Photos disappeared from my camera

steve_

I took a few photos yesterday and now today they have vanished from my camera. The card hasn't left the camera since then. All previous photos are still on the card just not the ones from yesterday. Is there any particular reason this might be happening. Im using a canon 60d and a 16gb sandisk extreme card 30mb class 10. Thanks for any help

Edit: I just realized more pics are missing then i thought. Pictures from my holidays are gone too. The most recent picture on my card is from the 2-1-2012. Everything after that is gone. It wouldn't be anything to do with the date format would it? just seems a coincidence that the last most recent pic on the card is 2-1-2012 and today is 1-2-2012. You know how some apps put the month first or the day first in the date

Just a side question. when i bought my cards a dont think i done a format on them, i just popped them in and started using them. Can this be a problem?

MrPudding

steve_ wrote: »

I took a few photos yesterday and now today they have vanished from my camera. The card hasn't left the camera since then. All previous photos are still on the card just not the ones from yesterday. Is there any particular reason this might be happening. Im using a canon 60d and a 16gb sandisk extreme card 30mb class 10. Thanks for any help

Edit: I just realized more pics are missing then i thought. Pictures from my holidays are gone too. The most recent picture on my card is from the 2-1-2012. Everything after that is gone. It wouldn't be anything to do with the date format would it? just seems a coincidence that the last most recent pic on the card is 2-1-2012 and today is 1-2-2012. You know how some apps put the month first or the day first in the date

Just a side question. when i bought my cards a dont think i done a format on them, i just popped them in and started using them. Can this be a problem?

Solid state media gets corrupted and suffers form failed blocks. As you write and delete repeatedly blocks of data get stored all over the place.

I think the general consensus would be:

• Take your pictures off your card frequently. These cards are not meant to be permanent storage media.
• Format the card frequently. Every time I take pictures I transfer them to my computer. Every time I do that I format the card.
• Use multiple smaller cards rather than a single large card. This is good advice if you are on a monster photo session or a trip. You will be less likely to lose everything if you spread your pics between cards. They are very reliable, generally, but they are not infallible.

As for your problem, it sounds very odd. Corruption normally isn't particularly precise...

MrP

pixbyjohn

Don't take any more photos until you use some form of data recovery on your cards. There are lots of free recovery programs on line. Just google for them

bigjohn66

You say you the card never left the camera. That makes me think you are trying to view them on the camera. Take the card out and use a card reader or the slot on your computer and see if you can view them here.

It has happened to me twice over the years that when I try to view me pictures on the camera I see noting but they are still there.

If the pictures are not on the card use something like Zero Assumption Recovery to recover them.

After you get it sorted and you have all your pictures and before you use the card again format it.

Sabre Man

Are you absolutely sure nobody else could have deleted the pictures?

steve_

ok so i tried just viewing the pics off a card reader but they still are not there. Im 100% sure no one deleted them. Ill try a recovery tool and report back

hbr

steve_ wrote: »

ok so i tried just viewing the pics off a card reader but they still are not there. Im 100% sure no one deleted them. Ill try a recovery tool and report back

Make sure you don't do anything that will write to the card.
Lock the write-protect switch and use recovery software to
search the card for missing photos. I find PhotoRec is one of
the most effective programs available.

Good Luck!

steve_

Great so recovered the pictures that were missed so im delighted!! What will i do now? should i format the cards in camera?

Also should i do just a normal format or a low level format? whats the difference between the two. Like as people say you should format regularly, is a normal format sufficient or will i use low level? Cheers

Cameraman

Just to highlight one thing which caught me out once (may not be what happened here).

On Canon cameras, when the image number reaches 9999, it creates a new folder and starts putting the photos in there from 0001 on. When this happened to me, I thought they had gone missing - and only found them after checking a few times, and trying different download methods. Now I routinely check all the folders on my cards.

ankaka

Maybe, if you are copying the pictures from your camera using Windows you are inadvertently selecting Move rather than Copy. Make sure you don't press the Shift key when dragging and dropping (or whatever).