JPEG Still photos simply vanished

[concisa]

I did not find a thread on JPEG repair so I am posting this problem here in the hopes someone out there has a solution for me. Here is the problem:

(1) I downloaded photos and reduced them using Microsoft Office Picture Manager as I have been doing forever.

(2) Picture Manager reducded and displayed the pictures as expected.

(3) At the end of the task, PM saved them to my directory on the hard disk.

(4) After saving, the softweare closed, thumbnails of the pictures flashed on the screen and then all of them, except three thumbnails went blank.

(5) A Windows Explorer DETAILS LIST display of the directory shows all JPG files, their respective dimensions, size, etc. But although it shows that all of the pictures dimensions are correct and as expected, the ones with problems have their sizes just 5KB in contrast with the others which show sizes at around 50K.

I've tried two different JPEG Repair tools: Picture Doctor and PixelRecovery to no avail. The first says BAD next to each picture and does nothing. The second says "no data to recover" and also does nothing.

Somewhere on the NET I read that it is easy to repair manually the JPEG Header. Well, I have no clue on how to do that.

I'd appreciate any help anyone out there can give me. A repair tool, a tool that would enable me to repair them manually, something to save those pictures. One of the pictures is attached.

Thank you very much.

[jagabo]

If Explorer shows the files as 5 KB patching the JPEG headers isn't going to help. And looking at the picture (and a hex dump) it looks like there's nothing wrong with the header. Office Picture Manager just saved an all white picture. Like in your post above.

[concisa]

Putzzzzzz! Unbelievable!!!! That would be so unusual and begs the questions:

(1) Why is that the dimensions are correct?
(2) How come all pictures flashed correctly in from of me for a small while before going blank?
(3) Finally, how come not all pictures suffered that kind of damage?

May be my questions are just rethorical, but they reflect my desperation and frustration. How am I going to recoup those pictures?

Thanks a lot for your feedback and for taking the time to look into the issue.

Armando

[jagabo]

(1) Why is that the dimensions are correct?

Because the images are still the same size. But the real picture has been replaced by a flat white picture.

(2) How come all pictures flashed correctly in from of me for a small while before going blank?

Because Windows keeps old thumbnails around in a file called Thumbs.db. When it sees the pictures have changed it rebuilds the thumbnails. When you first opened the folder it showed the contents of Thumbs.db, then it rebuilt the thumbnails and displayed them.

(3) Finally, how come not all pictures suffered that kind of damage?

There's no way of knowing.

May be my questions are just rethorical, but they reflect my desperation and frustration. How am I going to recoup those pictures?

It might be possible to restore the original images with a file undelete program. The less you use the drive the more likely you are to find the originals. If the pictures were on your computer since before the last backup you should be able to restore from the backup or system restore point. Right click on one of the images and select Restore Previous Version.

[concisa]

Again thanks a lot Jagabo.

I have refrained from using that disk. Question:

(1) Before reducing those pictures with PM, I cut them from one directory and paste them to another. Does the CUT operation deletes the file from the disk and actually writes it to another disk or just resets pointers? You see my hope here? IOf it does delete, then I may have the original picture somewhere in the disk.

(2) Perhaps my only hope is trying to undelete them from the camera flash card memory. In order to do that, I'd need a card reader and an undelete software. Am I right? Do you have any tool to do that?

Thanks again,

Armando

[Bjs]

Cut operation only tells windows the area the file originated is now free ... so while nothing major has been done to the original directory or drive, file recovery should be successful.

Card reader is handy ... and you'll find some pretty good freeware recovery apps that should be able to recover the data.

[concisa]

Thanks a lot, BJs...

[jagabo]

(1) Before reducing those pictures with PM, I cut them from one directory and paste them to another. Does the CUT operation deletes the file from the disk and actually writes it to another disk or just resets pointers? You see my hope here? IOf it does delete, then I may have the original picture somewhere in the disk.

If you cut/paste from/to a different folder on the same partition only the directory entries are moved. The data in the files remains in the same place in the partition.

If you cut/paste from/to a different partition (or drive) the files are copied form the source partition to the destination partition, then deleted on the source partition. So an undelete utility may be able to find the files on the source partition.

[concisa]

Hi Jagabo...Unfortunately: same partition. No luck there, then. Only hope now is the camera's flash card. Thanks a lot.

[concisa]

First of all I want to thank all of your that posted here; most of all, JAGABO. Also, I wanted to share what I've learned in the JPG recouping process. Here is what I've done to recoup the vanished JPGs:

(1) Got a USB SD card reader to read the camera SD card. Mu hope was to use a data recovery tool to undelete all pics on that card.

(2) Downloaded RECUVA's freeware version and ran it on the card.

(3) It did a great job undeleting all pics on the SD card.

(4) Copied all of the ones I wanted recouped to the hard disk.

(5) That did the job. RECUVA saved all of the vanished JPG pictures.

Moreover to RECUVA's credit, of the 40 pictures, only one is defective.

In short, RECUVA did a great job rescuing me and the photos. And, it is extremely easy to use.

Now the search is for a JPEG repair tool to fix what seems to be a simple JPG Header issue on that one pic. That quest has proven to be a much harder task.