Compact Flash Cards - Raw + JPEG

[johnphotog]

I am thinking about getting into shooting in RAW for an upcoming trip to Yellowstone.  I have not worked with this before....but I understand I will be able to have the most control over my images if I shoot in RAW.  Since these will be special pictures for me....I want to have the ability to edit some of the real good ones to make them great, while doing minor editing to the others.

I have a Canon 30D and will shoot at the highest resolution.  If I select the RAW and JPEG option for recording the images, what type of Compact Fash card do you recommend and how many images will fit per GIG??

Also, any recommendations on getting into RAW and editing is appreciated.

[n1r0t]

I have a Canon 30D and will shoot at the highest resolution.  If I select the RAW and JPEG option for recording the images, what type of Compact Fash card do you recommend and how many images will fit per GIG??
[a href=\"index.php?act=findpost&pid=180010\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]

John,

I use 2gb cards in my 20D, shoot ONLY RAW and get around 200-220 per card. Since the same size sensor is used in the 30D, it should be comparable.

What is your reasoning for shooting in jpeg? You can easily use Digital Photo Pro (bundled with camera from Canon) to output jpegs from the RAWs later. That'd stretch how far your GBs go.

RAW does offer a lot more flexible and depth than jpeg since the camera basically makes decisions and processes the photo when you choose jpeg output. I use aforementioned Digital Photo Pro to do the processing of the RAW images with tweaks in tonal balance, temp, etc. Output them (most frequently as tiff) and then do any further fine tuning in Photoshop.

Hope this helps!

~Torin

[DarkPenguin]

If you have Photoshop CS3 you might want to get Real World Camera RAW by Bruce Fraser and Jeff Schewe(baca).  If you're planning on using Canon's DPP then there is a canon web site with some training videos.  I can't remember its url right now.  (Google is your friend.)

Ron Bigelow has some articles on the subject (and really all other subjects, too) http://www.ronbigelow.com/articles/articles.htm

If you're worried about space you should ditch the Jpeg option.  You can create those after the fact.  If you want them to look like the camera would produce you can have the canon software produce them.  Just convert them all at defaults.

As to how many you can get on a card I'd just shoot 10-100 photos, average their size and divide it out.

I would also get something like a hyperdrive space or hyperdrive color space or Epson P5000 to at least back up my photos.  Even if you have a laptop with you.

[dchew]

I agree with about 200 images on a 2 gig card (20D).  Get at least two so you can swap them.  That way you won't be tempted to keep hundreds of images on one card.  If a card happens to fail you won't lose too many photos.  Although I've never personally had a card fail.

When I first started shooting RAW I shot RAW+JPEG, but that didn't last long.  I never used the JPEGs.

I don't know that brand really matters, but for some reason I've always bought Kingston, Sandisk or Lexar...?

After you've downloaded the images and verified/backed them up, reformat the card in the camera.  That tends to avoid any odd problems with CF cards going back into the camera after downloading.

Another vote for RealWorld Camera Raw.

[n1r0t]

When I first started shooting RAW I shot RAW+JPEG, but that didn't last long.  I never used the JPEGs.

I don't know that brand really matters, but for some reason I've always bought Kingston, Sandisk or Lexar...?
[a href=\"index.php?act=findpost&pid=180099\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]

Ditto here... Shooting RAW+jpeg lasted about 1 or 2 card's worth.

I've used primarily Lexar and had no problems at all. Sandisk is good too and there's a rebate going on for their cards. I think it's mostly a matter of personal preference.

[Eric Myrvaagnes]

Ditto here... Shooting RAW+jpeg lasted about 1 or 2 card's worth.

I've used primarily Lexar and had no problems at all. Sandisk is good too and there's a rebate going on for their cards. I think it's mostly a matter of personal preference.
[a href=\"index.php?act=findpost&pid=180191\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]

Likewise.

Multiple cards are a good safety procedure.

And having jpegs for the first couple of weeks is useful until you master your raw conversion software enough that you can get consistently better results than the in-camera or default jpegs. If it takes more than a couple of weeks, you're just a slow learner (like me).

And do save those raw files: After a couple of years of digital I went back and was able to do a much better job of reprocessing my earliest raws.

[jani]

I use raw+JPEG (medium size) with my 20D, even on 2 GB cards (ca. 150 pictures/card), because I sometimes need to/want to hand off a copy straight from the card without giving away my raw file.

It's far easier for the recipient, and leaves me the original in case they want something better.

The trade-off in speed doesn't bother me.

[Analog6]

My 20D gives me 137 to a 1Gb card and 885 to my 8Gb card (yes, I have filled that guy several times shooting surfing comps).

[nigeldh]

John,

Shoot RAW+JPEG. This way you will have proof images ready to upload to the web and have the high resolution files for the images that you want to manipulate.
Don't hesitate to bracket. Unlike film, creating digital images doesn't cost anything and hard disk storage is ~26 cents per gig which will store ~70 images for me.

I am regretting not shooting RAW+JPEG on my recent Florida vacation with the family - I shot RAW only. Even with a fast RAW processing program and fast computer, it still takes time to batch convert RAW images to jpegs - 50 sec/image in BreezeBrowser for full resolution. Jpegs are what I need to upload to the web.

1. Storage is cheap and getting cheaper. I can now buy a 16 gig x233 CF card for what I bought an 8 gig about 6 months ago from newegg.

If you follow the BestBuy, Staples, or OfficeDepot sale fliers you will find that 750 gig external 3.5" drives are $180 and 2.5" 320 gig drives are $130 on sale. This puts a 750gig, 700gig actual, hard disk at a cost per gig of about 26 US cents, 25 Canadian cents. (grin)

So get a couple of external hard disks and rotate them off site with back-ups of your images on them. For Windows I use robocopy, robust copy, from the Window resource kit since it allows me to mirror directories. And it will only overwrite updated files not all the files.

2. After shooting just raw for a while, with an occasional RAW+JPEG for some events I have decided to shoot RAW+JPEG small/normal. This gives me 2.5 megapixel proof images that I can upload to the web or send to a client. And I will get about 70 iimages per gig with my Canon 40D, 10.1 meg RAW, 2.5 meg jpeg.

The only time I might switch to JPEG is when I need the ~75 high speed burst images on my 40D vs ~14 or ~17 RAW only.

To those folks who worry about clients having issues with these images being different from the final, manipulated, image. You just need to call them digital contact sheets or digital work prints, and tell the client that the final "sign-off" image may look different.

3. For workflow I do a digital equivalent of putting a box of slides on a light table.
I upload my images into a raw subdirectory under the destination directory. This way I can move the good images up one level. I also using a final directory structure that groups images by what will fit on a DVD, then the date(s) then shooting date/subject/location/details
D:\images.for.DVD\DVD.2007\DVD.2007.10.08-19\2007_10_19_[insect].us.ny.west-danby.[bee,chrysanthemum]\raw

ACDSeePro and ThumbsPlus both allow one to include subdirectories in the thumbnail view. Otherwise my wife and son would give me a lot of grief because they couldn't see all the photos at once! ThumbsPlus only takes about 3 minutes to pull out of its database the ~97,000 thumbnails for the ~344 gig of images since 2000 I have under D:\images.for.DVD. Thumbs is using ODBC to connect to a mySQL database, db is ~6.2 gig in size.

4. I use Downloader Pro to download my images. You can set it to download the images to one or two other backup devices. Useful when traveling and you want to keep an other copy of your images on an external hard disk in case something happens to the laptop.
I then use BreezeBrowser to make sure that the images downloaded.