The job was post-poned until next week, but I visited the site today. Met with the foreman and went over our intentions. We'll use golf carts to get around and haul equipment. We're figuring on 2 to 3 days to get our work done. I'll try to get pictures, but the foreman will be with us the entire time and I don't want to come across like I'm there to goof off. Will likely be Tues, Wed, and possibly Thurs next week.
EDIT: Forgot to say that the ceilings in this mine will be 15 feet high.
-Garry
Beamshots .
Take a tripod and shoot pics without flash. I'm looking forward to seeing them.
I'm a little leery to do that. I was just going to "sneak" my cheap "point and shoot" camera in and get shots in "night mode" best I can. We'll see. Maybe I can justify the photos being for the engineers use in their design work!
-Garry
Get some small pocket tripod, that will do quite well and perform much better than holding a camera in your hand.
This is also a nice trick, cheap, small, portable:
I use my lights for mine exploring. The ultrafire H3 is very nice for just moving around. They DO take protected batteries now. The old ones were not as forgiving on length, but you will not find a version1 for sale anywhere. I get about 4-5ish hours on high per battery if I remember right.
As long as you are running 18650 in a headlamp then it makes sence to run them in a nice thrower flashlight as well for the long ranges you describe. C8 style maybe? I dont think they can be beat for even twice the price.
Alot of the things mentioned are good in here. Very true without any light than anything will light things up well to adjusted eyes. Hard rock mines will bounce some light off the walls.
The wild card is the 32650 batteies. They are not as MAh packed per pound as 18650's but might tip the scales for your hand held choices
My lights I carry are Zebralight H600, Ultrafire H3, Dry 3XML, and a old MTE light with a MCE led. I also carry 12 or more batteries with me for 10-14 hours underground. Its lumin over kill because I need extra light for photography.
This is a Spark ST6-500CW on high for reference
Day one of underground work. Remember, this is my first experience working underground. One word - DARK! Man is it dark! You don't know darkness until you have been underground (way back inside) and shut off all lights!
I don't have enough time to go into details, but I'll state a few things. Testing new XP-G R5 neutral is going well, but co-workers aren't overly impressed. Still can't fully light up a target at 600+ feet. Co-worker carrying that light. I'm carrying 5 lights on me (like a good flashaholic would!). I'm carrying a 2D Mag LED, a KD C8 XM-L, a 3AAA Rayovac 30/80 lumen, my Ultrafire Sipik SK68 clone, and a cheapie 3AAA Walmart "Bayco" headlamp which I am really quite impressed with. Long runtime with plenty of floody light. I have access to the old incandescent cap lamps, but their too big and bulky (20lb battery alone on your belt) and the 3AAA nearly puts it to shame!
I had one weird experience: in one spot there must not have been much airflow. I could see my breathe (about 55 degrees underground) and it would hang in front of me. I could move to the side to look past it! Never experienced that before!
I am taking photos and they are coming out pretty well surprisingly! Can't post them yet (sorry) Question - should I post a new thread with them? This thread's title might cause some people to overlook these posts. So what do you think?
-Garry
Oh, BTW, the KD C8 on high is the only light that really lights up that place! Even then you feel like you could use more light!
Yeah, baby, this is what I've been waiting for!
Thanks for the first hand experience!
Please open up a new thread for pictures, definitely!
I once visited an old mercury mine turned into a tourist attraction. Part of the tour is the lights being switched off. What you said is true, you have no idea what dark is until you visit a place like that.
Cant wait for the pictures. ;)
Viktor
Ok will do a new thread when ready and place a link back in this one.
BTW - I found my 30 lumen AAA (or KD C8 on low) to be plenty sufficient for general lighting in that environment. I also learned that you really don't want to kill your night vision either unless you need to.
I'm not sure how long it's been since this mine was active, but I did see a steel post marked "ERC'T 6 85" so I'm guessing that post was put in place in June 1985. That was maybe halfway to the extent of the mining.
Ok, here's a teaser:
This is what you see in the mine with little light:
Actually that's a lot of light! You wouldn't see all that foreground! I believe that was the result of the camera's flash (I can't turn the flash off for "Night Landscape" mode.) It does however show you how dark it is just beyond the target.
