Hähnel Extreme Batteries

Hähnel recently introduced an exciting new product for photographers: Extreme camera batteries. Why is this news? Many cameras today no longer ship with battery chargers – they charge the battery in-camera via USB. This is fine if you only have one battery, but most photographers carry at least one spare battery. For your second battery, you’re going to love what Hähnel Extreme batteries offer you. It will quickly become your primary battery.

Why you need an Extreme Battery

For photographers and videographers who push their gear – spending long days shooting video, creating timelapses, capturing weddings or photographing sports or wildlife, especially where you use continuous auto focus and image stabilization a lot – battery life is an important consideration. Landscape and winter sports photographers have a separate challenge – cold negatively affects battery life.

Enter the Hahnel Extreme battery range. These batteries are higher capacity than OEM and are built for “extreme” conditions, including drops and freezing temperatures.

Hahnel Extreme batteries match the voltage of your OEM battery and are chipped such that your camera can’t tell the difference. You won’t receive an error message when using Hahnel Extreme – unlike most third-party batteries that never work as well as OEM. Your battery level display works just the same, too.

The differences are in the construction and capacity. Hahnel Extreme batteries offer a little more juice – for my Nikon D810, the HLX-EL15HP Extreme battery offers 100mAh (2,000mAh vs 1,900mAh) more capacity than the OEM EN-EL15. That may not sound like much, but it equates to 5% higher capacity – at a lower price point.

Extreme batteries are also capable of more than 500 charge/discharge cycles without losing capacity – this is one of my biggest issues with my OEM Nikon batteries.

Build Quality

Hahnel claims their Extreme batteries are built with a shock absorbing design that lets the battery survive drops from three metres – almost 10 feet!

Each battery is injected with silicone to protect the circuits and cells and adds insulation. When the battery hits the ground, everything inside is kept in place instead of shifting and cracking.

I tested this out with my D810 on a tripod at normal height (for me) – about 5.5 feet or 1.7m. I opened the battery door and let the battery hit the ground a few times. Even on firm ground, no issues popped up. The battery worked as advertised and there are no cracks, dents or other evidence of it falling.

As much as many of you would like me to drop an EN-EL15 (which cost a bit more at the time), I’m not going to chance wrecking my own functioning battery. My reflexes kick in and I stick my foot under the battery to take the impact. I can tell you that I’ve dropped far more EN-EL3 batteries than anyone has a right to and broke quite a few of them. The EN-EL15 doesn’t appear to be built as robust as the older EL3 battery – it’s lighter and the plastic feels thinner. I just couldn’t do it. There’s no warranty for dropping a battery.

The other added bonus of all this protection? The batteries are cold resistant – perfect for use in Canada. Many landscape photographers keep their batteries inside their jackets and then have to fumble with their gloves and cold fingers to get batteries back in their camera. Hahnel Extreme should eliminate or reduce that problem. Other reviewers have found their Extreme battery to hold 10-20% more charge in the cold compared to OEM and last 50-60% longer compared to third party batteries. This is significant, especially for wildlife photographers and time lapse creation. Hahnel Extreme will power your camera to get the image, instead of you fumbling to replace a battery in the cold.

Hahnel Canada offers a one-year warranty against manufacturing defects. This surpasses the non-existent or 30-day warranties offered by OEM camera manufacturers.

Performance

Camera companies like to claim these incredible numbers with their batteries – my D810 has a claimed rating of 1,200 shots. Manufacturers use the CIPA (Camera and Imaging Products Association) approved methodology to test battery life. This test was designed back in 2003 and is applied differently depending on the camera being tested. If your camera has an integrated flash, the flash is used for every second image. A Zoom lens is supposed to be used and move fully from tele to wide to tele (or vice versa), but there is no specification for vibration compensation or auto-focus. You can find all the details at http://www.cipa.jp/std/std-sec_e.html

The reality is that this test doesn’t match real world results. I use auto focus but rarely do I let the lens move through it’s full travel every single image. I shoot with AF-Continuous often. I use vibration compensation on every lens I have that has that feature, unless I’m on a tripod. I rarely use the integrated flash except for commander mode. I’ve turned off image review but sometimes use Live View to compose. I shoot video some of the time. Real world use is completely different from the test. The CIPA test will give you an idea if one camera might be a little more efficient than another, but that’s it.

So how does the Hahnel Extreme battery compare to my OEM? I normally get 700-800 shots on an OEM battery under my normal usage. The Extreme battery gave me 850-1,000 shots over the two weeks of busy shoots where I used it. My camera reports the number of photos taken on the battery since it was last inserted.

I did a business portrait shoot on location, using my Tamron SP 85mm Di VC USD and SP 45mm Di VC USD lenses with AF-S and VC enabled; a family birthday party with those lenses, plus my SP 35mm f/1.4, including some video and with my Metz M400 speedlight; and then a fitness shoot on location with the prime lenses. The Hahnel Extreme lasted until we were almost done the fitness shoot.

Hahnel has a 60-year history as one of the leading manufacturers of photographic accessories. They are the only third-party battery company whose batteries and chargers are fully compatible with OEM batteries and camera systems. Ask for Hahnel at your favourite photography store. Learn more about their exciting accessories at www.hahnel.ca

Verdict

A battery that costs $20 less than OEM but delivers 15-20% better performance? A battery built better than OEM that withstands drops and lasts longer in cold weather? A battery that works seamlessly in your camera? You’ve got a winner on both value and performance! This is rare in the camera world.

If you’re a photographer who shoots during challenging conditions, where swapping batteries can cost you the image or isn’t practical, Hahnel Extreme should be your first choice. If you’re creating time lapses or video and need maximum run-time from your camera, Hahnel Extreme should be your first choice. If you’re looking for a long-life battery for your camera, Hahnel Extreme needs to be your first choice.

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About the Author – Will Prentice (www.capturaphoto.ca) is a professional photographer based out of Whitby, Ontario and Brand Specialist – Lighting for Amplis.