering if the screen/EVF would be turned off during time lapse. A quick test showed the monitor stays on. I was also wondering if forcing the EVF on would save any power. I don't know if the power consumption is lower or not for the EVFs.

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One thing I like about Panasonic is, in its "advanced" owner's manuals, they list battery times with monitor vs with EVF. Most cameras I've looked at, there's little difference. However some cameras, like my GX7 and all of those with sequential EVFs, using the EVF reduces the battery life a lot (~25%). It you have the GM5's advanced owner's manual, look for the battery charts. I'd guess (total guess) the E-M10 doesn't matter EVF vs monitor.

(Panny also posts results for different lens. Which lenses varies model to model, though. I think it's which lenses come "official kit" with the body, even if not worldwide kits.)

I forgot that the E-m10 mark II has two types of video out (either to a HDMI monitor using the HDMI cable or to the old analog video format using the yellow RCA connector with the CB-AVC3 cable). In older Olympus cameras, just plugging in the CB-AVC3 cable turned off video on the monitor, as the camera believed it was using an external monitor.

If you have an appropriate HDMI cable, you might try just plugging the cable in and see if it turns off the display.

Unfortunately, it appears Olympus no longer supplies either the CB-AVC3 or an HDMI cable with the E-m10 mark II. I don't recall off hand, what type of HDMI cable the E-m10 mark II has (full size, mini, micro, etc.).

You probably want to look at pages 101, 110, and 111 in the fine manual.

If you want to get fancier without removing the CB-AVC3 cable, this post (in polish, use google translate) shows how to mod the cable so it has a switch that enables video or not, and use the USB and/or shutter release at the same time:

• http://radom.city/index.php?n=Foto.OlyPlug

An alternative method might be to enable the wifi interface. But it might not be as helpful, as wifi takes some amount of power as well, and you have to also power the tablet/phone to keep the connection going.

Note, the CB-AVC3 won't work on the newest Olympus cameras (E-m1 mark II, TG-5, E-PL9, E-m10 mark III) as Olympus has moved away from its 12-pin combination cable that was introduced back in the E-500 time frame. However, the E-m5 mark II and anything newer should now have live view to HDMI, so that may be an option (it depends on whether just plugging in the cable turns off the monitor, or if you have to really connect an HDMI monitor).

Thanks for your reply. You say the monitor turned off, did the back light also turn off? You can tell in a darkened room or other dark conditions, as they'll still be a glow on the "black" screen. If so then great. It may not have any significant effect on battery life, but it will not generate additional heat if the back light is off.

vidrazor said:

Thanks for your reply. You say the monitor turned off, did the back light also turn off? You can tell in a darkened room or other dark conditions, as they'll still be a glow on the "black" screen. If so then great. It may not have any significant effect on battery life, but it will not generate additional heat if the back light is off.

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It appears the back light is turned off when I attach the CB-AVC3 cable and turn off the lights in the room.

"It appears the back light is turned off when I attach the CB-AVC3 cable and turn off the lights in the room."

Great, I think I may have a cable like that that came with my Nikon D5100. I'll have to look around. Out of curiosity, I tried plugging a MicroHDMI adapter into the HDMI port, but the monitor stayed on. Rats! That would've made life simple because there's no cables hanging. Being as I never used it, I suppose I could just sacrifice the CB-AVC3 cable and cut it at the plug. This way nothing dangles while the camera is on the tracker.

Michael Meissner said:

Following up on my post from yesterday, plugging in the CB-AVC3 cable into the E-m10 mark II does turn off both the rear monitor display and the EVF. You don't need to connect an analog monitor to the CB-AVC3 cable, just plugging in the cable turns off the display.

However, it won't be much help as the power draw is about the same. I used my external battery setup and provided 9v of power and I used a volt/amp meter in the circuit. The E-m10 mark II used about 0.45 - 0.5 amps of power when I:

• Used the normal rear display;
• Used the EVF;
• Plugged in the CB-AVC3 cable which turned off the display; (or)
• Used the wifi remote control.

Lets see:

• Olympus cable: https://smile.amazon.com/Olympus-CA...id=1547732883&sr=8-1&keywords=olympus+cb-avc3
• Third party cable: https://smile.amazon.com/Bargains-O...s=olympus+cb-avc3&refinements=p_85:2470955011

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Michael,

Can you comment on what you see on the display between the CB-AVC3 and the micro HDMI? I tried the micro HDMI briefly to try using it as a bigger monitor while copying my slides but as I recall I only saw the picture but not the histogram which was of interest to me. I've ordered the Third party cable you mentioned (thanks) but won't be able to try it for a while. Thanks

Bob Carstens said:

Michael,

Can you comment on what you see on the display between the CB-AVC3 and the micro HDMI? I tried the micro HDMI briefly to try using it as a bigger monitor while copying my slides but as I recall I only saw the picture but not the histogram which was of interest to me. I've ordered the Third party cable you mentioned (thanks) but won't be able to try it for a while. Thanks

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I don't have a micro-HDMI cable easily at hand, so I can't test that. I know some cameras have an option that the HDMI cable only does the picture and not the histogram, etc. This is to allow using an external video monitor/recorder. Perhaps the E-m10 mark II has an option to change this. I know the Panasonic GH5 and I think G85/G9 have this, but since I never use HDMI output on the camera, I skip over those options.

As I said, when I plug in an actual Olympus CB-AVC3, the screen goes completely black. I imagine it will display the image on an analog TV, just like my previous Olympus cameras did.

Michael Meissner said:

As I said, when I plug in an actual Olympus CB-AVC3, the screen goes completely black. I imagine it will display the image on an analog TV, just like my previous Olympus cameras did.

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Thanks I'll try that when I receive my cable.

Hey getting that AV cable was it, thanks! I bought the third-party cable, and it worked like a charm, so I got a scissor and cut the cable off at the plug. No extra dangling cables. I'm looking forward to where I can take some shots and not be found frozen the next day. I wish that jack did the same thing on the Pana GM5, that's the one that really needs the screen off more. I haven't yet found a way to kill the backlight on the GM5.