dive trip storage - what are you using?

So what is everyone doing for storage while on the dive trip?

I see four options...

- multiple storage cards

- download to storage-only device

- download to storage-display device other than laptop

- download to laptop

The first two seem to be good if you're trying to reduce the amount of gear you're lugging around, but you only get to see the pix on the camera LCD (maybe hook up to a TV if available and your gear supports it)

The third may be interesting for sharing / reviewing your work, but means no shooting in raw mode (?)

The last seems most versatile, but requires lugging around a laptop which may be unreasonable depending on the destination.

Thoughts? What actual devices are you using? What's on the horizon?

I travelled with my laptop and cd's with spare cards for back up. I burned to CD as a back-up in case something happened to the laptop. I also carry a surge protector power cord with me.

I have been using a Iomega Photoshow which is a 250 MB external Zip drive that has slots for direct down load of both Compact Flash and Smartmedia. Just plug it in insert a disk and your media push a button and away it goes. It confirms a successful download and if you want it has video outs so you can view on a TV. Also has USB port which makes it act like any other external drive.

It is small, light wgt, and you dont need a lap top to make it work in the field. So when wgt might be an issue it works.

I did a bit of digging around on "option 3" and came across the Nixvue Vista. This sounds cool - you can get pretty big capacity, directly accepts CF cards (type I/II), has an LCD for viewing as well as TV out (NTSC/PAL) and a remote (you can make slide shows).

But the really cool part B) (I think, anyway) is that with the recent firmware it will display raw formats (Nikon, Oly - check out the website for the complete list). Prices at B&H Photo are:

10GB - $390

20GB - $440

30GB - $480

Also shows EXIF data, histograms etc. So this could really be used to do some up front culling of photos, review of technique (looking at exposure info on good/bad shots), sharing with the folks in the clubhouse on the TV along with the videographers.

Although you might find a "cheap laptop" for a similar price that would be more functional, it would be bigger and more of a pain to carry around. This is the size of your average MP3 player....

It also has firewire and USB 2.0 "connectors" that you can get to speed up those desktop downloads when you get home (but at $85 for the firewire connector it might be worth the 20 minute time to download a full disk....)

Copy CF to laptop, then burn to DVDs using HP external DCD burner. RAW files are about 9 meg each...CDs have proven to be too small.

If you have a laptop and feel the need to back up, why not just take a 2.5" portable firewire or USB drive? Faster, smaller, lighter, easier and probably cheaper than burning DVDs in the field. My laptop has two drives so I just make a copy on each.

I guess I'll chime in as the guy who has tried it all...heh.

I have a 1 gb microdrive and 2 backup CF cards.

I have a 40gb Image Tank

I have a 30gb ultralight laptop

I probably shouldn't have bought the I.T. and the laptop, but I got a pretty good deal...

For my 2 week trip to Hawaii, I brought the IT. I was staying w/ friends that had a laptop, so I could check exposure that way. I wanted to travel reasonable "light" as well.

For last week's trip to Grand Cayman, I brought the laptop. We were staying at a B&B that didn't have a computer or anything like that, and both Sarah and I were shooting digital - so we could dump it onto the laptop and review after the dives. Plus, I could sort images on the flight back - that was key. My laptop is small (3lbs) and has 4 hrs battery life, which makes the choice to bring it a lot easier.

HTH

James

Hi,

I just bought a new External USB (2.0) Laptop 2.5in Hard-drive Case for laptop on e-Bay for 20$ and Then NEW 2.5in Hard-drive (40gig) you can get for less then 100$, make it total of 40gig storage for less then 120$.

It is small, it is compact, and you can connect directly to the laptop, this work great for me.

Thanks,

Gadi Porat

With the new USB bridge devices you may be able to hook up the USB Hard Drive directly to your camera. I don't know how that would work but I'm sure someone is working on it.

Cheers

James

Just did a 2 week photo expedition in Bonaire in August for http://MarineBio.org, after much research and trial and error here's what worked great for us (three photographer/divers, three different cameras, 3-5 shore/boat dives/day, 1700 photos taken):

Max high-speed CF cards for all cameras (128-512MB multiple cards/camera) - usually used one max card per camera per day.

Rechargeable batteries for the cameras - longer life ones made a big difference. Main downside we found out to cheap digital cameras is short battery lives and having to use external rechargeable batteries... internal rechargeable battery-packs are a must.

