When Good Memory Cards Go Bad

by | Dec 16, 2022

Today’s Post by Joe Farace

On this #filmfriday I planned to publish my review of JCH Streetpan 400 black and white film that was shot at a Cars & Coffee event and in and around Parker, Colorado. On November 19, I dropped the film off for processing and scanning at Mike’s Camera in Lone Tree Colorado. They said it would be ready on December 9, yet on on December 10, a store manager told me there was a delay because of “sickness at the Boulder Lab.” He promised I would have my film this week. As of this morning, I have not yet received the film and this post was created instead. When I actually receive the film, I’ll publish my promised review.

Memory Cards: Never underestimate the importance of only using the best possible and highest speed memory cards for your photography. In fact, some problems I had with my Lumix GH4 were diagnosed by Panasonic at related to using slower memory cards than I should.

Higher speed memory cards are designed to perform faster, which means the camera can write to the card faster, which in turn means the imaging error you see at right (from a shoot for the print edition of Shutterbug with Pam Simpson) would not have occurred.

Looking at the cards: The X that you see on a card represents its transfer rate and 1x means the card can perform data transfer at 150 Kilobytes (KB) per second. This is important to know because it lets you match the capabilities of your camera to the memory card.

How I made the original shot: I photographed the formidable Pam Simpson using Rotolight’s now discontinued RL48 Interview Kit but they are available used at some attractive prices and make a inexpensive way to experiment with LED lighting. Sure, they’re not that bright but the do work; the problem that’s the topic of today’s post is related to the memory card used—my fault—not the lights. The camera I used was a Panasonic Lumix GH4 with a Olympus M.45mm f/1.8 lens with an exposure of 1/30 sec at f/2 and IS) 800.

Reliability is the most critical component for any memory card—you can say that again. And a high-quality, high-speed memory card ensures you won’t lose any images or parts of images. Besides enhancing in-camera functions and greatly reduced transfer time, you get the extra enhancements of security and memory features that make selecting a high-speed memory card an easy choice and one I’ve finally learned, albeit a bit too late.

How I made the reconstructed shot: The image directly at left is a composite of sections of five different JPEG files, that when added to the original half-photograph, created a more or less finished image. It uses a technique I call Cut & Paste Portraiture and you can read more about how that works here.