Nikon D3100 - Star Trails - Buffer problem?

[james_tigerwoods]

I've been trying to do some star trails photography with, so far, limited success. I am shooting with these settings: ISO 800 - F4.5 - 30s.

What I am struggling with seems to be write speed - a 30 second exposure takes 30-35 seconds to write to my memory card (8Gb Class 10) - JPG or RAW. As a result, I get gaps as you can see:



A 15 second photo at lower JPG quality takes only slightly less time to write.

I've assumed it's a limitation of my D3100 - or could it be another problem?

Thanks

JTW

[YorkshirePudding]

Have you turned off long exposure noise reduction?

[james_tigerwoods]

YorkshirePudding said:

Have you turned off long exposure noise reduction?

Hmm. No. Not tried that one....

[markmullen]

YorkshirePudding said:

Have you turned off long exposure noise reduction?

Aye, that'll be the one, it'll be taking a dark frame to subtract noise, that means that a 30 second exposure is followed by a 30 second dark frame, hence the gaps.

[james_tigerwoods]

markmullen said:

YorkshirePudding said:

Have you turned off long exposure noise reduction?

Aye, that'll be the one, it'll be taking a dark frame to subtract noise, that means that a 30 second exposure is followed by a 30 second dark frame, hence the gaps.

I'll check that out - I've googled this same thing and the response is exactly that.

I'll check the camera tonight as I, for a change, don't have it with me...

[james_tigerwoods]

That's solved it - just in time for a cloudy evening. Arse.

Thanks all - PH has been a proper saviour to my sanity of late :-)

[Simpo Two]

You had the answer all the time - in the instruction manual... custom functions...

[james_tigerwoods]

Simpo Two said:

You had the answer all the time - in the instruction manual... custom functions...

I am actually now going to read the manual...