How Do You Manage Your SD Card Library?

txmadman writes "Like a lot of my colleagues and all of my three children, I have several SD , mini-SD, and micro-SD cards for various purposes: cameras, cell phones, my laptop, etc. These things are handy to have around, offer easy and significant storage, but are very easily lost. We have also have run into some instances where it wasn't clear whose SD card was whose, and have also started to see a need for a storage mechanism. I have seen SD card 'wallets' and such, but have never seen anyone actually use one. So: How do you manage and keep track of your SD cards?"

Comments

Labels

[FluffyWithTeeth]

Put labels on them and keep them in a credit card pocket of your wallet.

This is seriously not a difficult enough problem to warrant a /. story..

Re:Labels

[rm999]

Having 100s of memory cards around makes about as much sense as having 100s of rolls of used, unlabeled film laying around. Even if your uncle is taking 20 megapixel RAW pictures, he can fit 800 pictures on eight 2-gig cards. In this extreme example, he shouldn't need more than eight cards if he takes 800 pictures a shoot, because the first thing he should do when his shoot is over is empty the pictures onto a hard drive with an automatic backup, then format the cards.

If you are having trouble organizing your memory cards, you can probably simplify some other aspect of your life to fix the problem.

Re:Labels

[lordSaurontheGreat]

He needs to have a number of cards at his immediate use at all times. Large high-resolution raw-format images are big no matter how you spin it, and the prospect of loosing an expensive card (well, probably less expensive now, but rewind five years and let the horror set in) isn't good.

When you're at a shoot, "oops, I somehow managed to grab ten cards, five of which were full" is inexcusable.

He organizes it by keeping track, putting things in consistent places, eg. full cards in need of download to the computer go in one place, cards that have been downloaded to the computer can be put in another place.

Simple habits can fix most problems of organization.

He needs so many cards because sometimes he doesn't have time to process photos between shoots, and there isn't always time to stop by the store to buy more, either.

And yes, he archives all data to hard disks and what not. Keeping it on flimsy cards that can easily get deleted by a camera's "clear card" function is a horrifying way to loose your customer's data.

While not always avoidable, try to keep critical data off cards. We've all seen photos of cell phones with address books in toilets or the fabled $2,000 latte. Do you really want to be the next /. headline "I lost my SD card in the wash and there was data on it I didn't have replicated - can you suggest any good recovery techniques, or am I basically screwed?"

Re:Labels

[lordSaurontheGreat]

One of his largest client bases are public schools which pay to have pictures taken of all the kids for the student ID cards.

For some of the larger schools, you're looking at 2,000 kids, and you want a minimum of four to six good photos of each kid. 2,000 times 4 is 8,000 photos.

Granted, he brings computers and other equipment on those shoots and sets them up on-site (with cool card-printing machines and stuff) but the point is that if he's far away from his studio, he can't go running back to get more cards, and stores don't reliably have cards in stock. The best way is to have many of them on hand. If you're away from studio, you may shoot many different events before going back to process the images, filter out the bad shots, touch up the color (he's a color freak - subtle things that I can't even begin to pick up bug the snot out of him) and do other things.

If he's out of state (not uncommon) the dangers of being caught unprepared where your professional reputation is on the line are catastrophic. And how does he manage all these little cards?

Simple habits that scale from managing a house of 10 flash cards to photo studios with hundreds.

So grab your family, their memory cards, and a sharpie, and establish a system and good habits of keeping track of your things. Nothing is cheaper, and nothing is more effective.

Re:Labels

[icebike]

And we all know student photos need the highest possible resolution so they can all look back fondly at the sheer variety and size of each and every zit, whitehead, and pimple.

Re:Labels

[hairyfeet]

Actually I have a customer who does those jobs, and you do actually need them to be in high res. Why? Because it makes it easier for him to photoshop out all those zits, whiteheads, scars, etc. And from talking to him he has gotten a lot of business on the side from parents who look at the nice school photos and who are happy to pay the cash to have nice photos of their kid without giant blemishes.

Re:Labels

[theheadlessrabbit]

no, you would need at least 16 cards, but likely more. much more.

800 shots per job is not an overestimate, it is actually a very reasonable number.

I use one set of cards for each particular job. each set of cards is numbered and lettered. (1a, 1b, 1c, 1d, 2a, 2b, 2c ...etc.)
for one job, i use my '1x' set, while the next job, i use my '2x' set.

use a sharpie, never pencil, to label your cards. different colours can help, too.

I copy the images to a properly named folder on a hard drive at the end of the night, and put those memory cards into a clearly labeled box. (I use an Altoids tin with some padding material thrown in)
at the start of the next day, I insert the next set of cards into my camera bag for the next job.

you ONLY format those cards and re-use them after the job is complete. before then, a minimum of 2 copies of the data must be kept. even after the job is complete, i keep the data on the cards until i need to format them for another job.

A professional has no excuse for lost data. but even at the amateur level, you don't want to lose your data. those photos could become treasured memories for generations to come.

