Posted: 4/28/2005 11:39:49 AM EDT
| I'm taking a trip to Alaska soon and don't have a laptop. What's the best way to take tons of pictures but not have 14000 cables, devices etc. Should I just buy some really HUGE CF cards, or is there a better solution for offloading tons of digital pics? |
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there are a few solutions, but most are not economically feasible for the casual photographer. www.nixvue.com/ Buy a few 1gig cards. |
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you could also get something like this: www.archos.com/products/overview/gmini_400.html |
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depends on your numbers for "tons" and weather you plan on doing them all at VGA resolution (640.480, approx .3 megapixel) or 5MP and printing them all. My 128MB xD card can hold up to 198 pictures at 2MP/fine from my Fuji 2650, and that's far far more than we ended up taking on a road trip from MI to CO. The nice thing about digital is you can delete them off the memory card from the camera. That being said, memory cards are cheap and buying one (maybe two) of the largest size that your camera will take (double check, very few will work with a gig card, some need firmware upgrades to use them or even 512's) and you'll be fine. |
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You'd be surprised how many images will fit on a memory card if you do nothing more than reduce the resolution (or increase the compression) a little bit. Let's face it: Unless you're blowing them up to poster sizes before printing, you don't need 4+ Megapixels of uncompressed images - you'll simply never notice any difference in a smaller-resolution image that is printed at normal photo sizes. My suggestion would be to experiment a bit first: Take a few identical photos at various resolution/compression settings, take them to Wal-Mart or Target to have them printed at 3 x 5 or 4 x 6 photo size, and compare the results. On your Alaska trip, use the setting that gives the best trade-off between quality and number of images stored. Unless you're using a VERY small memory card, you should be able to store at least several hundred images per card. |
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some good point on image sizes... my company regularly produces 20"x30" posters from images that are taken on the medium setting on professional gear. (2544 x 1696 or thereabouts) You can even make 12x18's from 1728 x 1152 originals. No need to shoot at the largest setting your camera has. You'll be able to take about 1000 shots per gig at the low setting. |
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You didn't mention a price limit, but you did mention a gear limit and not having a laptop. Go to dpreview.com and look in the Storage and Media forum. Simplest are the portable hard drives/image banks. Most reliable would be the CF Card->CD-ROM's, but that requires a case of CD-ROM's also. Site note relating to NoVaGator's comment - yes, you can print large prints from a lower resolution camera, but the difference between professional gear and point and shoots is incredible (and hugely in favor of the professional gear). Do have more than 1 CF card (primary and backup), regardless. |
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You're going to want all your resolution and save the images at a good JPEG quality level. I took a TON of pictures from my Alaska trip 2 years ago and am so glad I did. I took arsy-fartsy ones as well as the "hey, we were here" type pics... IMHO buy some large CF cards. They can be purchased pretty cheap at Crucial, they're great there. It's slower memory but guess what? I bought a so-called "pro" memory card (at "pro" pricing) from Sandisk and it's just as slow as the Crucial card. BTW when I was there I stopped at this electronics shop in Sitka and purchased more memory- get this, it was an off brand card but they not only let me put it in my camera to see if it recognized it, but the price was as good as Crucial! There's something called a "Digital Wallet" that works as well but when I left they were too pricey for me to justify at the time... So flash cards get my vote! Enjoy, please post pics when you get back! The only way to take a bad picture in Alaska is if you leave the lens cap on...  EDIT: My personal preference is to have a bunch of smaller cards as opposed to one big one. That way if you lose the camera or it's stolen, you're not out all of the pics you took on your trip. JMHO, YMMV. |
Good point on the smaller cards.... (for me, that means four 1 gig cards instead of one 4 gig card....but for joe consumer, that might mean 512 cards instead of 1 gig cards...I fill a gig in a half hour - it might take you a week to do that and you wouldn't want to lose a weeks worth of pics) And the more expensive cards certainly are faster - but the typical consumer camera is slower than the slowest card...My 1Ds shoots 8 frames per sec, but the slow cards will not write the data as fast as my camera can create it. A "pro-sumer" camera like the 10d shoots about 3 fps, and you can even create a buffer issue at that speed. |
IMO, making blanket statements (without knowing the resolution capability of his camera or his intended end use) isn't particularly helpful... Again, seeing is believing: Until you see what the final print looks like, you can't say with any certainty whether any particular resolution or compression will suffice. Experiment, and then use what works best for you. I think you'll be surpised at the results. |
