What to do with digital photos

[kgoldman_aj]

The thought hadn't occurred to me until now, but does anyone have any ideas on what to do with digital camera memory cards once they get full of taking pictures while you're on vacation? You certainly can't erase them until you've transfered the pictures. I don't have a laptop to transfer them to, but I'm going to borrow one from work. There's got to be a better way than this or buying more memory cards ($$$). Is there a place in Disney you can transfer the memory cards to CD-ROM?

Thanks.

 

[WillAndFinn'sMom]

I think there is a place to tranfer at Disney, because I remember a story once about how someone was transfering her pictures and they disappeared I don't remember where she said it was, though.

We take a laptop and transfer them to the laptop each night. Dh also transfered them to a disc just to be safe. Once we got home, we transfered them to four different discs. We gave two away and kept two.

Those cards can get expensive. It was pretty easy for us to transfer them each night.

 

[Ratpack]

I believe they can do this in the Exposition Hall at MK and also somewhere in EPCOT. I believe it is fairly expensive, like $12 or more each time. Wouldn't take long to have paid for a memory card.

 

[ktglads]

The cards were easier for me since my house has more than one camera that uses the same type of memory card. I just take 2 256 MB and 1 128 MB card and I am more than fine. Not sure how many pictures you can fit on a card, but I would say to look into the price of one more card. I found a 256 SD cardfor less than $50 after rebate. Much easier than worrying about a laptop. Also, you can buy the cards but keep them in the package with receipt. That way, if you do not need them and don't open them, you can always just take them back to the store.

Also, if you wish to maximize the amount of pics per card, look at your settings. You get a lot less pictures when you take on fine. At 4X6, I found no noticable differences between quality of pictures, but could fit a lot more pics on the card!

 

[bkrusen]

I posted a similar question a few weeks ago and was told that there is a Walgreens Pharmacy across from Down Town Disney that will transfer your digital pics onto a CD for $3.99. I haven't tried this yet but it sounds like a good idea if you can get there. Someone also suggested buying an extra memory stick just in case but don't open it unless you need it and if you don't just return it when you get home. You could also try playing around with lowering the resolution and see if your still happy with the pics. If you are then you can get lots more on the memory card. Good luck!!

 

[MichaelH]

The only thing about lowering the resolution is in printing the pictures. If you want to print a large picture and it was taken at a low resolution the picture will not look good. This is what I have been told by others.

Although I have no experience with this, it makes since to me. There are devices that they make that you can download your pictures to. I believe that it is just basically an external HD. Someone in a similar thread mentioned the name of these devices. I believe that is might have been in bkrusen's thread.

If I find the name of them I will post it.

 

[gmech6145]

i have an Olympus C-740 3.2megapixel. It uses the XD card..really small thing. I have 2 128MB cards that I use. My camera is set to high quality at 2048 by 1536, or somewhere in that area. I can fit 160 pictures on that card with great resolution. It will print an 8x10 picture without loosing any quality. If you want to just view them on your computer, the image is like 3 times the size of the screen. If you want to PRINT pictures, it is most wise to use the higher settings so the image will print without looking grainy.

 

[Aimeedyan]

I always set mine to the highest resolution. Not worth the risk in having a great photo taken, but the pic quality is bad.

There is a Walgreens that you can take your card to and have it loaded onto a disk for you. A place in the parks can do that too, at about 10 x the cost =) All about convinence.

I am loading mine up onto a laptop at the end of each night... If you borrow one from work, you can do that too.

=)

 

[disynut]

Will the laptop that you borrow have a cd burner on it? I believe you could just download the pics from the camera to the laptop then burn a cd of pictures yourself.

Plus, if you have a rather large card, like the others have said, you can fit quite a few pics on one card. Last year we were in FL for 10 days, I had a 128 card and never ran out of room. But maybe I don't take as many pics as some do.

 

[gmech6145]

most newer laptops have cd burners....pretty much the standard anymore. I was in Sicily and used the whole 128 MB card in 1 day in Palermo. 160 pictures......I think I deleted 5 at the most that werent that good. I dont know anyone else who takes as many pictures as I did then. But, I can look at ALL the pictures and remember almost everything about that day. I downloaded them to the laptop and then to cd, reuse the card over and over..

 

[Alacrity]

Hi there! I recently purchased a device called and X-Drive from a Vosonic. It is a portable hard drive with built- in card readers for just about any format card. Mine is a basic unit that only copies the card date to disk but there are others that will display the pictures and play MP3s. Once you copy to the drive you can erase the card and start again. Mine is a 10GB drive but the hard disk itself can be changed and you can install any size you like. Once home you connect to the computer and the device shows up as a hard drive on the computer which you use as usual. Works pretty will for me so far! I found mine on EBay but I have see them at retail places too.

http://www.vosonic.com/

Compugeeks had 'em at one time...
http://www.compgeeks.com/

 

[Tigge50447]

I think this is a great idea but at the moment are still pricey. I sure hope they come down. I think this is a great idea. I would opt for the ones that you can view.

