[Osprey]

Originally Posted by a.saliga

Very useful advice Nicole. Thank you.

I'm good at foreplanning and troubleshooting, so I'm not too worried about that.

I have a 4GB CF card which allows me around 400 shots when shooting RAW. How many shots should I be prepared to take?

I am soon to purchase a flash unit as well. I have a Canon 400D. Any recomendations for the flash?

Also I realize this flash will shorten my battery life, so an extra battery needs to be added to my list. Anyone have any experience with 3rd party batteries?

I've just done a wedding shoot with a photographer friend (I was invited for the experience) and took over 600 photos for the wedding and reception. The principal photog took over 800. There was very limited use of the flash from either of us and we both had a 580EX. Instead we used zoom lenses with a constant aperture of f/2.8 and upped the ISO where necessary.

Nothing wrong with 3rd party batteries (I have a few that are more reliable than the original Canon one), but with the flash using its own batteries, you shouldn't find a loss of power on your camera.