Much like ‘safely removing’ USB drives, the nebulous idea that deleting photo files on camera could corrupt the memory card was never something I really invested much thought in. So I’d blaze away and then bin obviously bad photos to make room for more.

I rely on large-capacity CF cards when I’m travelling, as I often don’t take a computer with me. So I’ll pack a few 16GB, 8GB and 4GB cards and rely on them to see me through. It has worked well for me. However, our trip to South Africa earlier this year saw me in turmoil, as I had near-about filled a 16GB card after a few days there! This wasn’t a huge issue, as we didn’t spend every day doing a lot of photography, and some days we did none at all. Our trips to Giant’s Castle and Boulder’s Beach were interspersed with days of holidaying and road-tripping that didn’t offer much photographic opportunity, so I didn’t really need to worry too much about space. I deleted blurry photos straight off the camera and didn’t think much of it.

I was worried, however, when the memory card wouldn’t write any more pictures despite have around 30 shots left, and brought up an error message saying the card couldn’t be read. Having big memory cards is a bit like putting all your eggs in one basket, and if something happens, it’s a bit of a disaster.

I could still view the photos, and could download them on to my iPad, so I was content that the photos already on there were secure. The only problem is that this happened with nearabouts every CF card I had – when it got down to ~30 photos left, it would stop and pull up the error message. It had happened the previous year as well, during a trip to Australia, where I mercifully had my computer, so I could download the files immediately.

My theory is that the cards were simply overestimating the amount of space they had left on them, so that they were actually full and that’s why they couldn’t store any more photos. I’ve also only ever had this problem using the D300, so that may be a factor.  Still, it’s a nerve-wracking thing to deal with, especially when overseas! So now I save the deleting for once the files are downloaded. Save myself from any undue stress!

Well done if you made it through that wall of text, here’s a photo.