After four days of shooting in the San Juans I was in awe of the beauty I had experienced. John Klotz and I spent time mainly in the Clear Lake, Stoney Pass and American Basin areas. All had great wildflower displays. For us first timers it was better than we could have imagined. All four days had great lighting with cloud and sun combos throughout. What more could a nature photographer ask for?
Upon returning home I couldn't wait to upload my images for a quick preview. Then disaster struck. My main 4GB CF card became corrupted somehow. You can read the gory details in the digital forum. Suffice to say I was in shock and disbelief. All my images from each day except part of the last were on 'that' card.
I have since sent the card into the manufacturer (Ridata) who stated they would try to recover some of the data. Either way it was a beautiful trip. Nothing will erase my memory of the beauty I encountered, except possibly a good blow to the head.
Thanks to everyone here for your great trip reports and tips. Here are a few I managed to bring back from the last day. Unfortunately morning light was on the other card.
Bummer to hear the bad news about the corrupt card... Hope you can get the data back. Glad you had a good trip! I bet we crossed paths, since I was at both Ice Lakes Basin (on the road to Clear Lake) and Stony Pass.
Sorry bout the bad news. After shooting a commerical wedding with a 4GB Extreme III that got corrupted (I was able to get back about 85% of the images) I made 2 moves. 1) I shoot on 2GB cards at maximum and 2) I purchased an Epson P-4000 80GB viewer and another data only 80GB card reader to backup data to. Redundancy is key to protection in this non-film world IMHO.
Afterwards the only thing I could imagine worse in terms of loss of data was a wedding shoot. You can't re-take that one. It is all or nothing. That is great that you were able to recover a large part of what was originally corrupted. Did you go thru a data recovery service?
I agree with you 100% about redundancy and smaller cards (relative I know). I guess for the next xxMP camera a 4GB card will be considered small. But the key for me is in using *several* cards to minimize the impact of *one* card going bad with all my images on it. So for a four day trip I would prefer to use four cards as a minimum. For a wedding on the other hand, the more the better IMO.
I used the recovery software that came with the extreme 3 card. I'll look for the name of it. But it seemed to go through the card bit-by-bit and found the images. As soon as I find the name I'll post it. It really worked great and chewed on the data for a good 2-3 hours.
If you would like to borrow one of the 80GB drives i have to see if it works for you let me know.
My philosophy is that with how small the cards physically are 2GB is my standard and i just keep a couple xtras in my pocket just in case of.
Shoot me an email if you want to stop up and try the data recovery software.
BTW, your trip report on the Ice Lake Basin area from a couple of years back really inspired us. And although we stayed primarily around Clear Lake, the area did not disappoint. What an awesome place!!!
Hopefully we will see some of the recent shots by John K., Scott B. and Kalin W. of the same area. Sometimes it is the hard lessons that teach you the most in life.
Richie - Thanks much for the offer. I had actually tried about a dozen popular data recovery programs before sending my card in to the manufacturer. If that doesn't work I may try one of the data recovery groups out there. But that can get really pricey. I'll just have to wait and see at this point.
- Derek
Posted by Kalin Wilson on July 30, 2007 at 4:58 PM
Derek,
Sorry to hear about your card. I hope you get those shots back! I'd be pissed too!
I used two new 4GB Extreme III cards on my trip. No problems luckily. I backed up to a 40Gb drive on my laptop but that wasn't until Thursday (when we got out of the back country) after three days of shooting.
You and Rich's reports of bad cards are good food for thought. I really like the Epson P-4000 solution. Just another toy to buy
I've been sick and taking an image break. Hopefully I'll have some stuff to share soon. Thanks for the interest.
2 - 4GB cards of image data sounds like my trip to Yellowstone and GTNP. That is a lot of work and will take some time to process I am sure. I definitely wouldn't have posted anything yet if I had all my images to work on.
Thanks again for the field updates. Get well and take a little break if possible.
I was really exhausted after the trip, especially since the last day I *almost* went to the top of Handies. I got distracted shooting the scenery and ran out of time. But I have never hiked a 14er before and once I got up to around 13K I started feeling really light headed and a bit dingy. Above Sloan Lake you can really begin to see the rest of the San Juans. So next time I want to go to the top for sure.
