Learn from my mistake (Page 4): As stated by others, images are not totally lost until overwritten. I suspect the older images that were recovered were from sessions with a larger...

steve_stoneblossom Loc: Rhode Island, USA

James R wrote:

I had something like this occur. However it was w... (show quote)

As stated by others, images are not totally lost until overwritten. I suspect the older images that were recovered were from sessions with a larger total number of images which, consequently, were never overwritten on subsequent sessions.

steve_stoneblossom Loc: Rhode Island, USA

Skitch wrote:

I learned - by trial and error, fortunately not this grievous - to NOT delete the image from my card until I have completed editing. Yes, this means I have to go back to the camera and delete the images individually, but a smal price to pay!😃😝😂😱

You could- after editing is complete, and you have saved a minimum of 2 copies- reformat the entire card and not delete individually. Deleting does not clean the card as well as formatting does, BTW.

marki3rd Loc: Columbus, Indiana

steve_stoneblossom wrote:

You could- after editing is complete, and you have saved a minimum of 2 copies- reformat the entire card and not delete individually. Deleting does not clean the card as well as formatting does, BTW.

What are you talking about? Explain to me how formatting cleans better than deletion.

steve_stoneblossom Loc: Rhode Island, USA

marki3rd wrote:

What are you talking about? Explain to me how formatting cleans better than deletion.

I must admit I cannot scientifically validate my statement, and I will gladly retract if I am indeed in error.
I have seen it said here and elsewhere that simply deleting images from cards leaves traces behind, and that reformatting is a more thorough method to clean a memory card.

Do you have evidence or an argument to the contrary?

LFingar Loc: Claverack, NY

James R wrote:

I had something like this occur. However it was w... (show quote)

If you could recover old, pre-formatting photos from an SD card it's because you have only done quick formats in camera. Only the directory gets formatted. All the rest of the data stays intact, unless it gets written over by newer photos. In order to fully format an SD card in a Canon you have to check the box for "Low Level Format". Other manufacturers probably call it something else. Periodic full formatting of SD cards is recommended in order to restore full write speed.

LFingar Loc: Claverack, NY

steve_stoneblossom wrote:

I must admit I cannot scientifically validate my statement, and I will gladly retract if I am indeed in error.
I have seen it said here and elsewhere that simply deleting images from cards leaves traces behind, and that reformatting is a more thorough method to clean a memory card.

Do you have evidence or an argument to the contrary?

With SD cards:
Deleting only removes directory data. The file itself is untouched and can be recovered.
Quick format only formats the directory. Everything else stays untouched and can be recovered.
A full format (Low Level in a Canon) formats everything. No data remains.

steve_stoneblossom Loc: Rhode Island, USA

LFingar wrote:

With SD cards:
Deleting only removes directory data. The file itself is untouched and can be recovered.
Quick format only formats the directory. Everything else stays untouched and can be recovered.
A full format (Low Level in a Canon) formats everything. No data remains.

Thanks for the clarification. Now I need to research Nikon equivalency.

blackest Loc: Ireland

marki3rd wrote:

What are you talking about? Explain to me how formatting cleans better than deletion.

I looked into this, ken rockwell made a good point that you can have file system corruption and formatting the card renews the file system and fixes corruption. Cards are made with a certain number of spare blocks and these get mapped in when other blocks fail. There are limited write cycles to SD Cards and blocks tend to get written too in groups which can mean rewriting existing data as well as new, plus there is fragmentation of files that can occur e.g deleting a file might free 10 blocks but when writing a new file it might be 8 or 12 blocks say.

I found this, and I think the best reason is number three.

"I format my card every time I stick it in my camera and start a shoot.

I do this for a couple of reasons.

First, it means every time I start a shoot, I don't accidentally leave the previous shoot on it (and it also means I don't delete it until I start the next shoot, by which time those images are safely on various backup disks; gives me an emergency backup on the card until I'm sure I've got multiple copies elsewhere).

Second, I use multiple camera bodies, and I know people who've had corruption issues with cards formatted by the computer (which I never do) or by one body and used in another because the bodies interact with the card slightly differently. By formatting every time, I know the formatting is what the camera wants and is expecting.

Third, formatting at the start of the shoot will (or should!) catch a card that is starting to fail. At the least, it'll catch some early failure modes in the card -- and in two cases for me so far, it has. So if the card hits an error during format, I know to immediately retire it. I'd rather find out I have a card error at the START of the shoot that midway into it, or worse, when I'm trying to read the images out later.

Note: any time I get a card error, I retire that card. Cards are cheap. Dead cards that eat my only copy of an image is expensive. And formatting a card every time means that every time I shoot gives me a blank slate in a known state that hasn't reported an error. Which means many fewer potential problems later. And FWIW, I basically never run into corrupted cards, lost images or problems during a shoot or during a post-shoot import.

Even if it means the card will wear out sooner, I don't care. I want reliable cards, not ancient ones. I'll happily replace them rather than try to recover images from them.... "

steve_stoneblossom Loc: Rhode Island, USA

blackest wrote:

I looked into this, ken rockwell made a good point that you can have file system corruption and formatting the card renews the file system and fixes corruption. Cards are made with a certain number of spare blocks and these get mapped in when other blocks fail. There are limited write cycles to SD Cards and blocks tend to get written too in groups which can mean rewriting existing data as well as new, plus there is fragmentation of files that can occur e.g deleting a file might free 10 blocks but when writing a new file it might be 8 or 12 blocks say.

I found this, and I think the best reason is number three.

"I format my card every time I stick it in my camera and start a shoot.

I do this for a couple of reasons.

