# corrupt images - cam or card?



## Amina (Sep 2, 2005)

hey guys!

so here's my situation:

i shot an event last week with 2 bodies and 2 cards (1 card per camera).

after importing and backing up, i formatted my cards.

then i loaded the images into lightroom/bridge/photo mechanic and noticed that some of my thumbnails and previews were scrambled. thankfully, if i open the files (CR2), they're fine.

i checked the serial number associated with the problem images and it seems it all came from one camera. problem is, i don't know whether it's the camera or the card.

given that i formatted the cards, i have no way of knowing which card was in that camera.

i've done some tests since then with the same body and the same 2 cards, but of course (like when you take your car to the mechanic), the images are coming out beautifully. no corruption. even after sitting there with my finger on the trigger for 3 minutes shooting continuously.

any advice on how to diagnose? is there a way to extract the card's serial number from the image metadata somehow?


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## Guest (Jul 29, 2011)

My guess would be the cards ... I've seen that happen before and a format usually resolves it. Hope it was just a transient thing for you.


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## Amina (Sep 2, 2005)

it happened to me once before about a year ago. but i can't say whether it was the same camera or card. so now i'm getting paranoid!

almost every image from this serial number is damaged. it looks like the embeded jpg preview of the raw is corrupt. but the raws are fine.

it makes it almost impossible to cull my images though. i can't tell what's what!


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## Guest (Jul 29, 2011)

I think there's a way in lightroom to force it to generate new previews, probably similar in bridge too but not sure how offhand. Good luck with it! At least it's just the jpeg previews .. happened to my wife a couple of times as well and she was shooting jpg only and they were all no good (and it wasn't shots that could be re-created either)


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## Lawrence (Mar 11, 2003)

I've had it happen before and had to resave all the images using GraphicConverter to remedy the problem,
I don't think it's the cards that are the problem.

But I haven't had that problem ever again after that one time.

Never did find out what the cause was.


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## Max (Sep 26, 2002)

I dunno about you folks, but I reformat my card each and every time I've dumped the latest batch into Lightroom. Works for me and I've not had any scrambled card issues in years. Takes a few seconds to do, too.


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## FeXL (Jan 2, 2004)

Over the course of our digital experience, we've shot around half a million images. During that time, we've had maybe a half dozen flaky downloads (corrupted or missing images). Most of those bad downloads we attributed to a single compact flash card, which was replaced under warranty. It was nothing that was consistent, over the course of about 4 months occasionally there would be issues with a download. We haven't had an issue since (that was probably 4 years and 300,000 images ago).

I'd bet it's a card issue. ID your cards and keep track. If the corruption occurs again, note which one it is & replace it. Many cards have a lifetime warranty, check with the manufacturer.

If you have a camera body that will accept two cards, now may be a good time to write to both cards until you find the source of the problem. 

We always initialize the card in the camera prior to shooting.


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## eMacMan (Nov 27, 2006)

I would agree the card is most likely the culprit. Try new card in same camera and keep a very close eye on things. Hopefully you were using two cameras to CYA in case this very problem occured.

Gives me a good excuse to review my tried and proven download method.

Lock card. mount card to computer directly or via a reader. Down load images. Back-up images. Test backed up images by opening each and every one in Preview. Preview will open a lot of images in a very short time. When you know images are good then format the card. 

By locking the card before connecting to the computer you insure that the computer does not inadvertently erase your images from the card. A dangerous practice as it makes it more difficult to recover should some images prove problematic.


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## Lawrence (Mar 11, 2003)

Max said:


> I dunno about you folks, but I reformat my card each and every time I've dumped the latest batch into Lightroom. Works for me and I've not had any scrambled card issues in years. Takes a few seconds to do, too.


That is a possibility because I always format my cards after I dump them,
It's possible that I waited too long, They are 16 gb cards after all and they hold a lot.


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## Amina (Sep 2, 2005)

thanks for your help guys. i appreciate it.

i'll cross my fingers that it's a transient thing and hope for the best.

i format my cards in-camera every time i shoot, so it looks like i'm following good procedure. 

wish me luck!


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## eMacMan (Nov 27, 2006)

Amina said:


> thanks for your help guys. i appreciate it.
> 
> i'll cross my fingers that it's a transient thing and hope for the best.
> 
> ...


Yep once the images are saved, backed up and the back-ups tested; it is the perfect time to format the card in the camera.


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## Waylon (Aug 10, 2011)

Amina said:


> hey guys!
> 
> so here's my situation:
> 
> ...


I was a rookie, is not really understand.


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