Taking photos on safari - where do I keep them?

dakid

dakid

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Hiya all,

I'm off on safari next month, and am planning on taking lots of photos while there. I'm intending to take four 16GB CF cards (one of which I still need to purchase), but I think I'm going to really struggle to take my laptop, because of its size/bulk. Can anyone please suggest some alternatives, as I expect to fill a lot more than 4 cards. I normally fill 3x16GB during a 10-12 hour wedding shoot, so I think that on a 5-day safari holiday (plus 10 nights at a beach resort afterwards) I could probably fill 8-12 16GB cards, and I really can't afford to buy that many! My only thought so far was for some kind of media storage device (Epson??), but I really am open to all ideas.

All advice would be greatly appreciated!
 
I am sure I read a number of post about backing up using a battery operated devices but cannot find them.

You have the option of something like the Hyperdrive HD80 (if you can source one in the UK) but a cheaper option may be to buy a used netbook and take a card reader with you.
 
dakid said:
All advice would be greatly appreciated!
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I'd say you should pay more attention to your new bride than to your camera! ;)

dakid said:
I could probably fill 8-12 16GB cards
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Really? Assuming 25MB per RAW image from a 5D Mk II, that's 5000-8000 images. I don't know what your style of shooting is, but that does seem an awful lot. Stuff doesn't happen very fast on a safari, and you'll often find yourself hanging around waiting for something to happen.

Plus ... one wildebeest looks very much like another wildebeest, and one wildebeest's facial expression looks VERY much like another wildebeest's facial expression, or indeed the same wildebeest's facial expression at any other time. I can appreciate that at a wedding you shoot lots of photos so that you can capture THAT moment, but seriously, how many nearly-identical photos of wildebeest do you want to have to sift through?

My suggestion: slow down, chill out, and 4x 16GB cards will be plenty.
 
:eek: - thats a LOT of cards! Like Stewart says, that should be MORE than enough.

On the otherhand, if you want to have additional back up, in case of card loss, etc - then one of the portable storage devices like the epsons are good, but tbh, I would probably look at investing in a netbook with a good size HD & decent battery life. They dont cost much different to a storage device with a good amount of drivespace, but have a bigger screen for viewing your pictures, can connect to the internet as and when possible and if you want to and you can always sell it on when you return if you dont need one otherwise.
 
Netbook here too. I came back with 160Gb of images and video from the 5D2 after 7 weeks in Australia so I'd struggle to get near your planned shooting rate :)
 
StewartR said:
I'd say you should pay more attention to your new bride than to your camera! ;)
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She'll appreciate the photos after, honestly. Anyway, that's what the beach holiday bit is about, surely? :D

StewartR said:
Really? Assuming 25MB per RAW image from a 5D Mk II, that's 5000-8000 images. I don't know what your style of shooting is, but that does seem an awful lot. Stuff doesn't happen very fast on a safari, and you'll often find yourself hanging around waiting for something to happen.

Plus ... one wildebeest looks very much like another wildebeest, and one wildebeest's facial expression looks VERY much like another wildebeest's facial expression, or indeed the same wildebeest's facial expression at any other time. I can appreciate that at a wedding you shoot lots of photos so that you can capture THAT moment, but seriously, how many nearly-identical photos of wildebeest do you want to have to sift through?

My suggestion: slow down, chill out, and 4x 16GB cards will be plenty.
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I always shoot lots and filter later. Always have done, whether it's wildlife, sport or weddings. I'm sure I won't be shooting as fast as I do at weddings, but I still expect to take far too many photos ;)
 
Just have a flick through and clear out every night, if you take more than 4x 16gb cards worth then you need to take a long look at the way you are shooting.

I find I take lots of keepers and alot less 'wasters' now. Otherwise see if the Hotel(s) has a PC you could use to burn CD/DVD, take a card reader too.
 
I've been using a netbook for a few years now and find it's almost perfect for me as a backup/viewing device. I'm a bit OTT maybe but I also take a small portable hard drive "so my eggs aren't all in one basket" should any baggage get lost or hard drive failure be suffered.
 
Hyperdrive Colorspace UDMA - downloads cards very quickly and has a long battery life. I wouldn't go on safari without one.
 
Used a backup storage device for my trip to OZ a couple of years back, to be truthful, it was a lot of money at the time, equivalent to a reasonable budget laptop and at the end of the day, even though I backup my images, I still kept the images on the cards and to be honest it was a bit of a waste of money and should have perhaps bought a small laptop instead.

Last trip to South Africa, I just took cards, perhaps you should think about shooting JPEGs, although I must admit, I spend nearly 2 weeks in the Kruger Park in SA and took less than 1000 shots of the animals, depends how many animals you'll see (there's only so many shots of each animal), but as Stewart said, seems extreme that you can't fill all you requirements on 4 x 16gb cards.
 
Karl12347 said:
Buy an iPad and an eye-fi SD card. Then you can send them all to the iPad and free up your camera card.
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And use iCloud? £400 on an 16gb iPad (perhaps more for 32 or 64), £60 on an 8Gb eye-fi card, would probably need an extra 1 or 2 cards (so another £120) .......... sounds like an expensive option

Personally I would shoot Jpeg's then there's plenty of room on 4 x 16gb cards

Just a few shots from the Kruger National Park in South Africa

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