First, it means every time I start a shoot, I don't accidentally leave the previous shoot on it (and it also means I don't delete it until I start the next shoot, by which time those images are safely on various backup disks; gives me an emergency backup on the card until I'm sure I've got multiple copies elsewhere).

Second, I use multiple camera bodies, and I know people who've had corruption issues with cards formatted by the computer (which I never do) or by one body and used in another because the bodies interact with the card slightly differently. By formatting every time, I know the formatting is what the camera wants and is expecting.

Third, formatting at the start of the shoot will (or should!) catch a card that is starting to fail. At the least, it'll catch some early failure modes in the card -- and in two cases for me so far, it has. So if the card hits an error during format, I know to immediately retire it. I'd rather find out I have a card error at the START of the shoot that midway into it, or worse, when I'm trying to read the images out later.

Note: any time I get a card error, I retire that card. Cards are cheap. Dead cards that eat my only copy of an image is expensive. And formatting a card every time means that every time I shoot gives me a blank slate in a known state that hasn't reported an error. Which means many fewer potential problems later. And FWIW, I basically never run into corrupted cards, lost images or problems during a shoot or during a post-shoot import.

Even if it means the card will wear out sooner, I don't care. I want reliable cards, not ancient ones. I'll happily replace them rather than try to recover images from them.... "

I looked into this, ken rockwell made a good point... (show quote)

Basically the practice I follow, although I format immediately after saving on 3 separate hard drives and returning cards to the cameras.

zdncer Loc: Vancouver, WA

OK so I know we are talking about cards here mainly. I had this happen on a trip to Italy and Spain. I did check my files and put them on a thumb drive and check them there as well before I pulled them from the computer. Unfortunately I did delete the card and reuse it but I thought I had two more copy's one on the computer and one on the thumb drive. When I got home 7 days were missing. Now prior to that my computer had an issue that I think was from it trying to do an update internationally then I shut it down in the middle of it which had caused it to lose my entire desktop in Italy. Everything gone. When I got to Spain and new I had secured internet I turned it back on and logged in. Went to dinner and came back several hours later and some of my desktop was back so I just let it keep on going. It took a couple of days but everything came back that I had previously lost but now several of the days that were on the thumb drives were no longer there and neither were the files on the computer. Was this because I was not actually on the internet or it was shut down because the update had failed because I shut it off in the middle of it. I tried to recover everything when I got home. Had others try too including professionals at Best Buy? to no avail. I have not really used that laptop since. Do you think they are still in there somewhere?

I really do appreciate all of the above info. So even though the fella that started this has notbeen back others do actually read it and take notes. You never know when you will have a faux pax again.

Thanks everyone, yes I am computer illiterate, no doubt about it

BudsOwl Loc: Upstate NY and New England

boberic wrote:

I have never made a single misteak in my entire life.

I like my stakes medium rare!!!

amfoto1 Loc: San Jose, Calif. USA

xptom wrote:

Can you use Lexar's program on other manufacturer's cards?

Yes, it works fine with any brand of memory card.

OP, if you haven't already retrieved your images and want to use the Lexar program, get in touch via a PM. I've have bought a bunch of Lexar cards, so have lots of extra licenses for the software. I'm happy to share, since I'll never use them all myself! Download their recovery software from the Lexar website, then shoot me a PM and I'll get back to you with a license key to activate it.

Works great and so long as you haven't saved anything new to the memory card since you formatted it, you probably can recover all the images. Even if you've used it a little, saved a few shots to it, you should still try.... probably can recover a lot of the images.

All formatting does is mark the existing image files as "okay to overwrite"... it doesn't actually erase them.

Gifted One Loc: S. E. Idaho

Gee Am what a nice guy!

J. R.

LFingar Loc: Claverack, NY

amfoto1 wrote:

All formatting does is mark the existing image files as "okay to overwrite"... it doesn't actually erase them.

That is only true of quick formats, which is how the majority of people seem to do their in-camera formats. Hopefully, the OP is one of them.

Jim Bob

Bluetick wrote:

Here's one that I made recently that I'll bet no-one in the group has ever made. I attended a friend's 75th birthday party a couple of weeks ago and took quite a number of images. Was intending to make him a photo album. When I got home I went thru the normal saving of the images to my computer and supplementary external hard drives. I checked the computer to see that the images had been saved and having confirmed that, proceeded to reformat the card. The next day I decided to work on the file to do the customary deletion of near duplicates, some enhancements, etc. Then, about 1/2 way thru the exercise I realized that a significant portion of the images were missing! Horrors! Double horrors! What had happened to them? I had seen them in the camera. Where are they now? Going back thru every card I have produced nothing. So, I surmised that I had made the grievous error of highlighting only a portion of the images when I went to copy them from the card onto the computer. That portion was transferred successfully but I obviously left the others behind only to bite the dust when I reformatted the card. At the moment I am frantically trying to determine if the images can be retrieved using a special scanning software designed to restore lost photos, documents, e-mails, etc.. Nevertheless, what was the root cause of the error you ask? Remember I said I checked the computer to see if the images had been saved? Well, I apparently didn't scroll thru the entire file to assure that the entire group of images had been saved. I had the computer set on large icons and having seen that some images were there, proceeded to assume all were there, which they were not. The rest is history. So, I learned an important lesson the hard way. Always assure that ALL images are saved to multiple hard drives before reformatting your memory card. Sound perfectly simple and basic doesn't it? I've been into digital photography for over ten years and have never done something so #@$%& stupid. Well, yes - I did back in 1972 with film but that's another story.

Here's one that I made recently that I'll bet no-o... (show quote)

Hey man, it happens. Don't beat yourself up too bad. The key is it will never happen to you again I bet.