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How can a memory card help improve your photography?

512mb Memory Card

How can a memory card help improve your photography?  The answer is in the details. The size of the memory card is what will help improve your photography, simply by forcing you to slow down.

So you've purchased a new DSLR, you threw in that 32gb memory card, and just started to photograph everything you see, landscapes around town, family events, your pets. . . everything. I know this because this is what I did, I began my journey to understanding how creating a photograph works by getting my hands on my dslr, taking dozens of photos, changing my camera settings, and taking a dozen more.  Learning by doing is a great way for us to learn because we can see the changes, and study them.  Fast forward a while, and you then are starting to realize that your photos are properly exposed, they're sharp, and clear, but still lack something.

This is where this memory card comes in.  We work so hard on getting to know our camera, we forget to spend anytime working on "seeing" the scene.  Our photographic eye is just as important, if not more, as our camera settings, but it gets left behind, and thats because when we go out to take photographs, the thousands of photographs that those big memory cards allow us to take causes us to constantly press that shutter simple because there is so much room on that memory card, there isn't anything forcing us to slow down, and ask ourselves "Do I really want that shot?", or "Are my setting right, and the composition what I want it to be?".

Nikon DSLR set to raw with 500mb memory card.

Nikon DSLR set to jpeg with 500mb memory card.

The 512mb memory card in my D600 allows for only 9 frames when it's set to shoot raw files, and only 32 frames when it's set to shoot jpeg files.  Imagine how much more thought you would put into a photo, your settings, and the composition if you only had 9 photos to shoot.  Even if once a month, you put a small memory card in your camera, and set out to only take the 9 or 32 photos, your will start to see an improvement in your results within the first month.  Now this doesn't come without any willpower on your part.  Even though you only have a small number of photos that can fit on the memory card, you could hit the delete button if you don't like a shot, but that would be cheating, and the improvement your looking for will be what suffers if you cheat like that.


I challenge you to purchase a small memory card. set it to raw, go out once a week for a month and shoot, don't hit delete at all, just use your eyes, look at the scene, think about your settings, and shoot.  In a month, look at a photo you recently took, and the last photo of the month.  Post the before/after photos in the comment section here so we can all see your progress, and to help inspire others to improve their photography.

To make it easier for you, here is a link to a good quality 512mb sd card on Amazon.  For less then $20, you can be improving your photography within days from now.

Why not a little low key lighting.

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