Looks like you saw my reply over in Digital. Really sorry to hear this. I remember a couple of years back when Darren came back from Canada and had big trouble recovering his images from much of the trip. That was from a portable drive rather than the cards, but it definitely got me thinking that saving images on multiple devices was they way to go. Keeping my fingers crossed that Ridata can save them for you. Keep us posted!
Derek, I like what you got.. nice stuff! I hope Ridata can recover what was on your CF. My American Basin shots are nothing to write home about (must have been the asthma). Stoney and Clear Lake are better. I got a very nice shot of Treasure Falls from Wolf Creek. Still workin through the images though. My 4GB Extreme III worked flawlessly but now I think I will use my smaller cards to minimize risk.
John
Discussion
10 repliesUpon returning home I couldn't wait to upload my images for a quick preview. Then disaster struck. My main 4GB CF card became corrupted somehow. You can read the gory details in the digital forum. Suffice to say I was in shock and disbelief.
I have since sent the card into the manufacturer (Ridata) who stated they would try to recover some of the data. Either way it was a beautiful trip. Nothing will erase my memory of the beauty I encountered, except possibly a good blow to the head.
Thanks to everyone here for your great trip reports and tips.
http://derek.zenfolio.com/img/v1/p461928037-5.jpg
http://derek.zenfolio.com/img/v1/p116574985-5.jpg
http://derek.zenfolio.com/img/v1/p301116768-5.jpg
http://derek.zenfolio.com/img/v1/p253237841-5.jpg
http://derek.zenfolio.com/img/v1/p62272839-5.jpg
Next time I'll take Rick's advice and perform some kind of daily backup. Live and learn.
- Derek
Glad you had a great trip.
RichieV
Afterwards the only thing I could imagine worse in terms of loss of data was a wedding shoot. You can't re-take that one. It is all or nothing. That is great that you were able to recover a large part of what was originally corrupted. Did you go thru a data recovery service?
I agree with you 100% about redundancy and smaller cards (relative I know). I guess for the next xxMP camera a 4GB card will be considered small. But the key for me is in using *several* cards to minimize the impact of *one* card going bad with all my images on it. So for a four day trip I would prefer to use four cards as a minimum. For a wedding on the other hand, the more the better IMO.
- Derek
If you would like to borrow one of the 80GB drives i have to see if it works for you let me know.
My philosophy is that with how small the cards physically are 2GB is my standard and i just keep a couple xtras in my pocket just in case of.
Shoot me an email if you want to stop up and try the data recovery software.
RichieV
BTW, your trip report on the Ice Lake Basin area from a couple of years back really inspired us. And although we stayed primarily around Clear Lake, the area did not disappoint. What an awesome place!!!
Hopefully we will see some of the recent shots by John K., Scott B. and Kalin W. of the same area. Sometimes it is the hard lessons that teach you the most in life.
Richie - Thanks much for the offer. I had actually tried about a dozen popular data recovery programs before sending my card in to the manufacturer. If that doesn't work I may try one of the data recovery groups out there. But that can get really pricey. I'll just have to wait and see at this point.
- Derek
Sorry to hear about your card. I hope you get those shots back! I'd be pissed too!
I used two new 4GB Extreme III cards on my trip. No problems luckily. I backed up to a 40Gb drive on my laptop but that wasn't until Thursday (when we got out of the back country) after three days of shooting.
You and Rich's reports of bad cards are good food for thought. I really like the Epson P-4000 solution. Just another toy to buy
I've been sick and taking an image break. Hopefully I'll have some stuff to share soon. Thanks for the interest.
Kalin
2 - 4GB cards of image data sounds like my trip to Yellowstone and GTNP. That is a lot of work and will take some time to process I am sure. I definitely wouldn't have posted anything yet if I had all my images to work on.
Thanks again for the field updates.
I was really exhausted after the trip, especially since the last day I *almost* went to the top of Handies. I got distracted shooting the scenery and ran out of time. But I have never hiked a 14er before and once I got up to around 13K I started feeling really light headed and a bit dingy. Above Sloan Lake you can really begin to see the rest of the San Juans. So next time I want to go to the top for sure.
John