Ask lbobi: Missing Images on Compact (gone in a) Flash Cards

Dear lbobi, Oh how I've missed thee.

Since my last post, I've graduated college, sent out oh...maybe three thousand resumes, shot a few weddings, re-branded my photography site ( www.austinjwalker.com check it out! ), traveled a bit, dominated kids that got Black Ops for Christmas on XBOX live, and lost countless pictures on my flash cards. Yep. countless. And that's NOT because I can't count very high.

So here's the deal lbobians. I need your help. Let me paint you a little picture of how my past three wedding shoots have gone, and get your advice.

10.16.10:
Let's just say, I know know why some photographers say there IS such a thing as a client you shouldn't book. We wont dive into all of that right now. So I'm shooting the pre-wedding portraits, getting ready, etc. Including some killer bridal party shots. Moving into the sanctuary, I start hammering out the ALWAYS creative, never boring family formals. Momzilla comes over and wants to see if the flower boy was looking at the camera or just a little to the side, and so I push the play button. On the screen is something along the lines of "File Error" or "Corrupted Card." My heart stops beating and time freezes in a Kato-From-The-Green-Lantern type manner. I was somehow able to recover and get out of the situation without her realizing what I realized: The card was corrupted. In the end, I was able to recover MOST of the images, but not the bridal party ones that didn't suck.

12.23.10:
LUCKILY I was just second shooting for a friend of mine. By second shooting, I mean I was predominantly a gear-mule, which is what I volunteered for. I did shoot a bit during the ceremony and reception. Some of the images I got during a dance I absolutely loved, and during some down time wanted to click play and go back to brag to myself about these images. I hope I'm not the only one, but I like chimping after the moment is gone. I just have to break myself of the belief that it looking awesome on there does NOT mean it's in focus. Anyway, back to the predicament. Turns out, the first 40-50 something images I took on that card were nowhere to be found. Images, poses, angles and details I KNOW I took. Gone. Not even trying to run a disk recovery type program yielded results. Totally. Gone. No idea what happened. They disappeared. Again, thankfully I was second shooting (for free) and so it was more just the scare I didn't like.

1.15.11:
I was shooting a booth setup at our Junior High retreat for the church I work for. The band, speaker, and an improv team we brought in were there before the session started, and I'd just gotten my booth set up and ready to roll. I asked if they wanted to take some crazy pictures and they LOVED it. We had a blast for about 30 minutes just shooting away getting some profile-worthy images out of it. After the session, we were all talking as students filed out to their small group time and we went to go look at some of the goofy pics. Again, gone. without a trace. I ran a disk recovery on all of my CF cards in case I accidentally switched out or something and they're nowhere to be found. so here I am.

OBVIOUSLY, i'll be getting a new batch of CF cards. I just didn't know that was something you had to do? Has anyone else had this happen to them or am I alone?


Austin