Recovering deleted clips from p2 cards

J

JZalutsky

Well-known member
Hi, I recently shot a short film on an hvx at 720/24pn over 2 days. we had 4 4gig cards and filled them both days and then dumped the footage and backed it up after the first night on several harddrives so we could reuse them the next day. But the problem is I happen to be an idiot...after the first night instead of importing all of the cards I mixed them up and imported them one of them twice thinking it was the 4th card....so one card full of footage that day never got imported. the 2nd day I formated all the cards and then procedded to go out and shoot....so my question is, can I get that footage back somehow. It seems the obvious answer is ofcourse not the cards were formated but, I remember that on a friends digital still camera with some recovery software they were able to get back pictures from years ago so I figured you might be able to do the same with the p2 card as in theory they work very similary. If anyone has any idea on this I would greatly appreciate it THANKS!!!!!


-Jake
 
There are two types for formatting -- one which just creates a new file system (in the case of P2 cards and the FAT32 file system the two File Allocation Tables and Root Directory), and one which does all of that as well as writing to and reading all of the sectors on the media to make sure there aren't any media defects that need to be mapped out.

If the format is the former, then recovery software may be able to get some or all of the data back. If it is the latter, or if you subsequently put new data on the disk/card, then the chances of getting the original data back are slim at best. If the card was filled up, all of it will be gone.
 
ok, um what would decide what kind of formating was done....do you have experience with this...anyone else?...I know people who have used file recovery software on digi still cards and gotten back very old pictures and the card had been filled up multiple times since.
 
You didn't say what you did to format the card so I can't tell you what type of format was done. But ,you did say that you've written to the card since -- that will pretty much rule out getting anything back.

There are various free and commercial file recovery programs on the Internet that you can download, but you didn't say what type of computer you have, so I can't give you any recommendations.

The thing to do in the case of data loss (or suspected data loss) is to write-protect the media if that is possible, and then to make an image backup that includes all sectors, even those that are part of the free space. Then you have the ability to experiment with different programs and different recovery options because you can revert back if needed; if you don't do this, then you may only get one shot at getting anything back.
 
I'm currently conducting some experiments with my camera to determine the best way to recover data from P2 cards, and I will post my findings when I'm done. My goal is to produce a step-by-step guide to getting the data back using free tools available for download.

I don't think this will help you at all because you have continued to use the card after formatting it. That's a cardinal sin when it comes to data recovery.
 
Anything with a FAT-32 or NTFS file system (hard drives, cards, etc.) I highly recommend GetDataBack from runtime.org. I paid about $80 for each copy (one for NTFS and one for FAT) and it has saved my ass more times than I can count.

And if it fails to do the job, it is 100% nondestructive... doesn't write ANYTHING to the drive or card that's being recovered... so you can still send it somewhere and pay for recovery.
 
Label your P2s. The big white panel on the bottom of the P2 card is to sharpie marker in a big number.
 
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