Photos & RAW · exFAT image medium
TIFF camera images: recover after an interrupted recording
What can I do with deleted TIFF photographs after a recording interruption?
Short answer
Not always completely: a TIFF interrupted while saving can have a valid header while strips or its final image directory were never written. Remove the medium, keep an untouched copy and then check each recovered file. If only the top of the picture decodes, the rest was most likely never written to storage.
The situation
deleted TIFF photographs is missing, too short or unreadable after power loss, a card error or an unsafe stop.
An interrupted save leaves a file that starts correctly and stops early. Header and first strips can be perfectly readable while the final image-file directory, which tells a viewer where everything sits, never reached the medium. That mixture is why the file opens and then fails.
01 / Diagnose
Work out what actually disappeared
TIFF writers commonly stream the picture data first and place the directory that indexes it at the end. If power failed, the medium was pulled or the program crashed, that index is missing or points beyond what exists. The file-system entry may still claim the full size, so the file looks complete in every listing.
The payload may have been written before duration fields, indexes, directory entries or closing structures were committed. For TIFF camera images, this matters because TIFF stores byte order, image-file directories and offsets that must point to complete strips or tiles.
Check the last known path, trash and backups without writing to the original device.
02 / Protect the source
Preserve the best recovery chance
- 1
Stop the program and unmount the medium instead of saving again, so the incomplete file stays exactly as it was left behind.
- 2
Note which picture was being written, its expected dimensions and bit depth, and whether an earlier version of it exists elsewhere.
- 3
Duplicate the medium into an uncompressed image and attempt every repair on that copy, never on the interrupted original itself.
- 4
Export the candidates to another drive and open them in sequence to find the last picture that was written in full.
Do not let the program save again to the same volume and do not let a check-disk run truncate or move the file. An interrupted TIFF is still the only carrier of the data that did arrive, and any write can take the readable part with it.
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.
The border of this case is plain: what the interruption prevented from being written exists nowhere. File Recovery Hero copies out what is readable from exFAT, NTFS and FAT16/FAT32 media; rebuilding a missing image-file directory belongs to a repair tool working on a duplicate.
04 / Verify
Check the recovered content, not just its name
Decide per file, not per list: a usable TIFF shows the entire frame, with the lower rows drawn and no abrupt cut. If only the upper part appears, the rest was never stored, and no further scan of the same medium will bring it out.
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 exFAT image medium be recovered in this situation?+
An interrupted save leaves a file that starts correctly and stops early. Header and first strips can be perfectly readable while the final image-file directory, which tells a viewer where everything sits, never reached the medium. That mixture is why the file opens and then fails. The result still depends on what remains readable on the source.
What should I avoid before scanning?+
Do not let the program save again to the same volume and do not let a check-disk run truncate or move the file.
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?+
Decide per file, not per list: a usable TIFF shows the entire frame, with the lower rows drawn and no abrupt cut.