Any concern shooting welding?

Thinking of making a video soon of a welding project. Any issue with video'ing welding with a 7D or 5DII in terms of sensor damage etc? I can't imagine it would pose an issue but I don't know. I will not have the camera close to the welding so heat and spark will be of no issue, I am more concerned about the actual bright light, etc.

My advise would be to use a cheap filter to protect the lens from the sparks. The spatter and sparks from welding or grinding are hot enough to melt into the surface of glass if they hit.
Also set up your exposure manualy so you don't get wild variation when it the welder flashes, i don't think there are any issues regarding sensor damage. The only issue I've heard of is with high power laser light directly onto the sensor.

If you are planning to film arc welding / Arc Brazing then DON'T! Not without shooting through a suitable welding mask. The amount of light from the arc is about the same as from the SUN! The UV levels if anything are higher. Using an arc for brazing while wearing short sleeves will lead to arc burn much faster than exposure to the sun, well compared to the sun of an exceptionally good English summer; I know this from personal experience. I would be inclined to start with the same amount of filtering even for gas welding, it is easy to then go the other way, rather than starting without the filter and trashing the sensor.

You can get welding mask filter glass, and it is quite easy to cut it to size to fit a Cokin style filter holder, the glass thickness is close enough for it to fit properly. This was the approach I used to try to photograph/view the Eclipse we had here in the UK about 10 years or so ago. Unfortunately the weather clouded over and all that happened was that it got dark in the middle of the day!

Alan

Bright lights of any kind in close proximity to the camera can damage the sensor. I would avoid using live view at all costs. You might find THIS interesting.

Just a heads up for the old farts like me, if you have any implants of the electronic variety, gas welding is your only option! I am a certified welder and only gas welding is available to me since aquiring a defibulator 2 years ago. I talked with the cardiac team and they all agreed TIG ,MIG and shielded arc were off my table now. The electrical fields WILL interfere with my implant.

This was discussed a few years back in a thread at https://photography-on-the.net …/showthread.php​?t=1084196. Also check http://photo.stackexch​ange.com …-can-i-photograph-welding.

Your main concern is your eyes. Just as you should not look at a welding operation, you should not look through the viewfinder. I'd use a strong ND coupled with a short telephoto to grt some distance between you and the subject.