CF Error: Horror Story Ahead

AprilRamone · Apr 18, 2007

So, I just got done with a newborn in home photo shoot. I was actually just finishing up my last shot and all of a sudden my camera wouldn't work and it said "CF Error" ALL OF THE SHOTS I HAD JUST SPENT TWO HOURS GETTING WERE GONE! Ugh, I had to inform them that we had to redo everything. I felt so unprofessional and crappy

I talked to my Dad about it since he's pretty good with computers and electronics, and he said that it sounded like I might be having a problem with static charges. He asked if I had walked on a lot of carpet and set my camera down during the shoot (which I did). He suggested that I get an electrostatic discharge kit for myself and my camera. Apparently the dry conditions here in Colorado make this problem worse.

What I want to know is if his theory has any validity. I had formatted my card before I started so that couldn't have been the problem. I'm really upset that this happened. (At least it wasn't at a wedding, but I have one coming up soon and now I'm really stressed out that this might happen again). Can anyone give me advice about how to prevent it from happening again? Should I get the electrostatic discharge kit?
Help!

AprilRamone · Apr 18, 2007

Also, it appears as though the images are all gone off of the card, but do you think I might be able to recover them somehow? I felt like redoing everything was rushed and I'd be so pleased if I got the originals back...

edit: I just tried to put it into my card reader to open it, but it just says that the card hasn't been formatted. I formatted it before I began the session, and if I format it again, I'll lose everything correct?

Antarctican · Apr 18, 2007

^^^ Do NOT reformat the card 'til you've tried to recover the images!!!! Because yes, if you do, you'll definitely lose anything that might be there and recoverable.

I've received that 'CF error' message on my camera, but after shutting it on/off, removing and replacing the battery and removing/replacing the card, all the images were still there. I know when I submerged a point and shoot camera, thus frying it, my local photo developing spot was able to recover most of the images from the card for me. I hope you have similar luck. I'm not a techie, so don't know what else to recommend, other than I know you better not reformat that card just now.

AprilRamone · Apr 18, 2007

Yep, there's no way I'm reformatting until I know for sure that there's no way to get my images back. It's weird, I put it in my card reader and then checked the properties on it and it says that it's completely full with no free space.

Antarctican · Apr 18, 2007

^^^ I take that as a good sign!!!! I've got my fingers crossed that the images are still there and recoverable.

DSLR noob · Apr 18, 2007

If you shoot canons and the card is completely full then an error message would be displayed. a canon cannot do anything involving the card if it's fulll, even read it. It just would say CF error. your card reader however should work (unless the card reader is the camera)

AprilRamone · Apr 18, 2007

Hmm...well I don't know if I filled it up and then the error occurred or not. But, it seems weird that my camera would say that it has no images on it when I put it in. Usually when I have a full card, the camera will still show the images. Also, the card reader wouldn't work with the card. It just kept saying that the card wasn't formatted. I just went to Wolf Camera to buy a new card and it comes with Media Image Rescue software so I'm attempting to rescue my images right now.
I really hope it works. If not, the girl at Wolf gave me the info on what software they use. It's called pc inspector (or inspecter, she wasn't sure how it was spelled). I'll just have to try that next if this doesn't work.
(Unless someone else has any ideas

)

Going back to the original question though. What do ya'll think of my Dad's theory? Do you think I should try the electrostatic discharge thing? I just think it's odd that I haven't heard of anyone using it if it works to prevent this sort of thing from happening.

midget patrol · Apr 18, 2007

I know that when handling IC's, you always want to be grounded. The thing is, the camera body is plastic-coated, so any charge that builds up will remain local because the plastic won't conduct the charge evenly. That means that it wouldn't end up on the inside, where the card is.

It's worth it to save yourself that much trouble. It really shouldn't cost all that much.

AprilRamone · Apr 18, 2007

Midget patrol, what does IC stand for?
Yeah, it does seem like it would be relatively inexpensive. So maybe it'd be worth it just to try it.
And, thankfully the new software that came with my new card brought back a good portion of the images that I took today. Yay!

usayit · Apr 18, 2007

I have a similar horror story.

I had my wife's P&S Olympus digital when my was born. I had dozens of precious photos that I now cherish. After mother and baby were resting at the hospital, I went home to get rest myself and look at the photos. I couldn't find my wife's sync cable ( rarely use her camera) so I decided to push it to my Wolverine image tank and retrieve it from there. To my horror, the transfer failed. I went the store and purchased a reader only to find the card is totally corrupt ( that XD card no longer goes into my Wolverine). The happy ending is that I was able to use Stellar Pheonix Picture recovery to retreive most of the photos... I had no problems paying that $40 fee.

DO not format the card. There are several utils out there to help recover. Most will allow you to try out a disabled version and verify that their software can actually retrieve the files. Stellar just happens to be the one that worked for me.

http://www.stellarinfo.com/digital-media-recovery.htm#
Read it over... download it.. and try it out. If it can retrieve the photos, pay the fee and get them back.

Good luck.

Antarctican · Apr 19, 2007

AprilRamone said:
thankfully the new software that came with my new card brought back a good portion of the images that I took today. Yay!

Wonderful news!!!

darich · Apr 19, 2007

AprilRamone said:
Midget patrol, what does IC stand for?
Yeah, it does seem like it would be relatively inexpensive. So maybe it'd be worth it just to try it.
And, thankfully the new software that came with my new card brought back a good portion of the images that I took today. Yay!

I think it stands for "integrated circuit"

And great to hear you got your images back!!
:thumbup:

RMThompson · Apr 19, 2007

AprilRamone said:
Midget patrol, what does IC stand for?
Yeah, it does seem like it would be relatively inexpensive. So maybe it'd be worth it just to try it.
And, thankfully the new software that came with my new card brought back a good portion of the images that I took today. Yay!

Since you recovered them I would wager that this happened not because of static but because of a bad bit of memory...

Each flash card has a limited about of cycles before each individual sector cannot be written. Likely a sector (or a few) went bad, corrupting a few images, and then giving you the error.