[Closed] A couple of digital photography questions

Not sure about the first question, but I have found that it is the camera buffer waiting clear that is the limiting factor. Not the card. I do notice faster downloads to a computer with a faster card however.

As for forums, maybe try dpreview? Waaaay bigger than STW, but it's all I can think of. Nikonians also good, but nae much use fur yur Fuji.

HTH!

Stay right here for your answers to almost anything.

42, if you were wondering.

Amateurphotograper has a good forum but mainly DSLR focussed, and yes DPreview is very good.

A faster card will always help, but the camera is often the limiting factor. 7DayShop are have some good deals on fast Sandisk cards at the mo, I've just ordered a couple myself.

Is this helpful?

To test the FinePix HS30 EXR's continuous shooting performance I fitted it with a formatted 8GB Sandisk Extreme UHS-1 card. Set to the full resolution 8fps continuous mode it fires a burst of six frames marginally faster than the quoted 8fps rate. Set to the fastest 11fps mode it fired off a burst of 13 8 Megapixel images at close to 12 frames per second. So a good performance slightly better than Fujifilm's quoted speeds but the short burst rates, even at the lower resolution will allow the capture of only very short action sequences of around a second or so. With the UHS-1 card, the full buffer takes just under 10 seconds to clear, slightly faster than with a Speed class 10 card, which takes almost 12 seconds.

From: http://www.cameralabs.com/reviews/Fujifilm_FinePix_HS30_EXR/

Have you got any noise reduction switched on? This dramatically slows the camera down as it processes the image prior to writing to the card. I discovered this last night when my camera was taking about 2 mins to save a 30 second exposure when it was rapid the previous days. Turned out I had switched on long exposure noise reduction and forgot about it.

Thanks for the answers so far.
I have it set to generate both JPEG and RAW, so im guessing that may be part of the issue. Cant remember about the noise reduction, but thats worth a look also.
So a faster card may be a partial solution, as would possibly switching to RAW only when I need the camera to be quick at clearing the buffer.

I have it set to generate both JPEG and RAW, so im guessing that may be part of the issue.

A bit part of it, I'd hazard.

If speed is your primary concern then you JPG only will be fastest, I expect (though with the obvious drawbacks there). You really want to be picking one or the other though; either you need RAW or you don't, pick one and stick with it.

RAW + JPEG uses a lot more RAM, so you fill up the buffer faster.

As for whether the card speed makes a difference, best to try a faster one (if you can borrow one) as some cameras will write faster and other's won't. Depends on the HW etc.

Mind you the RAW Files are about 20Mb, JPEGs 5Mb, so it will have an impact, plus I suppose the processing that has to be done before saving might have an impact too.
I'll have a play at the weekend and see what difference it makes.

You really want to be picking one or the other though; either you need RAW or you don't, pick one and stick with it.

I generally go with both and only use the RAW if the JPEG isn't good enough. 99% of the time I just keep the JPEG, it's only of the JPEG is over exposed that I use the RAW to get back dynamic range.

tend to record RAW+JPG too, and 90% of the time just go with the JPG (due to laziness).
think the OP's issue was with burst mode, where RAW+JPG may end up getting stuck after "N" images. So in that special case it's not really a case of picking one or the other, but one that allows acceptable burst mode.
I knew the max write speed of my camera, and bought a card that exceeded that by 10-20%. And always forget to swap to JPG only when I want to do a burst, so get a burst of 5 and miss the action (old camera - about to replace).

I shoot in JPG, cos I can't be ringed with post-processing. YMMV.

I tried some things this morning.
Took a burst of 7 pictures to deliberately load up the buffer.
Noise reduction std, RAW + JPEG - 30secs
Noise reduction off, JPEG + RAW - 29secs
RAW only - 24 secs.
Not much difference really, so perhaps a faster card will help, assuming the write speed of my camera isn't already maxed out.

After much researching I wasn't able to find out the max write speed of my camera.
So I took the plunge and lashed out on a Toshiba Exceria Type 1 SDHC 16Gb card (£20 from mymemory.com), which has a max write speed of 90mbps compared to my current Transcend card which has a max write speed of 45Mbps. So in theory twice as fast. I needed a spare card, so nothing lost if it made no real difference.
Im pleased to report that my initial testing today has reduced the write time by approx half. Im going to try some further testing tonight, but the initial results are more promising that I had hoped for.

Can I ask what it is you're trying to shoot? As a rule if it's sports/action photography you'd use fine quality JPEG only, RAW won't add a huge advantage over JPEG on action shots, vs missed opportunities. I used to use RAW for everything until the error of my ways was pointed out on a recent wildlife photography course. The switch to JPEG made a huge difference buffering wise with minimal loss of quality 🙂

All sorts really, planes, landscapes etc.
Obviously its the moving stuff the causes issues.
I tend to use RAW as a backup to "rescue" a pic when the jpeg has a funny exposure.
Obviously saving both will affect the buffering adversely as the raw is 4 times the size of the jpeg. I have considered switching to jpeg only when theres action stuff going on.