Blanket statements? How about your blanket statement to use a lower quality JPEG setting, or to use LESS resolution just so you can pack more images on a card? I was going by my personal preference, to have every bit of quality I can wring out of the image (within reason- I don't have the time nor the storage capacity to save the images as TIFF or RAW format). Alaska is a beautiful place, and if you have the kind of trip my wife and I did, you'll want to take hundreds of pictures in each place you visit. I personally go for quality as well as quantity. I know what my final prints look like, I know what my preferences are. I'm an art director by trade and I'm fairly anal retentive with regards to my photography. I want my pics to look good. I've read from some pretty well respected digital photography experts that you can indeed save to a low quality setting and it'll be OK when you print it or have it printed. Bully for them! I prefer the highest JPEG setting, and maximum resolution the camera can take. As always your mileage may vary. I have some images that if I'd taken at a lower resolution, I couldn't have cropped into them for a better composition. Frankly I don't know why you'd want to take pics a lower resolution if you have the MP, but it's your vacation and your memories, have it it. |
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My advice as a frequent Digital camera user and traveler without a laptop. 1. Every night back at the hotel or camp site, review the pictures you've taken, and shitcan any remotely blurred, boring, or repeated of pretty much the same scene. A scenic spot makes you take multiple pictures of pretty much the same vista, but in reality you can look through 10-12 of those pictures and 3-4 will do justice to it at the end of the day. 2. Memory cards are cheap enough that you should have at least enough room for 200 saved pictures from a typical week of vacation. If your camera has a movie mode, it will eat up memory FAST. 3. Try a few sample pics around your house with the camera set at higher compression. If you're happy with the results on your screen and printer, use a little higher compression for all but the most breathtaking views. |
My Sony Cybershot 4.1, with a 512Mb memory stick and the resolution set down to 1MP, will hold 730 pix. |
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I have a PowerShot A510 Canon 3.2mp camera. It's small, light and takes nice photos. I like the higher quality shots. I have mine set at the highest resolution. I have three memory cards I carry (two 256mb and one 128mb ). The 256mb cards hold 151 and 152 photos. I don't know why they differ by one photo.  The 128 card holds 74 photos. I also have two 16mb cards but don't use them often. They hold 8 and 9 photos. There's that one photo difference again. I don't take a laptop or any other storage device with me on vacations. Not a lot of room for stuff on a motorcycle. I suggest more memory cards. It doesn't hurt to have more cards. They don't take up much space. I also like the video feature. The problem is, it takes a lot of space on the memory card. I also suggest, get rechargeable batteries. They're great. I find they last longer than the best alkaline. Colt_SBR |
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Remember to take enough batteries to last for all those pictures, too. (I didn't catch which camera you have; mine uses up one battery per 128MB card full of pix. Since it uses its own special Li-ion cell, it's effectively another $30 per card for me, unless I'm in a place with 110V power.) |
Defintely good advice, although if you need or intend to do a lot of cropping of your images before printing, that extra resolution helps. I am very much a beginner at photography and I find that I typically include too much in my photos. If you have the extra resolution, you can crop down and still have a usable capture. YMMV but I would pick up a couple of extra 512M or 1G cards. You can always delete images that don't measure up to save space. One last piece of advice - bring plenty of spare batteries. Most film SLRs can run at a fixed shutter speed without batteries, but digitals and point and shoots sure won't. |
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I have a Sony DSC-P92 Cybershot camera. It's a 5.0 Megapixel camera, and I ALWAYS use the highest resolution when taking pictures. It IS ABSOLUTELY noticeable.... I feel I won't have a 2nd chance to take the picture again once I'm home, and if I fuck up the shot, at least it is HUGE so I can crop and resize accordingly. The image quality is fantastic. Every time I try to skimp on the MP settings, I kick myself in the ass because the pictures look like crap... I was using a 128mb card, and recently bought a 512mb. I also have a cheap ($350) Dell Inspirion 7500 laptop to download, crop, resize, etc... Just my $.02 
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Use the highest resolution setting. One day you're going to go on a trip and take a ONCE IN A LIFETIME picture of say, UBL getting maximum ownage and go home to realize you took it at 0.3 MP resolution. Now if you had always taken pics at the max res (4MP, 5MP, or 6 MP+) and go home, you can have a nice high-res JPG that you can copy and make smaller pics for your wallet, business cards, webpages, etc... It's better to have a high res photo and work down, than it is to have a low res photo and work up. |
Of course, if you fill up your cards entirely with max res shots, you won't get a shot of UBL at all..... Seriously guys....I'm a pro (I'm the only one qualified to carry this BAM  )a 2 megapixel shot is PLENTY for making great 8x10 prints. Work on your composition skills, and you won't need to crop the heck out of the images. Think about what you're shooting. Take a sec to compose the scene in your viewfinder. (anyone remember the rule of thirds from grade school art class?) The best zoom lens in the world is attached to your body....your feet....use 'em. Consider where the sun is. When taking pictures of individuals or groups, make sure the b/g is clear (yeah, Mt. Ranier might be back there, but there also might be a telephone pole sticking out of Aunt Bea's head) oh, and buy at least a gig of memory....you can get GOOD 1 gig cards for less than $100 But don't feel like you need to shoot at the highest resolution. It's a crutch. My company has sold more than $2,000 in prints already today (actuallly between midnight and 6:27:46 AM)....and we shoot at the medium/normal setting....about 1/4 of the camera's max resolution. We've taken orders for 4x that amount for other photographers in the same time period. |
