Buffering on Nikon d600

[Stephanie Dunton]

hello everyone!

I am having an issue that is greatly hindering my camera performance both during my portrait sessions or when I'm second shooting.

My buffer can only go to r15 and takes about 30 seconds to refill. This may not seem like a lot of time, but I photograph a lot of children under the age of 2 and smilies are wide spread sometimes. During weddings as a second shooter, I'm constantly focused on the wedding party and during entrance and exits with a big party I need more than 15 shots many of times.

I've read a few threads already and I've checked my d lighting and long exposure settings.

I shoot in raw and use my second memory card slot as backup.

I've tried shooting continuous to see if that would help but it just causes shots to not be crisp and the buffer still fills up.

Does a greater MB memory card solve this issue? Mine are currently the standard, 32GB and 80MB.

Essentially my goal is to take crisp photos at a quick speed (I know this is a big wish).
Any advice?

 

[jaomul]

When you say r15 do you mean it takes 15 shots in raw and then needs to write to the card?

 

[jaomul]

Some cards may say 80, that could be read speed, rather than write speed. Also if your backing up raws to second card that will slow it down more.

Generally, of course people differ, the backup to second card is JPEG.

Also the speed will be dictated by slowest card if putting raws on both.


You could try raws one jpegs the second, you could also set your taw quality to 12 bit compressed instead of 14 bit full quality.

Generally cameras have to write to cards after a burst but 30 second seems a lot, I'd guess a better card will also help

 

[Stephanie Dunton]

When you say r15 do you mean it takes 15 shots in raw and then needs to write to the card?

When you say r15 do you mean it takes 15 shots in raw and then needs to write to the card?

Yes, it takes up to 15 shots. It refills slowly after and will allow me to take one or two shots, but to completely fill up again about 30 seconds.

I have it on 12 but compressed already.

I appreciate your support and response!

 

[oldhippy]

Have heard an added battery pack helps speed things up.

 

[Alexr25]

Some cards may say 80, that could be read speed, rather than write speed.

That IS the read speed, generally memory card manufactures only advertise their card's read speed and in most cases you have to trawl through the specs to find out the write speed of the card, often is quite a bit slower than the read speed.
30 seconds to clear the buffer does seem excessive so I suggest getting something like the Sandisk Pro 95MB/s card that is rated at 95MB/sec for both the read and the write functions.

 

[jaomul]

Try a different spec card as suggested, I would however only backup as jpeg

 

[goooner]

Take a look at this site. The speed of the card does not matter much if your camrahas a slow write speed. The sandisk recommended by Alex seems to be the way to go.
Nikon D600 Fastest SD Cards - Memory card speed tests for D600 - Camera Memory Speed Comparison & Performance tests for SD and CF cards

 

[Braineack]

you need a better memory card.




you'll take better pictures if you're more precise with your captures. There's no reason to spray over 15 shots in CH at a wedding -- especially in the situation you mentioned.

 

[astroNikon]

I recommend the Sandisk Extreme Pro 95/mbs cards as well.
You never specifically mentioned which card you use. But the D600 is not a sport camera, even though I used it as such. I did not use it as a spraying camera (keeping the button down) and would more limitedly do Full Continuous.

As to the "crisp" photos, that could be another problem such as the appropriate shutter speed for the subject.

 

[greybeard]

Pretty much the nature of the beast. I bought my D7500 (which will shoot 50 RAW or 100 jpg before the buffer fills) because the buffer on my D750 was just too small for shooting wildlife. Those D600, D750's are just not made for "spray and pray" type shooting. There are probably some features you can turn off that will give you 1 or 2 more shots but nothing will improve the slow camera to card write speed.

 

[Dave442]

Pick up a faster memory card and then work to make sure you don't fill the buffer. If that perfect shot comes up with the buffer full then you just missed it, as I'm sure you already have found out.

Staying within your cameras capabilities is just another fun aspect of photography. With the small buffer on the D600 I would look at knocking off no more that 5 or 6 shots at time and then give a few seconds before the next sequence and so on (timing it so you can cover the intense action and reach a point where you can allow the buffer to completely clear out).

Also, a second body gives you a second buffer.

 

[480sparky]

When you say r15 do you mean it takes 15 shots in raw and then needs to write to the card?

No. It simply means it can take 15 photos before the buffer fills up. However, as you take images, the first one gets started writing to the card, even while you're shooting. So you might fire off 5 shots and by the time you're done, two of them are written on the card. So you'll see r12. As the last three are written, it will rise to r13, then r14, then r15.

I use 95mbps cards in my D600s, and can fire off 27 shots of 14-bit raw images before the buffer fills. On a lark I bought the same card but only 80mbps and it managed 23 shots.

 

[Derrel]

Buy a better memory card. Shoot RAW+ JPEG. Make SURE that the "primary" card is a high-quality card. I am not sure, but it is possible that un-compressed .NEF files might write MORE-quickly to the card than do compressed .NEF files. Yes, you read that right. Again, though I am not sure about that on a D600. I do not own a D600, but I have a D610. I use high-grade SanDisk 64-gigagbyte SD cards, and have pretty good results. Dave442 has some good advice.