Canon R5C Battery Drains Quickly in Video Mode

[upa86]

Every one knows that the Battery on the R5C drains very quickly in video mode. There is a fix! When shooting video the battery will drain very quickly even when not recording or in the menu screen. However.....if you press the "media" button and enter the media screen, the battery doubles and no longer drains so quickly. During my last shoot I would enter the media screen after every time I stopped recording. Yes, this can be a pain. Pressing the media button every time after recording a clip is not ideal, but it will make your battery run double the usual time. This seems to be a software issue as the camera drains battery equally when recording, not recording, or in the menu screen. This is not a problem when on the media screen. Im wondering if Canon is able to fix this issue in a future update as the camera is able to run effeciently on the media screen when not recording.  

[AtticusLake]

When you say that the battery "drains very quickly in video mode", I wonder what you mean.  It isn't awesome, but I routinely get over 50 minutes continuous recording in 4k, including RAW.

I haven't really tested standby time, just recording.  If I was going to let the camera stand by for a long time, I would turn it off; it only takes seconds to boot.

I've seen other people complain that they ony get 15 or 20 minutes record time, and I wonder if they have some odd setting set, or if they're using the wrong batteries (LP-E6 as opposed to LP-E6 NH).

[upa86]

Hey Atticuslake, thanks for responding to this topic. I personally get about 30 minutes in video mode with the R5C. Upon placing a fully charged battery in the camera, the battery display will stat 45min. However, timing it in stand by mode (without recording) I got almost 30 minutes. This number usually goes down to 20 minutes if I actually record. I have recently purchased the canon battery grip for the R5C and use my "media" method. This has allows me to shoot up to an hour and 30 minutes without changing the batteries. It would be great to see if Canon can address this in a future update. As @shadowsports stats below,"Pressing the play button stops the oversampling, the load on the CPU decreases and battery power is saved." I believe this to be true and it would be amazing to see this addressed in a future update. Thanks again for the response!

[dlpasco]

I hate to say this, but this one got me - we have a number of older cameras and batteries in our house and they got mixed up. I went out to shoot some video on a walk and came back convinced that, between the lack of IBIS and the twenty minute battery life I was getting, that it was going to be completely unusable.

I feel like an idiot but it sat collecting dust for more than a year after that. The Mark II announcement had me mulling over things, especially the new battery, and I suddenly thought "my god, the *battery*, ran off and got it, and sure enough, it had the OG LP-E6 in it 😳.

I casually asked my son, who was using my 5D Mark III "hey sweetie, can you go grab the battery you're using for the camera?" and he brought it over. Sure enough, there it was. Total accident, neither of us had really paid attention to it before.

Between that and the ability to use Power Saving mode, it's a completely different machine now.

Honestly, so many people on YouTube freaked out about the battery life that it never even crossed my mind but this was anything but how it was supposed to work.

[shadowsports]

Greetings,

I've seen some videos on youtube suggesting what upa86 mentioned.  From my own knowledge of the camera now, I believe it's this.  When you turn the camera on in CinemaOS, the processor immediately starts oversampling video.  Shooting or not, the processor is "ready" to do its thing. Pressing the play button stops the oversampling, the load on the CPU decreases and battery power is saved.  Its an interesting use case, one I have not fully explored either.  For video, I use a small USB-PD.  I don't even notice it.  I might experiment with the play button at some point, but thus far am not having any big issues with recording time.  In photo mode, I can always go a full day with 1-2 batteries. 

I wouldn't mind some battery optimization (video mode) in a FW update.  I'm not sure if its possible, but believe Canon is looking at it.  The R5 has gotten better and better over time.  Generally speaking, batt life has been acceptable in video mode.  I knew what I was getting in to from the get go.

@upa86m, making feature requests is important.  Many of us, including myself requested the ability to defeat the internal mic when using an external mic or tascam accessory be offered.  The latest FW included that feature. 

Where to make feature requests.

Canon Support Site:

Canon Support for | Canon U.S.A., Inc.

Press +Feedback very bottom of page, then Product 

[upa86]

Hey shadow sports! Thanks for sharing your knowledge and providing me the link for canon support. I will definitely provide feedback to canon in hopes of this being addressed in a future update. It would make an amazing camera only better! Thanks again. 

[robwettengl]

I’d like to see a firmware up that includes a standby mode, media mode helps but screen is still on and boot time is a few seconds so a sleep mode to an assignable button would be great.

[shadowsports]

Greetings,

Please follow my recommendation above for submitting a feature request.   "Sleep mode to an assignable button" Currently you can only use the media playback button in record standby to disable oversampling for battery savings.