Re:Labels

[jocknerd]

If one 16GB card fails, you've lost 16GB's of photos. If one 2GB or 4GB card fails, you've lost 2GB or 4GB of photos. Better to have multiple cards around 4GB's than a single 16GB card in my opinion.

uh...

[Anonymous Coward]

I leave them in their damn slot.. be it camera, phone, vibrator, etc... no need to keep multiple ones around... save the data, or delete! jeez... lame noobs....

Keep the cards used with the device

[syousef]

I keep the cards with the device I use them most with.

MicroSD - my phone or GPS
SD - Point and click camera
CF - SLR

Oh and chuck smaller capacity cards as you replace them (like the ones that they ship with cameras and fit 3 images). They're worse than useless - they're a distraction (possibly at a crucial time in photography).

I find I don't need thousands of SD cards. I probably have 20 SD cards and 10 CF cards.

Wipe them

[dargaud]

Plug them in a PC, move everything over to the PC, reformat the card. Now they are all identical and it doesn't matter who they belong to or if you lose them. Why do you ask ? Incidentaly I use the following Linux/Cygwin script to sort out the files.

Horde!

[lordSaurontheGreat]

I horde my digital media! People. Do. Not. Touch. My. Stuff.

Family members taking personal responsibility to know what is theirs and where it is is the only solution. There is no technological substitute for plain-old responsible living.

Putting labels on cards if they know they'll forget is part of that. Putting their things in their specific corners of the shared domicile are manditory. I infest my bedroom and my computer desk. My dad inhabits his desk of the study and his side of the master bedroom. My brother floats between the sofa, the piano, and his room. My mom Supremely Controls the rest of the house, and of course has jurisidiction as to the aesthetics of everyone else's little corners.

Do what you (hopefully) learned in kindergarten! Put things back where you found them! Develop habits! My keys always go with my wallet and phone and PDA on the articulating arm base of my computer monitor. I never wonder where they are: they're either on me, where they belong, or stolen.

Life is very simple when you take responsibility. It's all black and white, easy to differentiate, and on the whole much more pleasant.

Re:Horde!

[UncleTogie]

I never wonder where they are: they're either on me, where they belong, or stolen. Life is very simple when you take responsibility. It's all black and white, easy to differentiate, and on the whole much more pleasant.

Let me guess... there aren't any toddlers or shiny-object-hoarding pets at your house, either...

Re:Horde!

[Captain Splendid]

It's hoard, not horde.

Fucking WOW idiots...

What's to organize?

[nsayer]

I haven't found a need to have more than one SD card per device - that is, one in the camera, one in the Wii (to back up the WiiWare), etc. You just empty them onto your computer every so often (this doesn't work for the Wii, but that hasn't filled up anyway, and it doesn't look likely to anytime soon).

Treat Them as Garbage!

[Bruce Perens]

Treat your SD cards as garbage! No kidding!

You do this by using a hard disk copy as the "master", and copying to and from SD, considering that the SD is always "ephemeral", and may get bent, may pop out of the device and be stepped on and lost, etc. So, it is never the host for any critical data for very long.

And you make darned sure to back up the disk. These days my short-term backup medium is a couple of 1G or larger SATA disks, which I place in a front-loading holder and put in the fire safe after they're written. Long-term backup media is currently DVD, but will probably go to Blu-Ray when the media gets cheap enough. Some of these are stored in a relative's closet, because having all of your backups in one building is stupid.

Bruce

Re:Treat Them as Garbage!

[Psychotria]

couple of 1G or larger SATA disks, which I place in a front-loading holder and put in the fire, safe after they're written

Bruce, I have no reason to doubt you; but are you sure it's OK to put SATA drives into the fire? I know it's probably romantic to sit in front of a nice fireplace made from SATA disks, but wouldn't logs be cheaper (NO, NOT the /var/log kind)?

No Subject

[Orphaze]

Like a lot of my colleagues and all of my three children, I have several white, black, and blue pairs of socks for various purposes: school, work, dress, etc. These things are handy to have around, offer easy and significant comfort, but are very easily lost. We have also have run into some instances where it wasn't clear whose socks were whose, and have also started to see a need for a storage mechanism. I have seen sock 'drawers' and such, but have never seen anyone actually use one. So: How do you manage and keep track of your socks?

Re:No Subject

[DavidD_CA]

Like a lot of my colleagues, I have several white and black, and blue children for various purposes: school, work, social, etc. These things are handy to have around, offer easy and significant entertainment, but are very easily lost. We have also have run into some instances where it wasn't clear whose children were whose, and have also started to see a need for a storage mechanism. I have seen child 'drawers' and such, but have never seen anyone actually use one. So: How do you manage and keep track of your children?

Dump to disk

[hpa]

Dump them to hard disk, RAID array, what not; then threat the physical media as transient and/or a backup.

That way you can also index electronically and what not.

