If you use a digital camera, READ THIS!

Just a heads-up for anyone who uses any sort of digital camera: It's a fact of life you will, at some time or other, find yourself needing to recover images from a corrupt or reformatted memory card.

DO NOT wait until you need to recover lost images before you look for a solution.

It's frustrating as all get-out to lose digital files. But to jump through all the hoops, trying this software and that software, some free, some costing good money, spending the time, pulling out your hair, learning each software from scratch, wondering if you'll ever see those files again..........

BE PRO-ACTIVE and find a solution NOW.... before the need arises!

When I got my first DSLR (Nikon D60), I made d***ed sure I had software that could recover not only JPEGs, but NEFs and video files as well (not all software is up-to-date, and not all .NEFs are the same, you know!). I also figured out how to use it. When I upgraded to the D7000, one of my first tasks what to verify that the same software could recover the D7000 images. Fortunately, it could.

However, when I upped to the D600, the old software just wasn't up to the task of recovering .NEFs. And with no updates for it on the horizon, I ended up searching for a solution. Having found one after a couple weeks, I can now go forth into the field with solid confidence that any lost files can be recovered. Having the software in place, and knowing how to use it, is cheap insurance.

I always download my pictures as soon as I get done using my camera and then back up my photos to my external hard drive as well as storing on my lap top. Once I get a few gigs of new pictures I copy them to a DVD for yet more protection. These go to my locker at work were I also keep pictures and info of the valuables we own. Ya, you can say I have a wee bit of OCD! But I lost some pictures in the past when the hard drive failed on our computer and vowed it wouldn't happen again.

Good advice Sparky (nice nick also btw). I always, always, dowload the images into an external hard-drive as son as I get back home. Not even into the computer. Next step, in camera, format the memory card and ready to go...

This isn't about backing up.

It's about recovering images, for whatever reason, BEFORE they can be ingested into a proper back-up.

And your solution is? Also how did you create a card issue?

WJYPhoto said:

And your solution is?.....

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Find software to recover images in the file formats your camera creates. Keep in mind, not all .NEFS are the same. The .NEF a D7100 is different from a D800 .NEF, and they are different from a D5100 .NEF........

WJYPhoto said:

......... Also how did you create a card issue?

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Reformat the card. That's the largest reason we see the "How Do I Recover My Images From My Card?" posts. To corrupt a card, remove it while the camera is still writing images to it.

I am aware of the different file formats, just curious about what you chose.

I, too, misunderstood what you were driving at. Good point.

WJYPhoto said:

I am aware of the different file formats, just curious about what you chose.

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R-Studio 32.

Thanks, I have done recovery a few times, I usually do it under Linux due to possible windows issues. Looks to be a good product too bad they don't offer a trial version to give it a test spin.

All R-Studio and R-Studio Emergency features and capabilities can be evaluated and tested in the Demo mode. The only limitation the Demo mode has pertains to the maximum size of a file that can be recovered. The software running in the Demo mode can be registered on the fly at any time. No reinstallation is required.

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I tried the Demo first. It did find the .NEF files, but refused to recover them because of their size. That was all I needed to know, so I ponied up for the full version.