best practices for card backups on solo shoots

[David Morgan]

Looking for ideas on how to save the most time and secure your data cards when shooting solo, either run and gun or fixed locations. Card format may be S x S, P-2, compact flash or other.....

Is anyone taking the time and effort to backup the cards on site before driving home with the shoot in your camera or bag? Are we really hauling laptops and hard drives to the shoot?

[Dean Sensui]

I do this occasionally.

After the day's shoot I'll use a MacBook Pro to copy files to two different Firewire drives. The drives are compact and self-powered so I only need to provide power for the laptop.

Only once did I have to copy files during a shoot and that proved hectic without an assistant. Too much risk for a mistake and losing important footage. It's better to have enough cards to last through the day.

[Burk Webb]

One of the reasons I love shooting with the C300, you can shoot to two cards simultaneously.

[Mark Watson]

I dump my CF and SD cards to a Nexto DI.

[Mike Calla]

Using DSLRs (cf,SD)
- Cards from camera straight in to small netbook via usb3 reader-
- back it up to ext HD when i have two secs

[Peter Kay]

I bought the Black Magic Design Hyperdeck and a couple of SSD's. Now, every time I hit record on my AF101 the internal SD card is written and the Hyperdeck also automatically starts to record.
The Hyperdeck is my primary footage whilst the internal camera's SD is the backup.

Fingers crossed, no lost footage yet... :)

[Jonathan Levin]

With the cost of CF cards being low enough to add to a budget, I wonder if anyone here just archives the original CF card(s) and uses new cards for each project?

P2 is to costly to do this.

Jonathan

[Al Bergstein]

Cards are not as cheap as hard drives, yet. I just buy enough cards to last the day. I use Pelican holders for the cards, the label side up means they are empty, the white write on side up mean used. I never want to hunt for an empty card, and I never want to dump cards in the field, though I have done so during lunch at times.

[Mike Watson]

Originally Posted by Jonathan Levin

With the cost of CF cards being low enough to add to a budget, I wonder if anyone here just archives the original CF card(s) and uses new cards for each project?

P2 is to costly to do this.

Jonathan

I shoot on the Sony FS-100, it shoots on SD cards (which are half the price of CF cards), I keep the original SD card until the edit is delivered. We have a dozen or so SD cards at any one point.

My 2nd camera is a 5D, and when I use it as a b-cam, I keep the CF cards as well.

[Panagiotis Raris]

old dell laptop occasionally.

[Denis Danatzko]

Dave,
It depends on the type of event I'm shooting. If it's a "small' shoot, i.e. a brief interview, a promotional web spot, or a long performance, then I don't usually back-up on-site unless the client insists on seeing the footage then & there. If so, then I'll lock the card and back-up to an external drive and/or a G-RAID mini on a laptop before I play it for the client.

If it's a large, busy event, (I shoot barrel racing where there may be 200-300+ riders), then I'll back up at convenient times, (often, after every 15 riders within a class, and during breaks between classes). But I have enough cards handy to capture an entire class (divided by 15 riders) before I'll have to re-use a card. (Each ride only takes about 20-25 secs, but I do that so frequently because the riders like to see themselves/their horse shortly after their ride and don't want to wait an hour for me to get a break in the action, then another 30 mins or so copying to a hard drive).

I don't edit those rides on the spot, but I do have them ready for re-play, which is often handled by my wife or daughter.

I also take it on shoots where the job calls for a teleprompter, but I'm considering getting a tablet for that. (My prompter- an Ikan PT3100 - is too big and heavy for frequent on-site use).

But, basically, yes...I'm taking a laptop to almost every shoot, and often with a 2nd, larger monitor. I don't always take it out of the car, but I have it if necessary, and on some shoots, I find it's vital in order to provide playback quickly. However, I doubt many others face similar situations, i.e. rapidly successive action for 3-4 hours almost without stopping.

[Bill Davis]

Originally Posted by David Morgan

Looking for ideas on how to save the most time and secure your data cards when shooting solo, either run and gun or fixed locations. Card format may be S x S, P-2, compact flash or other.....

Is anyone taking the time and effort to backup the cards on site before driving home with the shoot in your camera or bag? Are we really hauling laptops and hard drives to the shoot?

Check out ShotPut Pro.

I use that running on a MacPro laptop to make multiple card backups to different drives if I know I'm going to chew through a lot of footage on a field shoot.

[Warren Kawamoto]

I keep enough SxS cards to last the entire day so I can stay focused on shooting. After a card is full, I put it in a pouch, which is in my front pocket. I never put a full card in a bag! If someone walked away with my bag or camera, at least I have the footage on me. My shoot is still recoverable. If someone ever walked away with my filled cards, however, I'm absolutely done. To be double safe, I also have my name and phone number on each card just in case it ever goes MIA somewhere.

[Bruno Demeocq]

Good idea to put the phone number on SXS, should be difficult on smaller card. I copy on my MBP and then on external laCie Rugged. I do not have enough card so sometimes I have to bring my MPB on the field which is not always a good idea.

[Darren Levine]

i used to do laptop + external drive backups, but now cards a pretty darn cheap these days, and my c100 records dual slots, so if im really feeling paranoid, i can run dual slot recording. and considering how cheap sd cards are these days....

Amazon.com: PNY Elite Performance 64GB UHS-1 SDXC Flash Card (P-SDX64U1H-GE): Computers & Accessories

one of those is over 5 hours at the c100's bitrate. 80 bucks for 5 hours of backed up footage is a bargain. double it and it's still only 160 for over 10 hours of backed up footage. much more preferable to having to keep a laptop around