Best option for saving photos and videos

I am not going to take my laptop on our upcoming cruise so I am trying to figure out what my best option is for saving videos and photos while we are on the ship.

I will be using my iphone, Nikon D40 and GoPro for taking photos and videos. I usually transfer every day to my laptop using the memory card. I will have my ipad with me. I did buy a card reader for my ipad but it doesn't work. It is an off brand so that may be the issue.

I will have wifi on the ship but not sure if the speed is good enough to upload all my stuff.

Hi LG123.

I use a WD passport wireless.

You can use the app on your iPad and transfer the data on your card to the passport (via its built in card reader)

You can then view the photos or vids on your iPad as well.

3 different HD sizes are available.

I am not going to take my laptop on our upcoming cruise so I am trying to figure out what my best option is for saving videos and photos while we are on the ship.

 

I will be using my iphone, Nikon D40 and GoPro for taking photos and videos. I usually transfer every day to my laptop using the memory card. I will have my ipad with me. I did buy a card reader for my ipad but it doesn't work. It is an off brand so that may be the issue.

 

I will have wifi on the ship but not sure if the speed is good enough to upload all my stuff.

Simplest, cheapest method is buy more memory. Compared to dedicated travel storage devices, an extra half-dozen decent mid-range SD cards are a bargain. Unless of course you take 100 GB of high-speed RAW bursts and 16 hours of HD life-blog video daily...then a portable backup unit would be better. ;)

Dave

Simplest, cheapest method is buy more memory. Compared to dedicated travel storage devices, an extra half-dozen decent mid-range SD cards are a bargain. Unless of course you take 100 GB of high-speed RAW bursts and 16 hours of HD life-blog video daily...then a portable backup unit would be better. ;)

 

Dave

Totally agree. I do not know what size cards his devices use but I can buy a 128 gig micro SD card from Amazon for $50 or a 64 G gig SD card for $23.

DON

I'd also agree with more memory. Don't know what ship you are going to be on, but the wifi i've used on Royal Caribbean ships is terribly slow.

I also don't know how many pics you plan to take but a D40 can realistically hold 8-900 RAW files on a single "tiny" 4gb card (even if the display says 539 - I have a D40 right next to me). Non "max" speed SD cards are practically free - a Sandisk Ultra 32gb for 16.00 for example - and the D40 gets no benefit from ultra high speed cards. that's over 6000 RAW image filies

The GoPro on the other hand, I can't speak to. Not much of a video person unless I'm underwater (and even then I'll shoot maybe 15 mins of video in a week) bt the same premise applies. get a big SD card or two and worry about transferring when you get home.

While I don't disagree with anything anyone's said, the use of smaller SD cards doesn't back up anything.

A malfunction of the card or loss/theft means those pics are gone, for good.

It's at times like these you'd wished you'd backed up.

There are 2 types of people in the world. Those that have suffered data loss, and those that haven't suffered data loss......yet.

My solution has been to use a camera with two card slots. In the first I use a small card (4-8 GB) and swap it out every day or two. I keep this one in the safe. I configure the second slot to make a back up copy of every photo. I put a large card (e.g. 32 GB) in the second slot and leave it there for the entire vacation. This way, I always have a built-in back up.

I realize that this only works for cameras with two card slots.

My solution has been to use a camera with two card slots. In the first I use a small card (4-8 GB) and swap it out every day or two. I keep this one in the safe. I configure the second slot to make a back up copy of every photo. I put a large card (e.g. 32 GB) in the second slot and leave it there for the entire vacation. This way, I always have a built-in back up.

 

I realize that this only works for cameras with two card slots.

You can buy a lot of SD cards for the $2k+ cost of a dual card body...

;)

Dave

While I don't disagree with anything anyone's said, the use of smaller SD cards doesn't back up anything.

 

A malfunction of the card or loss/theft means those pics are gone, for good.

 

It's at times like these you'd wished you'd backed up.

 

There are 2 types of people in the world. Those that have suffered data loss, and those that haven't suffered data loss......yet.

yes, all true.... but there is always that risk. If you are on vacation taking pictures all day, with the plan to back up at night.... The card can still malfunction, or get lost, or get stolen, before you back up that night.

If you wait a few more days to get home, how much does it really increase the chances of loss, malfunction or theft?

I'd say the odds of the memory card malfunctioning the same day, are about the same as malfunctioning a week later. By waiting longer, you are slightly increasing your chances of loss/theft.

But if at the end of each day, you stick your memory card for that day into a case in your suitcase.... I don't think you have really increased your chances of losing the photos, any more than if you backed them up that night.

