Photo recovery - unable to open recovered images, images corrupt, or thumbnails only

After about twenty years, I felt ZAR can no longer be updated to match the modern requirements, and I decided to retire it.

ZAR is replaced by Klennet Recovery, my new general-purpose DIY data recovery software.

If you are looking specifically for recovery of image files (like JPEG, CR2, and NEF), take a look at Klennet Carver, a separate video and photo recovery software.

I did the trial run at work (while researching drive recovery / forensics products for a work project) and saved the data in order to finish recovering the drive at home. When I paid for the program and installed the key - I loaded the file I had saved from work and while it appeared the files were recovered, NONE of the pictures would open (it gave an error message that it was not the same set up although I had ignored the warning). Zar also locked up and I got the threading error others have received. I tried running the entire thing again from the start and recovery went very well and recovered all (as far as I could tell) of my pictures and documents (and they opened fine) and I did not receive an error.

My Olympus D560 wants me to reformat the chip with 98 pictures on it. I downloaded ZAR, which transfered the files, but I can't open them. I am not sure I followed all the directions on how to use ZAR recovery software. Any advice?

I seemed to have recovered my images from my camera, but I am unable to open any of the images. I continue to get an error message. I was reading through some of the postings, and it says you should use a card reader to recover your photos. Is this more successful than trying to use your camera as an external device?

zar gave me a list of over 700 images in jpeg but when i click it says no preview available...they are between 1.5 and 4 mb in size...anything i am doing wrong?

I still cannot recover my photos from my Olympus XD-Picture Card. This is so frustrating. Earlier today I tried opening it through my laptop but it asked me to format it. I took the card to a nearest photo shop who tried to recover the files using Smart Recovery. But to know avail. Before the technician used Smart Recovery, he asked me to click on "format now" from my digicam (Olympus FE-210). He said it's ok because he can recover the files using the said software. Now, I feel hopeless. The pictures are of my mother's vacation overseas. This is the only time my mother can travel abroad and I don't have pictures.

I just used ZAR to scan my memory card and it found all my files so I saved them however, when I open them the pictures are really small to what they are meant to be. However there seems to be about 3 copies of each image all at different dimensions They are meant to be 2592 x 1944 pixels and I have found only some of the recovered images that are of that dimension but when I try opening them it says 'drawing failed'? I took images and videos on the 11/08/08 and it was the 12/08/08 that they vanished however I still used my memory card on the 13/08/08 and the images I took on that day seem to be fine. the other dimensions that do open are 170 x 128 and 320 x 240. Anyone know if there is a possibility of recovering them all properly?

I got all my photos from ZAR and the thumbnails are right but when I open it, the pictures have grey all over it and sometimes over half the photo is grey. What should I do? These photos were from my Grad dinner dance... It would be great if they turned out ok. Thanks =)

I was able to recover my photos, however I am having the same problems as stated with only 10 of the 320 recovered photos (they would be the ones I wanted the most). Has anyone been able to find a way to copy the photos that will not open? The fustrating part is seeing the photos and not being able to do anything with them.

When first attempting to access my SD memory card (by inserting it into the SD slot in my PC) to view photos, it worked fine, but later when I attempted to copy the images (during the same session) Windows told me it was not formatted and I needed to do so in order to access the drive. I used ZAR to attempt to recover the images, using both the 'recover data from a simple volume or from a functional RAID volume' and the 'recover images from the digital camera memory card' options. Both produced the same results- most have been recovered successfully, but many of the images have a grey bar at the top or bottom when viewing in preview. However, strangely when the preview of these images first appears the whole image is viewable, but once left to fully load, the grey bars appear over parts of the image (they then remain indefinitely). As the rest of the image appeared temporarily, it seems that the full data is there- is there any way to repair these files?

In case a digital image recovery run brings some files, but part or all of these files

• Fail to open (various error messages e.g. "Invalid SOI marker").
• Have the thumbnails OK but fail to open in full size.
• Are visibly distorted (e.g. only upper part of the image OK).

There is basically nothing we can do. If the image files are fragmented on the card, it is difficult to re-assemble fragments back into the complete and correct image.
In this case, you should try the "Data Recovery for Windows and Linux" mode, which may or may not achieve better results. If this fails as well, consider trying Klennet Carver (www.klennet.com/carver/), the completely separate product which I specifically designed to work with fragmented photo and video files. Also, if you need to recover data from SD memory card, it is advisable to use a card reader device which is useful when:

• You cannot get ZAR to recognize camera
• A "physical" (bad block) problem is suspected
• ZAR locks up when scanning using camera, or the entire system crashes during scan

other than that, card reader does not provide any benefit.

As for the latest question about correct preview of the recovered photos and damaged full image view, this is explained by the fact that the preview is lower resolution (and smaller size) than the full image. The preview is stored close to the beginning of the file. It thus has less chance to get damaged. So the preview is loaded first, and then once the full image is loaded, it becomes clear the full image is distorted.

Alternatively, JPEG can use progressive layout where first part of the file composes lower-resolution image, and subsequent parts provide increasingly higher resolutions; the same principle applies - even in theory, you can only get a lo-fi version of the image. As far as practice is concerned, we are not aware of any image editor that would allow you to discard a part of the JPEG.