2 MP plenty for 8x10??? you lost me there. Sorry. 2 MP is good for 5x7s, and while I have done 8x10s, the pixels are starting to show. Guys - my advice, take it or leave it, and it's what I was trying to say in my post to Skibane above: With digital camera cards so cheap, there is NO reason to skimp out and just try to pack as many pictures on a card as possible. They're memories that you'll review in a few years to reacquaint yourselves with and as such you'll want them in as high quality a file as possible. That's where I'm coming from. I'd rather drop $100 or less on cheap, reusable memory cards than wish a few years down the line I'd used the full resolution of my camera... (I just checked Crucial: You can get two 512MB cards for $80 or a 1GB card for like $73... COME ON) What are your memories worth? |
Yup. Beyond a doubt. What kind of printer are you using? (You might not be able to do this on a home printer) Quick update: $2,700 in print sales thru 7:30 am. But you're right...there's no excuse to have less than 1 gig of memory. EDIT: how many DPI do you print at? |
Epson 1200 Photo. It's a few years old and ink is pricey for it, so I'm angling for a new high end photo printer. Hopefully to go with the DSLR I've been eyeing. As I said, I've made 2mp work at 8x10, but you can't do it with every picture... Edit: I print at the max. resolution of the printer. I think it's 1440 dpi. |
Actually, I meant to ask what pixel resolution you adjust your image to before printing. |
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Ah Generally if I'm working with my 5mp camera there's no problem keeping the resolution above 240 dpi. If I'm using my 2.1mp camera, I try to keep it above 200 dpi. I don't tend to up-res the images because I don't like the fuzziness involved. I've tried the preview version of Genuine Fractals and if I had to up-res images, that's what I'd use to do it. GF does an amazing job of up-res'ing pics. But it's still no replacement for shooting them at the camera's highest native resolution possible. 
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Here's a few pics for comparison... All taken with the same camera, at each of it's available image quality settings... All pics were resized to 1024x768, but otherwise are untouched. I didn't even tamper with the pics to blot-out the serial number...(not concerned about it) Here ya go... FWIW, my little experiment here doesn't really support my claims... I may reconsider my MP settings... 
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I have a limitation that most photographers don't: sheer volume of pictures taken... At an event a few weeks ago, my crew of 12 shot 50,580 pics in a 3.5 hour span. We actually use some slick home-made fractals programs and print as low as 150 dpi. |
The real problem you have there Art is that every picture we're seeing is at the resolution of our own monitor. Either way, we're probably not seeing more than around 100 pixels per inch. |
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BTW, here are some 512 cards for $16 after rebate..... buy.com |
That, plus the compression settings don't matter once you've edited and re-saved as jpeg. You might not have changed the compression level, but opening a jpeg and saving (even without doing anything) will re-compress it and cause further lossyness. In addition, all we're really seeing in the higher megapixel ranges is your software's ability to interpolate/resize the picture. What you need to do to show yourself the difference is take the originals of those pictures (i.e. not resized or anything, fresh out of the camera) and go have 4" or 8x10 prints made of them professionally (unless you own a die sublimation printer or inkjet that cost more than $400). Then you will see a difference. Even non-professional prints will show you a difference between, say, 2mp and 5mp (I've played around with cameras and printers plenty when I worked at a gateway store). That being said, I own a 2mp camera because 99% of the stuff I take pictures of is intended for the web, and I still haven't printed anything. I still take all my pictures at 2mp/fine because it's much easier to make a big image smaller than a small image bigger. |
That's a very good camera. I have a CP 950 (2.1mp) and a 5700 (5mp), and love them both. My brother has the 995. You could get a few (3 would probably do you good) 256mb cards and you'd be fine. Personally, I filled 3 256mb cards, and 2 128mb cards. But then, I am a bit trigger happy.  I don't recall how many pics I took, but it was a bunch! Take all you can. I organize them by day, so later on I can go though a day by day record of the trip. Have a blast. Keep an eye out for eagles and whales. |
When you taking your trip? I'm going there for 3 weeks starting mid July. Where in Alaska you going? -d |
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I just bought a Canon Digital Rebel XT (350D), and a Canon 75-300 USM lens. While cruising around Ebay I found a Hitachi 4 GB Microdrive... which I bought for $140. I was worried about its power consumption and its speed when shooting in burst mode. 3 fps and 14 images buffered before writing to media on this camera! nice :) Anyhow, this camera only shows up to 999 for available photos to be taken.. but I just tried it out and I can store 1450 photos at its highest resolution, which is 8 MP. Granted that the file sizes will vary depending on what subjects I'm shooting, but I can't believe I haven't gotten one of these before. I also found a neat little addon to my iPod where you can plug in your CF (or the other media types) into the slot and then transfer all the images to your iPod. Then when you get home, you can transfer them to your PC for editing, printing, etc. -d |
For the average user, slow ones are fine. But If you're shooting action sports, the slow write speed will be your limiting factor so you'd want fast ones. What you really want are big, fast cards. duh Also, I persoanlly think 4g is TOO big....you're putting all of your eggs in one basket, and (historically) microdrives are less stable than regualr cards. (I hear the new ones are greatly improved) |