importing back into camera

Slipperman

Senior Member
i noticed that when i import my pics from the SD card onto my PC, format the card then recopy the images back onto the card that they're not recognized by the camera anymore even though they are in the right directory. is there some kind of archival flag on the image file itself or similar that i can set to make the camera recognize the pics?
only doing this because i wanted to try out the in camera filtering and color balance functions on a specific pic that i imported and deleted from the SD card over a month ago.
 

nickt

Senior Member
I'm assuming you formated in camera. After you do that format, the final picture folder is not created until you take the first picture. So you need to take a picture after formating or exactly recreate that sub folder on your computer. Probably easiest to snap a picture, then just copy photos back into that folder. On my D7000, the card has two folders, DCIM and under that a 100D7000 folder. The 100D7000 folder does not appear until I take the first picture. Yours should behave similarly.
 

Slipperman

Senior Member
I'm assuming you formated in camera. After you do that format, the final picture folder is not created until you take the first picture. So you need to take a picture after formating or exactly recreate that sub folder on your computer. Probably easiest to snap a picture, then just copy photos back into that folder. On my D7000, the card has two folders, DCIM and under that a 100D7000 folder. The 100D7000 folder does not appear until I take the first picture. Yours should behave similarly.
i just tried formatting, shooting 2 garbage pics, copying the desired pics from the PC to the card in the right directory (mine is DCIM/100D5100), then replacing the card and going through display mode. still only the garbage pics were recognized. do you think the file names have to be the same? ie: all new pics on mine are all _DSC000x.NEF. the old ones i tried copying onto the card already had a different name than that from when i imported them originally.
 

Camera Fun

Senior Member
What program are you using on your PC? If it's not Nikon software that may be the issue. A couple of weeks ago I opened a picture using windows photo gallery. When I returned the card to the camera, that picture was not available for viewing. The other pictures on the card were still available.
 

nickt

Senior Member
Yeh, maybe the name is the problem or like CF said, the software used. I've tried this for the same reason as you back when I first got the camera. I know it works if they are unaltered.
I just re-read your post. It is a raw nef file so it should be unaltered except for the name (I think, maybe Nikon software changes things in the nef, I really don't know).
So maybe the name is the problem. Try renaming the file exactly as a fresh picture observing case too.
I was just loading some pictures and when I was done I dragged a nef that I took months ago onto the card and my camera was able to view it. So if you rename it in exactly the same convention and still can't see it, I'd say something in the file has changed.
Just wondering.... Did the files you copied back still have a NEF extension? If not, that might be the problem. If they have a different extension, they were definitely converted and all bets are off.
 

LensWork

Senior Member
Most cameras will not recognize images that have been edited on a PC and then re-saved to the card. Even if you place it in the correct folder, if the file name does not fit the same format as what the camera records, it most likely will not be recognized. Also the jpeg compression algorithms used by the PC may not be the same as what the camera uses and therefore it may not be recognizable.
 

Slipperman

Senior Member
What program are you using on your PC? If it's not Nikon software that may be the issue. A couple of weeks ago I opened a picture using windows photo gallery. When I returned the card to the camera, that picture was not available for viewing. The other pictures on the card were still available.
i use ViewNX but the importing is done via Windows. when you plug in the card, an Autoplay dialog comes up with a lot of different options to import your pics the first being 'Import pictures and videos using Windows'. this is the one i've been using. you type in a directory name and the program automatically creates a directory of that name appending the current date in front of it (ie: typing in Testpics_ creates a dir called 08-31-13 Testpics_). all the pics are then copied and renamed to Testpics_001, 002, etc. there is another option called 'Import file using Nikon Transfer 2' but regardless of which one i use, the pics that were just imported are still viewable within the camera as long as they weren't deleted during import. it's copying an already imported file from your HD onto the card using Windows file explorer that causes problems.
 
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Slipperman

Senior Member
Yeh, maybe the name is the problem or like CF said, the software used. I've tried this for the same reason as you back when I first got the camera. I know it works if they are unaltered.
I just re-read your post. It is a raw nef file so it should be unaltered except for the name (I think, maybe Nikon software changes things in the nef, I really don't know).
So maybe the name is the problem. Try renaming the file exactly as a fresh picture observing case too.
I was just loading some pictures and when I was done I dragged a nef that I took months ago onto the card and my camera was able to view it. So if you rename it in exactly the same convention and still can't see it, I'd say something in the file has changed.
Just wondering.... Did the files you copied back still have a NEF extension? If not, that might be the problem. If they have a different extension, they were definitely converted and all bets are off.
yes they were still NEF files just with a different file name. i'll try using the right naming convention and see if it helps.
 
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