Production · documentary production cards and drives
documentary production: repair an incomplete ingest workflow
How do I investigate an incomplete ingest from the documentary production?
Short answer
First rebuild the day-by-day picture: documentary ingests can stretch over weeks, so compare each card with its own offload folder and log entry rather than the whole archive. Copy missing files again from cards that were not reformatted yet. For cards already reused, a read-only scan only helps where nothing was overwritten.
The situation
The destination contains only part of the material from the documentary production.
An archive that is short of material after weeks of shooting needs a day-by-day comparison, not a global one. The gap belongs to specific cards and specific shoot days, and those are the only ones where the source card still matters at all.
01 / Diagnose
Work out what actually disappeared
Documentary ingest happens in the field, often late, on laptops with limited space and unreliable power. Transfers get cancelled when a drive fills, a card is pulled before the copy flushes, a day is logged as offloaded when only the first folder made it, and cards then rotate back into use. The result is gaps spread across weeks.
A copy interruption, filter, duplicate name or delete-after-import action can leave gaps. For documentary production, this matters because the documentary production combines several sources, takes and handoff steps that must be reconciled as a set
Check the last known path, trash and backups without writing to the original device.
02 / Protect the source
Preserve the best recovery chance
- 1
Pull every card that has not been reformatted yet out of rotation and store it separately from the working kit.
- 2
Go through the shoot log day by day and compare each card with its own offload folder by file name and size.
- 3
Copy the missing clips again from the cards that still hold them, day by day, into the folder for that shoot day.
- 4
For days whose card was already reused, scan that card read-only and export whatever survives to the archive drive.
Do not mark a shoot day as archived on the basis of a folder that merely exists, and do not format further cards until the whole log has been checked. Every card cleared during the audit removes one of the last chances to close a gap.
03 / Choose the method
Match the tool to the source
For stable, readable exFAT, NTFS and FAT16/FAT32 or uncompressed IMG, DD, RAW and BIN images.
Unconfirmed exports are marked .UNVERIFIED.
For cards that were reused, a scan finds only what new recordings have not covered, and that shrinks with every day of shooting. File Recovery Hero reads exFAT, NTFS and FAT16/FAT32 cards read-only; the scan is free, the export needs a licence at 50 € once.
04 / Verify
Check the recovered content, not just its name
Each shoot day is settled when its offload folder holds the same file names and byte sizes as the card, and when the log's clip count agrees. Play the last file of each day; interrupted field transfers usually break off there rather than in the middle.
Keep the source until two verified copies exist. One working preview is not enough.
Sources and technical references
FAQ
Questions about this recovery case
Can documentary production cards and drives be recovered in this situation?+
An archive that is short of material after weeks of shooting needs a day-by-day comparison, not a global one. The gap belongs to specific cards and specific shoot days, and those are the only ones where the source card still matters at all. The result still depends on what remains readable on the source.
What should I avoid before scanning?+
Do not mark a shoot day as archived on the basis of a folder that merely exists, and do not format further cards until the whole log has been checked.
Does scanning write to my memory card?+
Your memory card is only read. Nothing is saved to it.
How do I know whether the result is complete?+
Each shoot day is settled when its offload folder holds the same file names and byte sizes as the card, and when the log's clip count agrees.