Recover your digital files on camera media

Just had a customer come in who lost all of her digital files on her SD card. Somehow they were formatted by accident. Don't panic! You can recover your data files by using the Free Data recovery software available on the internet. Just type in the search section of your browser the words Free Digital Photo Recovery software. There are a lot of free programs designed to find the data and restore the images back onto your computer. They are small digital programs so you can download a few and give them a try. It can't hurt and the time you spend recovering the photos is well worth it if they are important. The key thing to remember is if you lose your photos on the media card, do not write/take any more pictures until you recover the photos already on the card. The files are always still there, just the first letter of each name has been erased and that makes it impossible for the computer operating system to recognize the files. The software will scan the media and search for the data, restoring anything it finds. That includes old photos that are still partially there but have been overwritten by another photo. You can always tell the software to save everything to a folder on your hard drive and dump the corrupted photos at a later date. Don't let the software write the recovered files to your corrupted media because if the software doesn't do a good job, it will overwrite your media and won't be able to recover a second time. By writing the data to your hard drive you will be keeping the original data on the media. Then if one program doesn't work for you, you will have the ability to try again with another software recovery program.

Holidays & Digital Photos

This is the greatest time to purchase a digital camera and record all your holiday memories. Make sure you charge your batteries, clear your recording media for those new photos you want and the best idea is to check all your photos as you take them and delete the bad ones. It is so simple to edit your photos on the spot so later on you don't have a ton of pictures to look through and then have to delete the bad ones. Most people forget to dump the shots that aren't the best and later have to wade through a ton of images to find the good ones. Get into the habit of editing as you are taking the photos. It will make you a better photographer because you will immediately fix any problems you see in the first photo and will have dumped the bad ones right away. Saves space on your media, the computer, hastles at the place you print and later on the drudgery of trying to find the best shots in the group of images you have taken. Only takes a second or two to edit when you get the hang of it and the pictures are priceless when you get your best shots. Have fun over the holidays. Check out our Digital Camera Course offered by NWTC in January at the Crivitz Center.