 

[Crazy4mandms]

I had a very frustrating experience this past week at WDW regarding this issue! I was told EPCOT had a place to do them while u wait but they don't. I asked at the resort (POFQ) and again at each park and no one seemed to know how to do this. I eventually ended up at MK at expo hall where they have a machine that you can do it yourself..HOWEVER!!!! The machine DOES NOT ACCEPT XD cards anymore!! Luckily there was a CM standing by that told me I could 'envelope' the chip and have it back by 2 pm at my resort the next day. More frustration when the resort did not have my disks by 8 pm that night! UGH!! I only had a 16 mb backup that was full!!! I was very happy when they opened the resort store at 7 am for me before I headed to MK EMH to get the chip, which was there! Each disk holds up to 120 photos and costs $12.99 plus tax. You don't have to dump the whole chip, either....I had over 300 pics on mine and only dumped the first 240 (cuz it costs $12.99 whether you put 1 or 120 on the disk..good thing to know cuz if you have, say 125 pics to dump you will pay $12.99 for first disk of 120 pics and another $12.99 for 5 pics on the second disk!!)....they give you thumbnail printouts so you can see which pics were dumped onto disk so u don't accidentally delete the wrong ones from your disk.

 

[kgoldman_aj]

Well, it looks like my suspicions were confirmed. There is no great way to do this other than lugging a laptop down. I have a 256 memory card and a 4 pix Canon. Going for 8 days will definately fill up the card quickly since this is our first trip with our son.

Work was kind enough to lend me a almost new laptop with a CD burner, AND our IS department was even nicer to make it a DVD player as well. Needless to say, I have a nice backup if we're delayed at the airport or get a rainout next month. Will be bringing some movies - just in case!

Thanks for all of your replies!

 

[tinkandhook]

i too have a 256 mb XD picture card. i was going to go to walgreens and upload as needed to a cd( i am a photographer and take way tooo many pictures- just took 332 at the zoo) anyways, this is a new camera to me and have nnever uploaded (except to my computer) with the xd picture card. i know that they are extremely tiny. just curious if i need to buy an attatchemnt to upload them or am i just out of luck( i know i have heard of an adapter to be able to upload the pictures)
also am curious is there a limit of how many pictures you can have put on a disk at walgreens for the $3.99 price? i have heard it is however many fit on the disk so it depends on your resolution... i appreciate any help.
thanks in advance
tinkandhook

 

[Baloo76]

If you happen to have an iPod, there is an attachment that you can buy that will allow you to transfer your pics from your memory card to your iPod. Now apparently it's a bit bulky and the transfer rate is a little slow, but it does the trick.

 

[my3girlstoo]

We bought another memory card but need one anyway since we only had the one that originally came with the computer. I'm also taking along disposable cameras for the kids to use. I got them at Christmas time for .94cents.

 

[vikingfans]

I solved that problem by buying a Sony Mavica camera. It uses pocket CD's for the film. When my CD is full, I just put in a new one. And when I want to view my pictures, I just pop the CD into my CD drive. or I can view them from the camera.

It's been a marvelous investment and I can buy 50 CDs for about $20

It takes fabulous pictures!...it also takes movies!

 

[disneyfan551]

A few weeks ago, I made several trips to Walgreens to download my photos. I usually had 130 or so high resolution photos, on 1 cd. This is from a 256mb sd card.

Word of warning... I took TWO 256mb cards with me, practically brand spanking new, and one of them crashed right in the middle of MGM. So, please always be prepared and don't count on one card!

It was a pain in the popo going to Walgreens daily, but their photo quality was OUTSTANDING! Ten times better than the Super Walmart or Sams Club at home!!! And the cd cost of 3.99, can't be beat!

 

[verchad]

Originally posted by Crazy4mandms
I had a very frustrating experience this past week at WDW regarding this issue! I was told EPCOT had a place to do them while u wait but they don't. I asked at the resort (POFQ) and again at each park and no one seemed to know how to do this. I eventually ended up at MK at expo hall where they have a machine that you can do it yourself..HOWEVER!!!! The machine DOES NOT ACCEPT XD cards anymore!! Luckily there was a CM standing by that told me I could 'envelope' the chip and have it back by 2 pm at my resort the next day. More frustration when the resort did not have my disks by 8 pm that night! UGH!! I only had a 16 mb backup that was full!!! I was very happy when they opened the resort store at 7 am for me before I headed to MK EMH to get the chip, which was there! Each disk holds up to 120 photos and costs $12.99 plus tax. You don't have to dump the whole chip, either....I had over 300 pics on mine and only dumped the first 240 (cuz it costs $12.99 whether you put 1 or 120 on the disk..good thing to know cuz if you have, say 125 pics to dump you will pay $12.99 for first disk of 120 pics and another $12.99 for 5 pics on the second disk!!)....they give you thumbnail printouts so you can see which pics were dumped onto disk so u don't accidentally delete the wrong ones from your disk.

It's kind of funny to see some of the complaints/comments here and in another similar thread about the "high price" of $12.99. If you took these same pics on film, you would have the cost of film $2-$5 a roll depending on the quality level and number of exposures (24-36), $6 or more to develop one roll of film and you might not like some of the pictures. So $8 or more for 24-36 pictures. I know some have said that Walgreens will do it for $4, even better, but to me $12.99 to store 120 photos on cd-rom, then be able to print out the ones you want later, at whatever size you want, at $0.20 or more each isn't such a bad deal.