Home / Tutorials / Digital image recovery

Digital image recovery

	Summary
	To recover digital images from storage (typically a memory card) you need to connect the storage to the PC, download, install, and start ZAR, then follow step-by-step instructions below. We recommend to use a card reader device, rather than to connect a digital camera to the computer.

	Step  1 - Download, install, and start ZAR
	Download ZAR demo. You do not need a paid version of ZAR to do image recovery. This set of functions is provided free of charge. When you run it, ZAR displays the window like the one below: Click "Next >>"

	Step 2 - Select processing mode
	Select "Recover images from a digital camera memory card" Click "Next  >>"

	Step 3 - Select a physical device to recover
	Select the device corresponding to your device. Note: See the "Type" column for the "Removable", because most likely your device is connected to the PC via USB port. You can use "Model" and "Capacity" fields to identify your device. If you are using a camera and it is not listed as the device available for recovery, you need to use a card reader device Click "Next >>" to start the recovery run.

	Step 4 - Recovery run
	This part is fully automatic. If you are using the camera to read the card and all the dots on the map are red, or if the scan is unacceptably slow (more than several minutes with no progress), discontinue the run, remove the card from the camera, then restart using a card reader device. Card readers tend to perform better.

	Step 5 - Select the files to recover
	Mark files to recover by clicking their corresponding checkboxes. To mark all files at once, just mark the "ROOT" entry. Click "Next >>"

	Step 6 - Copy files
	Enter the name of the folder for the recovered files. Click "Start copying the selected files" to start file retrieval.

	Miscellaneous information
	The tutorial above describes the procedure used to recover photos stored on the digital camera memory card if the images were deleted before copying to the PC the card was accidentally formatted some camera failure occured and the images are not accessible any longer Current version (ZAR 8.5) supports digital photo recovery for the following file formats: GIF, JPEG, TIFF, CRW (Canon RAW data), MOV, AVI movie, WAV, CR2 (Canon CR2 RAW format), ORF (Olympus RAW format) and most of the digital camera models. As for Canon .CR2 raw format, the following is known thanks to Jeff of Jeff Berner Photography and Art: ZA Digital Image Recovery recovers Canon .CR2 files as TIFF. To open recovered files, Jeff used Photoshop CS "Open With" feature, which allows to specify image format override.

	Learn more
	For more information about the digital photo storage, for tips on how to prevent the loss of digital images, please visit Digital photo recovery guide.

"Two things are sure in life: data gets damaged and data gets recovered." -- Z.A.R.

There are currently 88 visitors browsing the site.