What about one of those adapters that transfer sd card information directly to the iPhone? Would this be an acceptable and inexpensive way to backup photos? About how many photos could a 32gb iPhone hold?

What about one of those adapters that transfer sd card information directly to the iPhone? Would this be an acceptable and inexpensive way to backup photos? About how many photos could a 32gb iPhone hold?

I've used a third party cable to transfer photos and vids to my iPad. Very hit and miss IMO. Sometimes worked, sometimes didn't, no matter how many times I unplugged and re-plugged the cable. When it did more it was slow!

And as you said, even 1 day of photos and vids may be more than you phone or iPads available memory.

What about one of those adapters that transfer sd card information directly to the iPhone? Would this be an acceptable and inexpensive way to backup photos? About how many photos could a 32gb iPhone hold?

I finally got my card reader to work with my ipad. I had to change the images that I had renamed when I transferred them to my laptop a while back. With the card reader the image names have to be exactly 8 characters. Luckily my camera names them like that.

I haven't tried putting any of my GoPro videos onto my ipad yet. I do a lot of videos and time lapse so I use a lot of memory. Will probably just buy a few more micro SD cards before our cruise.

Thanks for the suggestions!

I have just come in on this thread. I always take my Mac air 13" and 2 1TB drives. I guess that defeats the idea of travelling light, but I connect both drives at the end of the day, using Lightroom I can save to both drives at the same time on import. When travelling home one gone into checked in luggage, one in hand luggage.

1TB drives are quite cheap and small now. Taking my laptop then allows me to catalogue all photos and do some post processing as I shoot in raw. When you have thousands of photos from a once in a lifetime trip, it can save weeks when you home.

FWIW, I guess it's just what works for you and what level of risk you can accept.

Cheers Kim

Take a look at RAVPower Filehub, a $40.00 solution, if you have access to an IOS or Android device.

http://www.ravpower.com/ravpower-rp-wd01-filehub-3000mah-power-bank.html

Can I transfer files from a SD card to a USB memory stick/hard drive with this device, while having no computer in between?

A: You use either the browser interface or the RAV Filehub app for IOS or Android and it allows you to copy from sd card to your usb flashdrive or hard drive (or visa versa). The copy happens directly in the device without going through your computer and it appears to be much faster than copying up to your computer.

- See more at: http://www.ravpower.com/ravpower-rp-wd01-filehub-3000mah-power-bank.html#sthash.YEMCvmu8.dpuf

Take a look at RAVPower Filehub, a $40.00 solution, if you have access to an IOS or Android device.

 

http://www.ravpower.com/ravpower-rp-wd01-filehub-3000mah-power-bank.html

 

Can I transfer files from a SD card to a USB memory stick/hard drive with this device, while having no computer in between?

A: You use either the browser interface or the RAV Filehub app for IOS or Android and it allows you to copy from sd card to your usb flashdrive or hard drive (or visa versa). The copy happens directly in the device without going through your computer and it appears to be much faster than copying up to your computer.

- See more at: http://www.ravpower.com/ravpower-rp-wd01-filehub-3000mah-power-bank.html#sthash.YEMCvmu8.dpuf

Pity they won't ship it to Aus looks good and if you use a tablet you can look at them to confirm they went across.

http://i864.photobucket.com/albums/ab204/onespots/1731_edited-1_zpszlb7xogc.jpg

Not sure what you mean?

To summarize and chime in on a few things, get more cards. Get "small" cards, so your "fault domain" is smaller (if a card gets corrupted, it could impact one photo, or it could impact many/all. if you have small cards and several, one card only kills off a portion of your vacation).

I believe in buying "fast" cards. Even if your camera can't use the speed, your computer may be able to, and it'll make the download process less painful. Your next camera WILL be able to make use of the speed though, so a fleet of slow cards isn't helpful when you upgrade.

Moving the pictures from a card to another device (iPhone, iPad, external HD, whatever) is NOT a backup. Only copying (without reformatting/erasing) is a backup. Some say I'm anal about semantics, but I don't want you to think that you have a backup copy if you only have one copy.

In my humble opinion, there's risk of data loss when copying from the memory card to another device. If you're going to do this, I urge you to use a solution that allows verification. If you don't have verification, I urge you to take enough cards to last the whole vacation, and use the other device as a true backup, not your one and only copy.

-----------------------------------

Disclaimer: I'm SERIOUS about photography, use several DSLRs even when traveling, shoot in raw format, and so does my wife. That said, I take enough memory cards to last two days, and have cobbled together a laptop/drives solution that allows me to read in an entire day's shooting (one-day record: 157GB) in under 90 minutes, and by the time I wake up the next morning our images are VERIFIED on three drives. Memory cards are laid out in such a way that I can tell which card's images didn't pass verification, and that card is set aside until we get home for "surgery" if needed. Only the cards that pass verification are formatted and returned into the shooting pool.

