# How much memory do I need



## obmd1 (Jan 17, 2005)

Leaving for a two week vacation with my new Nikon D80. I have little if any idea what I am doing with the thing... and I have SOME memory, but how much do you think I need? 

no plans for RAW. 

thanks guys.


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## kurichan (May 1, 2004)

At least 4 GB


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## kattanapilot (Aug 26, 2007)

Most people will not even do 1gig, but for 2 weeks I need at least 4gig


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## kurichan (May 1, 2004)

kattanapilot said:


> Most people will not even do 1gig, but for 2 weeks I need at least 4gig


It's a D80 = 10 MP! How could most people take under 1GB?


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## Cliff (Apr 19, 2002)

obmd1 said:


> Leaving for a two week vacation with my new Nikon D80. I have little if any idea what I am doing with the thing... and I have SOME memory, but how much do you think I need?
> 
> no plans for RAW.
> 
> thanks guys.


From that description, I can't tell. Look at memory prices, determine your spending comfort level, spend that, and see if it worked at the end of your vacation. :dunno:

edit: my last vacation I took 11gb of CF cards, a laptop with a 120gb drive, an 80 gb external drive, and some blank DVD-R's.


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## kattanapilot (Aug 26, 2007)

kurichan said:


> It's a D80 = 10 MP! How could most people take under 1GB?


My boss has an 80 and I got to beg him to take any type of photo when he is at a trade show, that is where I am guessing my stats on.


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## hockeynut (Apr 14, 2002)

Make plans for raw - I don't touch JPG until I export for the web or printing.

I have two 8GB and two 4GB cards and I filled 'em up in a week in Colorado. I only shoot raw - leaves you with more options when you get 'em into the PC (I use Adobe Lightroom).

Cards are cheap these days - I think the 8GB ones were like $80 at Frys. 

Another option is to bring a laptop and download at the end of each day, or get one of those little portable harddrives that you can download directly from the cards.


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## FenPhen (Jan 13, 2004)

Debatable whether you really need RAW. If you're a pro, and plan on making extensive edits to huge prints, consider it, but really, you're just going to end up with a ****load of data you don't really need. You'll have to download/process it, archive it, and it'll eat up cards and might cost you a shot when you need space. I've never really used RAW, so I'm biased, but unless you really know what you're doing, I'd recommend sticking with fine JPEG and large resolution. Search for some essays on the RAW vs. JPEG debate.

Most of the noise in an image is going to come from the ISO sensitivity. Use a good noise-reduction utility (try Neat Image) and everything will clean up considerably, then tweak in your favorite photo editor. After that, I don't know why you really need to mess with RAW, since you should be getting proper color balance and exposure _with the camera_, no?

How much storage you need is totally dependent on what kind of photographer you are. I just got back from a 6-day trip. I didn't have the camera with me the whole time, but I burned through 3.5 GB and could've used more. I shot ~1200 pictures and filled up my cards with ~900 saved (fine, large JPEG), each picture being ~3.8 MB. I made one pass through them and selected ~80 worth showing to people. I clean the images with Neat Image and reduce to about 50% of the orginal resolution and post those.

The 2-GB SanDisk Ultra II SD card is $25 at Amazon, so get as many as you want. Just remember that more pictures is more work for you when you get home.


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