Do you take 20,000 photos in a day?
 

Spotted this on another forum


two weeks ago I shot 20 000 pictures within 12 hours. basically I just kept the shutter button pressed since that was the only way I knew how to take pictures of dozens of competitive ballroom dancers, all competing at the same time, constantly changing their routines with new pairs replacing old ones every few minutes or so. I've selected some 500 pictures from the lot and you can see them here:
http://antonipildid.net

Crumbs I thought I was bad taking neary 15,000 images since october. The photo's what I have seen so far look brilliant, I bet your finger was tired by the time you finished.

LOL,

3,600 seconds per hour divided into 20,000, it does seem possible. I question the number of cards required, personally I would need 100 2GB cards. How many batteries would been required, 20 again from personal experience!

Thats 20 batteries, 100 cards and a big camera bag!

A very determined photographer and possible.

Snap, 17,000 in three years!

The shutter on the 20/30D is supposed to be good for 100,000 actuations. At this rate it would only last 5 days :(

The memory card thing though should not be an issue as with help as one filled up it could be downloaded to a pc/laptop whilst another is filled. A 1gb card with camera set at full res medium quality will give well over 400 shots. Frankly I would find it hardest to actually point the camera at couples and continue to take the shots for so long :)

I considered downloading cards and recharging batteries but maths suggest the shutter needed to be actuated once every 2.16 seconds! Not enough time to download or charge but enough to swap and replace. IMHO.

Maths:- (3,600 x 12) / 20,000 = 2.16

Still a funny story!

Well to be honest I think he is full of s***
If you read the comments under his gallery. He talks about only stopping to change cards, lenses, eat etc. Plus 45mins to go home as his portable drive started complaining. Now take all this out of the 12hrs then the 2.16 secs per shot is reduced considerably. He also says somewhere he is using a 350D with 2x512mb cards which he downloads to a portable drive whilst he continues shooting. How on earth can he compose and shoot for such a long period of time and get 20000 shots. I don't think so :eek:

Once, on a good day off, I shot almost 500 shots and that involved 3 battery changes and dumping the shots into a folder on my computer as soon as the cards were full. I swore I would never even attempt it again as it took me ages to go through every photo and dump the ones that were horrible and even worse, trying to decide why I needed 30 or so very good shots of the same bird in different stances.

and from earlier today on another thread:

20,000 photos in RAW format in 12 hours with a 350D using 2 512Mb cards. Hummmmmmmm

Impossable,must be a wind up ! or the figure is wrong !

Did anyone check the exif, although this will not show how many shots he actually took, it does show that the first photo timed at 09.43 and the last at 22.07.

Also if you look at some of his shots you will see that he used the machine gun approach.

I don't see a problem with 2 x 512 Mb cards, any more would be rather pointless.

as you are downloading one onto a portable device the second would be in the camera. So a third card would never be used.

Another thing to consider is that the 350D is capable of a sustained 100 jpgs per minute, 6000 per hour.
20,000 photos comfortable in 4 hours :)

Battery power approx 600 shots per charge, suggests this to be the only problem, apart from maybe the camera shutter disintegrating.

Harry

Can I just add a comment to this thread.I read somewhere that these digi cameras do have a limited no of shots which one can take.Do not know the exact figure,but say,10,000 for the 300d,and 20,00,for the 20D.These are only an example,cannot remember the exact no stated.Also when a camera was advertised for sale(digi),a prospective buyer asked as to how many shots had been taken.This did concern me,I naturally thought that after a while ,ones camera would be defunct.But when I spoke to a company who do clean and service cameras,and I asked if the camera could be re-started from new as it were,and I told them what I had read etc,they very patiently explained it was the shutter which can go amiss eventually ,not the camer itself.They also explained that replacement shutters for digi slr's now only cost £20,whereas as previously the cost of a new shutter was £100.
So if a camera really has been overused ,as it were,it is possible to have the shutter replaced at a very reasonable cost.
Just thought I would mention this,in case anyone else,thought as I did, that the camera would need to be replaced!!!

Whatever the rights or wrongs of it all, I'm certainly going to show the opening post to my husband who was shocked at the 3,500 photos I took whilst we were on holiday in Scotland last year.

Mind you, he also is a maths chap so he'll be trying hard to sort it out as you all are. I'll still be showing him to give it a try!

Jim,

I don't think you've quite understood. Wolfie was not talking about himself doing this photo-marathon, only pointing out that he'd seen someone else (on another forum) claim this. Hope this clarifies.

Sorry if I did not make it clear, that it was not me. I've not taken that many in three years.

Harry

Sorry Wolfie,i understand as there was a bit above the sentence that we did not see !

I have never taken that many in all my 73 years of living and i started off with a box Brownie !

Thanks Christine. I did think it would be the entire camera to be replaced due to pricing of a new shutter. I've had me camera for roughly 3 months and take about 100 shots each time I take it out. Especially lately due to comptetitions being every week. Thats a relief!

I'm noted as a shutter-hog and always, in in the slightest doubt, take extra shots, but even so, I don't think I've ever taken more than 2000 in a day. More typically, on a good day, I'll take maybe 500 to 1000. That's if I'm doing fast-moving birds where you can't predict what the bird is going to be doing in advance, so you just concentrate on getting the lighting and framing right and hold that button down. Of course, it means a very tedious time spent afterwards ruthlessly deleting all bar the very best shots, but that's OK. If I wear the camera out, I don't care - at least not if I've had good pictures in the meantime.

Oh, and then there are the variations. Was f/5.6 really ideal for that sequence? Am I going to have enough depth of field? Maybe I better find that bird again and do another set at f/8. Hmmm ... shutter speeds are getting a bit low, let's bump up the ISO and repeat, just in case.

I guess that there are 3 ways to get the perfect shot:

• Shoot, chimp, shoot again till you get it right.
• Shoot lots, pick the bet one when you get home.
• Know your gear so well that you can shoot once and know it's right.

I hate chimping, so scratch the first one. Besides, I defy anyone to really know what the shot looks like on that tiny screen. Hell, I only get rid of maybe 2/3rds of my shots when I'm out in the field because despite havinbg the best laptop screen I can afford, I find it very difficult to be sure until I see things on the big screen at home

Second method is my choice.

Third method is what we all aspire to. When I'm good enough to get A1 results that way, I'll let you know. Don't hold your breath waiting!

Now, all of the above applies to birds and only birds. (Probably the same for sport and various other things I don't do, but birds for me.) If I'm doing landscapes for the day, it's completely different. You can take as long as you need to get the shot the way you want it, and though I might take up to half-a-dozen of one scene if the light is tricky, mostly it's just one plus maybe one extra to be sure and a full-on day's worth of photography fits on a single small flash card.