Here is a shot looking beyond the target. Again, result of flash use. (I moved the camera up on that tripod above with the target so the light wouldn't bounce off the target and ruin the shot):
That faint light in the distance is my co-worker (probably about 700 to 800 feet away).
-Garry
Here's a shot of the KD C8 on high:
-Garry
That is SO cool, Garry! 
I'm green with envy. My only experience with underground darkness was in lava tubes in Mt. Shasta. It's an experience I'd love to revisit!
Switch to manual mode, and turn off flash, please!
Which camera do you have? I bet we can figure out a way to turn the flash off for some decent pictures. You will have to put your camera on a tripod, any surface, rock or whatever immobile after turning it off.
Your flash is ruining the photos, when you are in such a dark place flash can only break photos, your eyes, nerves and our expectations. :)
With flash off, your camera might also require you to switch to long exposure mode, taking the photo for 1 or several seconds. There is a link above, to other mine photos, some of which are taken with 8 seconds exposure time, if I'm not mistaken.
If you deem it worthy of good photos, I suggest you might want to read some guides on how to take photos in (extremely) low light conditions, it will improve photo quality dramatically.
Here is an example, these conditions are not safe to walk around the room, let alone good to take a normal photo.
Image on the left is just a regular image taken with automatic camera settings, just with flash turned off.
Image on the right is 15s exposure image. The laptop on the right literally has blank (black) screen in this image, it's just that LCD is not shut off. And there's a piece of paper in front of the screen. Shadow behind the fridge is from another laptop screen with BLF on it, about 6-7m from the fridge. There are NO other light sources at all in the room. Red indicator LED bottom left is behind a bamboo roll-up calendar.
For those who want the original image, here it is, about 1.6MB.
Don't mind the clock on the microwave, it's time is not correct.
I'm betting _the_ knows a hell of a lot more about this than me, and has much more experience, remember his flashlight photo painting? I bet he can dig up some nice guide on low light conditions photo taking as well.
Viktor
Sorry my cheap basic Nikon point & shoot doesn't allow me to use a "manual mode". I have done "time exposures" and low light shots (see my Beam shots threads where I used 2 & 4 sec manual exposure with a better borrowed camera). This camera is all I have to take underground.
-Garry
Cool pics so far, Garry. I've been in Mamoth Cave once, and another one in Ireland, what a blast. Can't wait to see the full set.
Oh, man, that's too bad that you don't have a better camera. :(
Well, if there is no way to turn off the flash, the pics you posted so far are better than none at all! I'm still looking forward to more pics. ;)
Thanks for keeping us in the loop,
Viktor
I can try the regular “auto” mode where I can turn off the flash. Will see tomorrow.
Ok, I am back from my three days of underground work. It was AWESOME! A flashoholic's dream come true! Getting paid to play with high-powered lights to see what they can do! I am way way behind on work, emails, and sleep so it will be a little while before I post the new thread with photos. I have 104 photos (some duplicates - too dark, too blurry, etc . . .) that need gone through. I might post some and then post a link to a Google Picasa photo album where I store them all (like I did with my cycling trip/blog).
Good news! I was able to find a good mode to get photos which are quite close to reality without using any flash. I still couldn't change white balance (I have no idea if the camera changed white balance between shots or not). I was also able to frequently use items such as the truck, a rock ledge, a bucket, or one of the equipment tripods to brace the camera. I took quite a few comparative shots showing the same sights with different lights. Let me just say now that I am still stuck on my Dongrui All-920 Q5 thrower! Wow!
Oh, I even wowed the foreman with us! (He was really wowed when I told him I only paid $16.99 for the KD C8!) He finally asked me on day 3 where I get my lights at. He wants me to email him some links. (I did explain that they are lithium-ion powered and not for everyone since they require respect and attention.)
More to come!
-Garry
Sounds awesome, Garry! Looking forward to your pics. :)
good stuff.
I get to go into a salt mine every year for work (fire alarm inspections) and shine some lights around. i was just there last week. all i had was my 501B xml. I didnt want to take any of my nicer lights into a salt mine and risk corrosion. lit up the place pretty well... better than their luxeon rebel headlamps. they have 18650 batteries in them though and arent driven very hard from what i could tell withiout taking them apart...im sure the runtime is awesome when the ma are real low.
Brian