Startford-upon-Avon Butterfly Farm

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The butterfly farm at Stratford looks like a great place to try out my 100mm macro but I'm wondering if anyone has visited this location before. If it is a tropical environment will I have problems with my camera and lens steaming up?
 
Yes you will get a steamy lens but dissipates after about 20 minutes, don't wipe it off as it will come back.

Just have a walk about first and let the camera acclimatise.

Oh and don't wear a thick woolly jumper it's hot in there. :lol:
 
I have never had any problems with my lenses steaming up inside a tropical butterfly house.
Having said that on one of the occasions I was shooting in the house there was a chap who was so upset with his lens because it kept on steaming (according to him) and I noticed him and when asked he said that the heat was intense and his zoom kept on giving problems as it kept on hunting. Now I am really not sure if the hunting he mentioned was really due to that. In my view the hunting was purely due to the lack of light inside there as I was shooting and needed extremely high iso as my image below shows. And he must have assumed its because it was steaming, hence the hunting.
After a few minutes he went into the car and came back with a macro lens and then said that one wasn't steaming and it was fine. In other words what he tried to imply was that it wasn't hunting. Go figure :), that just gave more weight to what I was thinking, that it was just poor light :).
I have used the 70-200 f/2.8 zoom, the 300mm prime, the 180mm macro, the Sigma 24-70 and at times I have spent as long as 4 hours in a row inside the tropical house shooting butterflies in flight and never had my lenses steam.

But please note the temperatures may vary from place to place. I must admit that the ones I have been to the temperatures are relatively mild and not much humidity.
Once I went to Woburn safari park and they have a tropical birds house and when I went in there it was so humid that I decided to come out. Didn't even want to risk my kit getting steamed.

Hope this helps.

The following image was taken on one of the butterfly houses in St Albans and I had spent there a good few hours, note the high iso required



butterfly world-6210 by ZuluArt, on Flickr

Camera Canon EOS 7D
Exposure 0.002 sec (1/500)
Aperture f/8.0
Focal Length 300 mm
ISO Speed 2000
Exposure Bias 0 EV
Flash Off, Did not fire
 
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Went to the Stratford Butterfly farm a few years ago. It wasn't particularly warm outside, and I did have a problem with the lens steaming up.

It did take a while to clear , but I used the time to check out what was around . Patience is a virtue here.
 
I've never had a problem with my cameras in those environments.. One thing I'd never do is change lenses or memory cards inside the environment though, just to be on the safe side.. Have a good time :)
 
Been here a few times.

As others have said, just have a walk around first. If you can, stay in the main area, before going of into the hatchery, as they are sometimes slightly cooler.

And don't just think about butterflies, there is lots of other creatures in there as well......
 
Thanks for all your replies - they are very encouraging. I've never experienced a camera steaming up before and I guess it means there will be moisture inside the body too. My gut feeling says that Canon will have thought of this and tested it but has anyone found any detrimental effects on their kit after being in a 'tropical' zone?
 
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