1 Winbook - http://www.winbook.com/ - 512mb RAM, 60GB HD and CD-burner (CDs are cheap and burn fast)...

End of night we would download each cameras photos to the laptop, review them in full glory and discuss them which helped us plan..., clear the cards and recharge the cameras for the next day. This stage took most of the guesswork out of it and was the highlight of our trip.

End of trip we burned all photos to CDs as backup in case laptop was stolen or lost....

Back in the office, used laptop to transfer all photos to multiple systems for post-processing, worked like a charm. Hope that helps.

My experience has become simple, but started out complex (anal). I got 1 gig cards, a 440 gig storage unit, a laptop and a bundle of DVD's. The reality if that (for me) I downloaded my pics to the laptop and used re-writable DVD's. I simply used the DVD angle to back up my work. When I got home, I then backed up the back ups on a separate 200gig hard drive. A guy on my trip used only a FlashTrax viewer and storage unit, but I don't like that. You cannot really see what you have and I don't like knowing whether I have a nice shot or not. I want the option of re-shooting if I need to and I feel you need a laptop to do that....so for me, it's a laptop and DVD's (because they have a lot of memory.)

One recomendation Joe.

Stay away from RE-Writeable DVD's. The Write once disks are MUCH more reliable.

I am glad that there has been some recent interest in this thread as this is always an interesting question.

Storage needs do depend on how long your trips tend to be. How many megapixels you shoot. If you are snap happy and if you shoot raw etc etc.

I travel with a small laptop,lacie pocketdrive and firewire card reader. All power "daisy chain" from the laptop which saves taking extra adaptors/cables etc. I also back up my favourites from a trip onto my MP3 player. So I come home with 2 copies of all my images and an extra copy of my favourites.

James took this picture of me in Cayman (where I also had one of my less portable hard drives because it was a long trip. This pic shows my normal setup (small laptop, hard drive, reader and MP3 player. In the other picture James took you could not see my swimming trunks and it looked as though I was downloading commando style!

lmao

I've been taking my laptop since the very first trip. If it is a weekend trip, a small live aboard in Canada or 2 weeks in Bonaire I like having the ability to review and edit in my down time. I have a pelican case for the camera that I built a false bottom into. I store the laptop under the camera. With all the extras the case weights 48LBS. so it fits under the 50LBS. limit of most airlines. It's good for security as well because it's out of sight.

I've just bought a neat little unit from a company called iRiver. They make an iPod-type mp3 player - H340 (although more functional) and a personal media player PMP140. Both can link directly to a certain cameras via the USB2 cable supplied and download the images - no media slots required. Both units have a small screens (2.5" and 3.5" respectively) and 40gb drives. They also look seriously cool.

I went for the PMP-140 and hope to get it later this week. I'll give an update as to how well it works.

website: www.iriver.com

During a trip we carry the following:

Fujitsu P5010D 10.5" screen laptop

Small LaCie mobile drives (40GB USB 2.0) we mirror the content as a back up.

If we have to go out for a day, we use an Archos Gmini 200 MP3player/photo storage device.

The archos holds 20Gb of data, more than we need for a day. it fits into a small pocket in our photovest and we can perform about 10 downloads before its internal batteries need recharging.

Since we shoot raw (9.5Mb/image), we need a lot of space and CDs would not be an option for our needs.

I travel with a small laptop,lacie pocketdrive and firewire card reader. All power "daisy chain" from the laptop which saves taking extra adaptors/cables etc. I also back up my favourites from a trip onto my MP3 player. So I come home with 2 copies of all my images and an extra copy of my favourites.

 

James took this picture of me in Cayman (where I also had one of my less portable hard drives because it was a long trip. This pic shows my normal setup (small laptop, hard drive, reader and MP3 player. In the other picture James took you could not see my swimming trunks and it looked as though I was downloading commando style!  

That's taking the term "raw files" a little too literally.

It's "download raw files", not "download files, raw".

The risk I see with this scheme is that if your laptop fails you can't power your other devices and would have no working storage.

I take along a laptop and an Archos MP3 player which has a CP reader builtin. This give me two independent systems. At the end of the trip, I write my favorites on my CP cards, so I have 3 copies of the shots I want to keep.

Good pt herb - I also carry a laptop + portable hard drive+card reader (G2). If the laptop fails I can still back up to the Image Tank G2.

I've decided to take up a new hobby - naked watersports photography. I ran a workshop this weekend and we had a blast (make sure the weather is a bit nippy). Here's a shot by Aline, entitled "Andi goes surfing:"

(boy am I asking for it...)

Cheers

James