Meant to put this in its own thread but didn't. Oh, well. Off-topic is what we do here, eh?

Western Digital upped the ante in SDXC cards:

Kodak branded photography optimized smartphone:

ASUS Zenfone VR has a 23MP sensor that will shoot 92MP "Super Resolution" HDR files:

Panasonic also added a tiny GX850 16MP 4/3 entry level mirrorless camera:

Canon released another model with the Sony 1" sensor. The G9X II is sure pretty!:

Meike announced a new 6.5mm f/2.0 fisheye for e-mount. No idea about how it stacks up to the image quality of the excellent little Rokinon 8mm f/2.8 but it is available from China via Amazon for only $150:

I'm sure there's more to come. Need I repeat that it's a great time to be a photographer?

Dave

Non "max" speed SD cards are practically free - a Sandisk Ultra 32gb for 16.00 for example - and the D40 gets no benefit from ultra high speed cards.

Correct, but the download process to your computer does benefit from high-speed cards. There's also the possibility of a future camera upgrade, and it'd be silly to have to buy MORE cards to get the fast ones then. Sillier still if you then accidentally put a slow card into the fast camera (been there, done that, missed a bunch of bear shots because the camera that creates 60MB RAW files was shooting to a 15MB/sec card instead of the 95MB/sec card I thought it had).

While I don't disagree with anything anyone's said, the use of smaller SD cards doesn't back up anything. A malfunction of the card or loss/theft means those pics are gone, for good. It's at times like these you'd wished you'd backed up. There are 2 types of people in the world. Those that have suffered data loss, and those that haven't suffered data loss......yet.

Yes, but a card sitting in the safe or traveling home in a memory card wallet is probably less likely to get corrupted than a card still in the camera with more and more images to be written to it.

Phrased differently, corruption probably occurs most often during the write cycle. Shoot a day's worth of pictures to a card and if the corruption will happen, it has happened already. Making a backup of corrupted data just gives you a corrupted backup. Not formatting the card because you have enough cards to last the whole trip means you haven't disturbed the data, and you can attempt to recover it at home (which you probably would have attempted during the trip had you brought the laptop, IF you even noticed it before reformatting).

Just in case anyone is still interested...I bought a really cool gadget (and who doesn't love cool gadgets?) called ixpand for backing up photos from my iPhone while on the cruise. I also went ahead and uploaded pix online for safe keeping.

Exactly. The two times I have had corruption, SanDisk recover was able to restore all the images but one or two - total SD card failure is pretty rare..

The big risk with cards is loss, which is why I carry 2 sets in 2 different locations when transiting. SD cards are cheap enough nowadays to do that (don't need anything fast to copy in camera during dinner). I just picked up a 20 pack of slower 64gb SD cards for backups for less than $220 total plus a pelican case for $20 which will cover me for 10-20 days on vacation backing up the XQDs.

Yes, but a card sitting in the safe or traveling home in a memory card wallet is probably less likely to get corrupted than a card still in the camera with more and more images to be written to it.

 

Phrased differently, corruption probably occurs most often during the write cycle. Shoot a day's worth of pictures to a card and if the corruption will happen, it has happened already. Making a backup of corrupted data just gives you a corrupted backup. Not formatting the card because you have enough cards to last the whole trip means you haven't disturbed the data, and you can attempt to recover it at home (which you probably would have attempted during the trip had you brought the laptop, IF you even noticed it before reformatting).

Considering backup options for upcoming cruise, without carting along the usual laptop/notebook.

Thought the WD Passport Wireless Pro was the answer but it was DOA. Waiting for warranty replacement. Now a bit nervous about a wireless backup drive.

Have previosly taken enough SD cards to use without backing up until home again. Dangers in that practice as well.

Will have an Android tablet with large micro SD card storage but not sure of best method to get SD card data backed up to the Android.

Any suggestions please. Would prefer not having to pack a laptop.

Considering backup options for upcoming cruise, without carting along the usual laptop/notebook.

Thought the WD Passport Wireless Pro was the answer but it was DOA. Waiting for warranty replacement. Now a bit nervous about a wireless backup drive.

Have previosly taken enough SD cards to use without backing up until home again. Dangers in that practice as well.

Will have an Android tablet with large micro SD card storage but not sure of best method to get SD card data backed up to the Android.

Any suggestions please. Would prefer not having to pack a laptop.

When not taking a laptop (I prepared in case there was a travel ban on laptops) I have a usb sd card reader and a micro usb to usb OTG cable which allows the sd card to be read by a smart phone or tablet.