Get big ones

[yog]

4 gig cards are not that expensive and they hold an amazing amount of stuff. Probably 8 gig cards will be pretty standard in a year or two. So just get the largest cards you can afford and you won't need to have lots of extra ones lying around.

My camera case has about 5 SD cards ranging from 512 megs to 2 gigs, and I really could replace them all with one or two 4GB cards. That's a lot of pictures (but we take a lot of video clips too).

Why someone needs extra SD cards for a phone is beyond me. My 512 meg micro sd is larger than I would ever want in my flip phone. I guess a smart phone with a 3 megapixel camera would warrant something more capacious. So a 4 gig card should do it.

This is really not rocket science. It's like those people who used to ask, how large a hard disk should I get with my new PC? Well, the answer was, and still is, as large as you can afford.

Re:Get big ones

[Jason1729]

The difference between a mid-range Nikon lens and any point-and-shoot is just stunning. There's no games like "maybe your eye can't see it but a photophile can". I understand if I mention the size of the lens, elements, etc and especially price I'll sound like one of the audio fools, so leave that aside. I wish I had some samples on line, but when I take a picture of my dog with a point and shoot, you can see it has fur, get a notion of the texture of the fur, etc, but the fine detail is mostly a blur. When I use my DSLR, I can see every strand of fur. With a portait of a person, I can zoom on the eye and see every eyelash and the pattern of the iris.

The reason I say no difference between 2 and 10 megapixel, when I zoom in a point and shoot 10 megapixel image, it gets blurry beyond recognition long before it pixelizes; the pixels are much finer than needed and only show that the lens fails. With my 12 megapixel DSLR, when I zoom, it's the pixelizing that breaks down the image and I can see the sharp image degenerating because of pixelization.

All that only talks about the lens itself. When you get into the body, a point and shoot has a typical 6x8mm sensor. A DSLR has an sensor around 18x24 for a prosumer or 24x36 for a professional model. The effect is that each pixel is physically larger on the sensor, so it can gather more light and be less affected by noise. The result is a picture that's more vibrant and sharper.

Then there's a lot of other factors, like the dinky flash on a point and shoot (and front light is the worst kind too - it makes an image look flat), I have a wireless external flash, I usually put it around 60 degrees from me and it brings out side shadows that emphasize surface texture and make the picture pop. Or I can put the flash 20 feet away pointing at the background -- ever take a flash picture of a person and have the background come out black?

Re:Fire safe won't do much

[Bruce Perens]

Fire safes are generally designed to keep their contents below the combustion point of paper. Hard drives will melt at much, much cooler temperatures.

Good point. You don't want to be in the sort of situation where it's necessary to call Kroll Ontrak to recover the drive. The fire safe will probably reach an unacceptable temperature in a structure-destroying fire. That's why I have off-site backups.

Instructions to my wife and child in case of a fire are get out first, do not concern yourself about any disks. This even though some of the forest fires we are subject to give warning before the structure must be evacuated. My critical business data gets backed up out of the state every night, via the net.Bruce

Throw all of them away, except one

[webreaper]

I only have one SD card.

When it's full, I move the files off onto a large data filing and storage system that came with my PC (called a 'hard disk'). That renders the SD card empty again, and I can start filling it with data, photographs, video etc., and then repeat the process.

The PC's 'hard disk' can be accessed by an 'operating system' which has lots of functionality that allows you to easily organise the data into hierarchical 'folders', making it easy to keep track of the contents.

There. Solved that problem for you. Next?

Re:Altoids tin

[Bazman]

I use a 35mm film canister for the SD cards I use for photography.

I know how

[gparent]

I stored the info in a database on another SD card.

However I mislabeled it and lost it.

How do you feed/clothe yourself?

[Joce640k]

If a few SD cards leaves you confused...

If the label is blank it's empty

[sjbe]

Back when a 20MB hard drive was still a big capacity and everyone had zillions of floppy disks to manage I had a teacher give me a piece of advice I still live by:

If the disk contents aren't important enough to justify the tiny effort of labeling the disk then treat the disk as if it is blank.

Saves a lot of hand wringing about whether the files on the disk are important. If it wasn't important enough to take the very simple measure of writing a brief description of the contents of then you probably didn't need the contents anyway. If by some chance you did need the contents your organizational skills/system suck and you deserve the consequences.

The problem should never be organizing SD cards however. The problem should be organizing and backing up the photos once you have downloaded the contents to your PC. Even if a photographer has 30+ SD (or equivalent) cards with him for a shoot, the contents should not remain on those cards for long after the shoot is done.

Seriously

[tknd]

I had this problem and realized that the amount of time I spent sorting socks was ridiculous. The solution? Flatten your socks down to 1 or 2 types (white and black) and now the sorting problem goes away. Anytime your socks start developing holes or you feel you need to replace them, throw out the entire batch and buy all identical ones. By now you don't even have to pair up the socks when sorting the laundry. Just throw them in the drawer/basket and you're done.