5D MARK IV SD and CF CARDS

[Harley3348]

Hello, just upgraded to the 5d mark iv and planning a cruise to Alaska. Looking for help on the best SD and CF cards to use for all around indoor/outdoor photography and video. Thank you

[ebiggs1]

The best card is always the one recommended in your Canon manual. I, also, recommend smaller cards and have several. Any of the top brand bought from a a good retail source is fine. Amazon and eBay are not good sources. It's not that they are bad it is you just can't always tell where the cards come from which leads to easy counterfeit cards.

[Harley3348]

Thank you for the info. Why do you recommend smaller cards?

[shadowsports]

Greetings,

Memory cards play an important role for image and video capture.  Brands such as SanDisk, Lexar and Prograde all work well.  I suggest you buy your cards from a reputable source / dealer.  B&H is a great place.

Note, I just checked B&H.  SanDisk cards are on sale for the next 3 days.  Great pricing.   

I'm going on an Alaska cruise in August. I would definitely like to speak with you and hear more about your trip.  

[Harley3348]

Thank you Rick, I like your thinking and will do business with B&H.

[rs-eos]

I've been using three sets of SanDisk cards (SD and CF) with my 5D IV over the past six years without issue.  Two sets are 128 GB cards and the third are 64 GB cards.

I don't do any video work though with my 5D.   Do note that depending upon what codec you use, the file sizes will be massive.   If you'll be using that codec, be sure to look at very high capacity CF cards should you need to capture tons of continuous footage.

[ebiggs1]

"Why do you recommend smaller cards?"

To lesson the chance of a card failure or lose.  Today is seems people want to put all there photos on a single card. All their eggs in one basket thing. I suppose it is because that is how an iphone works. Of course in my line of work a lose of a photo is not acceptable let alone lose of the entire shoot. When you are just shooting or funsy I guess it doesn't matter as much. However, that best practice follows me on any shoot. If I were to be gone for five days for instance I would have five memory cards. One, a different one, for each day.

[rs-eos]

I've never had any issues with high capacity cards (SanDisk and AngelBird cards up to 256 GB).

For all photo work with my 5D IV, I shoot RAW+JPEG and save to both cards.  So two copies of RAW and two copies of JPEG (four total files per image).   Video work also involves capturing to two cards.

[ebiggs1]

"I've never had any issues with high capacity cards (SanDisk and AngelBird cards up to 256 GB)."

And that proves exactly what? Nothing.  It only suggests you might be lucky. Look most of you are in a situation where a lose is just a minor disappointment. In my line of work it is not acceptable and inexcusable. It can be a matter of getting paid and not. A matter of being hired to do the next job or not.  But if that is how you roll go for it. Males no difference to me as it is just a suggestion on a best practice.

[rs-eos]

You omitted the important part of my post that stated I ultimately have four copies of each image.  That does alleviate the issues should a large capacity card fail.