Upgrading to HMC150

C

ctb1010

Well-known member
Hello everyone,

I am upgrading my two DVX100's to HMC150's this week and I'm super excited! I've been reading these forums to learn more about the camera. The whole solid state recording process is entirely new to me. I'll be primarily shooting weddings with these cameras and have a couple of questions before I make the purchase from B&H.

My biggest question is about SD cards. If I'm shooting 8 hour events, how many cards should I purchase, what size cards should I purchase, and what is the best brand and class? I've been reading the forums and I really want to avoid card failures, but there seems to be many different opinions about the best card to go with.

I also need to pick up some spare batteries, are there any discount spots to pick these up at?

I believe besides that I'm all set as I already have microphones and all of the other necessary gear.... unless you guys tell me that there's something that I'm missing.

Thanks in advance!
 
I use 8gb Sandisk Extreme's for my weddings. I normally get through 8 cards for the average wedding. I have a couple of cheaper 16bg Verbatim cards for emergencies. I can shoot 48 mins per card so during the day i just treat them like i used to treat 1 hour tapes. I have no problems with changing cards mid ceremony (always shoot with two cameras anyway and normally change during a hymn or something). I've only ever had the speeches run over 40 mins a few times in my 5 years of filming weddings. Again, i film with speeches and ceremony with two cameras anyway so i can change without too much bother.

The reasons why i use 8gb cards are 1) damage limitation - if something does go wrong with a card then at least it's not 16gb or 32gb that i've lost. And 2) I read somewhere that someone was archiving their cards onto Dual Layer DVDs (8.5bg capacity) so i've started to do the same...for the time being.

I hope this helps

Cheers

Chris.
 
I'm also staying away from 32GB cards because of cost-effectiveness (2x 16gb cards are generally cheaper) and damage limitation.

Definitely stay away from A-data - a lot of people who are reporting problems have a-data cards. Sandisk, Panasonic and Transcend are generally accepted to be safe. I use 3x16gb Patriot cards and have no problems.

The idea of shooting everything on 8GB cards and archiving them onto data DVDs is really an excellent idea if you're ok with limiting your record times.

Don't worry about class too much, it only affects how quickly you can offload the cards to your computer (~10-15 minutes for a class 6 16GB). Anything above class 4 (which all SDHC cards are) will record all formats just fine.
 
Use at least class 6. Me, I don't trust class 4 because it's the minimum spec. So, I prefer higher classes. But it's not a warranty.

All brands have faulty cards. Me, I am ok with Panasonic cards, I have 7 of them. But few people here experienced some issues.

For batteries, I have 3 big batteries. With that, I am good for about 12 hours non-stop.
 
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