Most of the Canon cameras can be used on an external power supply.
The aim of this page is to help those who want to use a non-Canon PSU or an external battery power supply to run their cameras. This is essential for very long exposures, and for scripts that run continuously, monitoring a scene, for example, in a security camera or wildlife setting.
Please could people add in the pin polarity and voltages that their model of camera can run on.
Camera model | Pin polarity | Stated voltage | Peak current | Waiting | Half press | Full press | Zooming | Playback | |||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Monitor on | Monitor off | Monitor on | Monitor off | Monitor on | Monitor off | Monitor on | Monitor off | ||||||
A560 | Outer pin -ve | 3.15V | 720mA | 360 | 70 | 450 | 340 | 500 | 530 | 210 | 150 | ||
A590 | Outer pin -ve | 3.15V | |||||||||||
A720IS | Outer pin -ve | 3.15V | 920mA |
To calculate the time a battery will last, take the capacity of the battery, then divide by the average current drawn.
For example: A monitoring application has the LCD on all the time, and is wired to a 1400mAH battery pack. Sitting in the half-press mode for almost all the time, this means the battery will last roughly 1400mAH/450mA = 3.1 hours. The same camera attached to a 12V SLA with 40AH capacity will last for roughly 40/.45 = 88.8 hours or 3.7 days. (Note that this ignores losses in the battery discharge and gains from voltage conversions.)