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I think this is going to be my last post on batteries for a while.

As I said, batteries are as boring as backup but batteries are equally essential.

Sometimes, of course, batteries hit the news:

I’ve just read that the United States Administration is banning Nickel Metal Hydride batteries and rechargeable cells on aeroplanes unless they are packed and carried in certain ways as they believe that there is a danger of fire, in particular, from low grade batteries made by companies that perhaps don’t have the highest manufacturing standards.

So that’s something to be concerned about because one of the great joys of digital photography is that you no longer have quite the same problems in going through airports and airport scanners.

The days when you tried to pack your films in lead lined bags, or tried to persuade recalcitrant and overworked airport security staff to let you take your films through in your hand luggage without going through the scanners – those days are gone.

But it seems in these very security conscious times in the travel business, that we now have battery problems.

But back to the batteries themselves as we’re talking about them.

The main problems regarding the types of rechargeable cells that we’ve talked about is that they might have memory problems, sometimes have environmental problems and also that they have a discharge problem: That is that after you charge them they quite quickly lose their power.

Another factor is that if you forget to charge them or wait until the last minute then it’s too late because you can’t immediately charge them even with the quickest chargers.

So, I’m going to come to the last type of cell for the moment which is based on Nickel Metal Hydride technology and is sometimes called a Ready to Use cell.

These types of cells are provided by a few companies and they have the following characteristics.

• When you buy them they are already charged so you can use them straight away

• When you charge them they keep most of their charge for a long time.

My photo show the brands I have used and I have found them to be the best type of cell for photographic purposes.

That’s it for the moment on cells. If you found this post interesting please comment or bookmark.

Next post I’m beginning to respond to previous comments and emails about macro photography so bye till then.

Kicking off with another macro shot – where’s the point of sharpest focus?

And so back to the batteries.

Nickel metal hydride batteries – (Ni-MH)

Most of my rechargeable cells now are of this kind and they do a great job from the photographic point of view – but they’re not perfect.

Nickel metal hydride batteries – (Ni-MH) have most of the characteristics of nickel cadmium cells, but with a number of improvements.

The main improvements are that they don’t have any toxic metals like cadmium, and they don’t suffer memory effects to the same extent.

This makes them the most widely used type of rechargeable AA and AAA cell today.

They still have one or two of the same difficulties as nickel cadmium cells.

They have the same 1.2 voltage and also a fairly high self-discharge rate. That is after charging, they can lose their energy quite quickly. This is worse in high temperatures.

This is particularly frustrating from the photographic point of view. There’s nothing worse than collecting the batteries you know you charged quite recently only to find they simply don’t have enough power and have to be charged again.

One lesser problem is that they can’t usually be charged quite as many times as Nickel Cadmium cells. Still recharging cells 500 times is still a great bonus in cost and environmental terms.

To summarize:

Against: They

have a nominal cell voltage of 1.2 v self-discharge, i.e. lose energy after charging.

For: They

no longer use cadmium or other toxic materials don’t have significant memory problems are especially suited to high current drain applications like digital cameras and flashguns.

One point to watch out for is that they might need a dedicated charger

This is really just a brief update on my last blog post.

As I said, there are some pictures, which I consider to be both personally satisfying and which have been good stock sellers. So I thought I’d better give an example.

I mentioned, the question of travel photography and of travelling in so-called exotic locations before.

I suppose one of the places that I’ve been to, which I have found to be the most photogenic and the most rewarding is Oman.

I lived in Oman and on and off for about five years and a combination of the beauty of the scenery and the good-natured people made for a truly satisfying experience.

Now one of the most fascinating areas of Oman is in Dofar in the south of Oman centred around the region capital of Salalah. This is a really mystical land, where you can well imagine following in the footsteps of the Queen of Sheba, in landscape, that seems unchanged since the dawn of time.

Of course since then, it is Islam that has shaped Oman and its culture and Heritage and driving through Dofar, I came across the tomb of Bin Ali an Islamic sage and holy man who died in 1135 AD.

I took many photos of this tomb, which is a fine example of mediaeval and Islamic architecture.

In a wonderful and dramatic landscape, this is the image that I finally made.

This image has sold well, both as a stock photo and to the photographic media. It was published for example, in Practical Photography, where the editor at the time. William Cheung, e-mailed me with the comment, “Nice one John”.

Now this may seem like a standard image, but it is in fact, a composition of two images merged together combining an image of the tomb and the sky taken on a stormy day which I shot specially for this photograph.

As I said in previous posts there is a long history of photographers combining many images to make a new one, but it still causes a furore.

A reader to Practical Photography wrote complaining about my image.

She said that I had taken two bad pictures and made one bad picture from them. Her main complaint, it seems was that the sky did not fit the foreground. In other words, the meteorological content was poor.

As I have said before, I always make it clear when I have manipulated a picture so I have nothing to hide, but nevertheless, it seems that this type of composition is still controversial in spite of this.

Or perhaps because of this.

This picture has been well received on the stock market, and I think it may continue to sell well. I’d be very happy to hear your opinions on this topic.

And now as they say something completely different…

I always like to respond to e-mails and comments and a little while ago I was asked for some buying advice on digital cameras.

As I’m not an expert on all the cameras on the market today I gave some example of review sites.

Perhaps within my area of experience, it was clear that batteries were going to be an important issue, and I believe that batteries are a vital accessories for photographers today.

I personally regret this as I worked for most of my pre-digital career with completely manual cameras, such as my Bronica which needed no batteries at all.

Still in a digital world. Batteries are important, so I thought, my views on batteries, might be of wider interest.