Photographic Memory!

I have just discovered why it may be advantageous to procure a more advance memory card. In other words I need faster SD cards!

As you may know if you follow me on Google+, Flickr, Facebook or Instagram (search Bob Cartledge Photography. I’m just sayin’), I have been photographing a lot of birds in flight. I am starting to get the hang of tracking the birds, framing the image; I can even place my focus point on the eye in some circumstances! Now I am starting to look for the perfect moment. And missing it! Today I realised why.

When I’m tracking a bird in flight, I start out with my 70-300mm at 70mm so I can get the bird in frame and find focus. Then I start tracking the bird while I zoom in. Once I have zoomed all the way in I start shooting in 2-3 frame bursts. As the bird comes closer the length of each burst increases until, when the bird is racing past me, I am motor driving through my buffer space, grabbing shot after shot. Then the buffer fills. I shoot a D7000 in uncompressed RAW (14 bit), so my buffer is good for around ten shots of spray-and-pray.

And this is where the problem starts.

You see, I have noticed that the perfect shot comes just after the buffer has filled or just before it has emptied, i.e. it comes just when I can’t quite get it. 

 I mean, check out the shot below. Yeah, its not clear or sharp or in focus or good, but it was the last one before the buffer filled. Just after this the gull banked hard and flew straight toward me. it was only for a second, but the whole thing looked fantastic! And look what I got...

Yes, yes cosmic irony, the universe will have its little joke, Murphy’s law, etc, but really? F#%* off you @#$*&*$ universe! I just want the shot!

But let’s be balanced, shall we? According to the folk at Imaging Resource the D7000 buffer, when filled with ten 14 bit RAW files, will take around 9 seconds to clear when using a SanDisk Extreme III 30MB/sec 8GB SDHC card (see the full report/review at - http://www.imaging-resource.com/PRODS/D7000/D7000A6.HTM ); which isn’t terrible. It’s not exactly fast, but it’s not bad. I figure that means that my Sandisk Ultra 80MB/sec 16GB SDHC card will do it in around... (...carry the one... times 2...). Tell ya what – be back in a sec!

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Okay, after detailed scientific testing (I pinned the shutter button open, shot till the buffer filled and then, finger still on the button, I timed the buffer clearance rate) I can tell you that it averages out (I did the ‘test’ twice) to around 6.3 seconds to clear the buffer using a Sandisk Ultra 80MB/sec 16GB SDHC card. Faster than the Imaging-Resource test (Duh, Bob! Faster card!) but I am still missing the shot because Murphy and the universe!

This to me suggests that, until such time as I can buy a D500 and/or D850 (yes, I am a greedy gear whore, but have you seen the specs on those two monsters?!), I figure the next best option is faster cards. But what to buy?

This is how I’m thinking:

Question 1: What am I going to be using the cards for? Well, at the moment I don’t do any video shooting and when I eventually start I expect to be using drones and action cameras, all of which use micro SD. So my DSLR memory will be for stills only, meaning I probably don’t need huge capacity cards. I’ll probably stick with the 16GB; that’s a couple of thousand shots of storage and I haven’t shot that many images in one shoot yet!

Question 2: How fast do I want the cards to be? Bloody fast! As fast as possible! Why? Upgrading to either the D500 or D850 comes with what, in my personal honest opinion, is a bloody daft idea. Both of these cameras have the same problem - one SD card slot (all good so far) and one XQD card slot (oh dear!). I seriously do not get the thinking here. Why different formats? Seriously, why? Two SD cards? Fine. Two XQD cards? Hell yeah! One of each? No. Just no, Nikon...

Anyway, I like to shoot redundant where possible, which means with a D500 or D850 the SD card slot would be the back-up because XQD is lightning fast, so it should be the primary. But then you get the speed disparity. You have a 440MB/sec average speed for XQD and, from my research here in Oz, a maximum 300MB/sec speed for SDXC. And that SDXC card comes in at damn-near double the price of the XQD! And I can’t justify that kind of cash for an SD anything card at this stage (but that’s just me. Everyone has their own views). So, for me, a 150MB/sec card should be quick enough for back-up in the D500/D850 and super quick for the D7000.

However the D500/D850 consideration does mean I have to rethink question 1. Considering that 32GB seems to be the smallest XQD card available nowadays, I want to match that with the SD cards I buy if I’m using them as back-ups. I guess that means I’ll be going to 32GB SD cards!

So I want a 32GB SD card that runs at 150MB/sec. That’ll be the Lexar Professional 32GB 1000x SDHC then. For now, at least. Maybe Santa will bring me a winning lotto ticket and I can go the 300MB/sec route.

When it comes to memory, the choices are diverse and plentiful. You are only restricted by price, requirement and, of course, what fits in your camera. Also, when it comes to memory, I am not the most knowledgeable. If anyone out there has thoughts on memory for cameras, has experience with any of the hardware (memory or cameras) I’ve mentioned, or has an alternate view, please comment! And please, please, please let me know if the conclusions I’ve come to are wrong (and why they’re wrong, of course)! I could really use some advice here, my friends!