Mystery of the missing hi-res

August 14, 2020 9:50 PM

I was organizing my photo library to put the high resolution images together so I could order prints. Mysteriously, some images that should be high-res aren't, and many of those were taken by photographers who no longer have the files. Where could these files have gone / are there ways I can try to access them?

My PC runs Windows 10. I use Picasa to easily view my library. I just got this computer recently ad had to transfer over files from my Backblaze backup.

Going through the photos in Picasa, I thought all the art ones were high-res. But within the same session, I'll have big files and tiny files. That's true of sets by different photographers I've used as well as ones I took myself. So I doubt it's photographer error, and I know I wouldn't have sporadically converted lots to poor quality, but what, then?

I redownloaded all the photos from my previous laptop's Backblaze backup as well as the old downloads folder, but nothing there.

The photographers all deleted their files, and I've sold originals of a lot of the art so can't just rephotograph it.

Any ideas on other ways to find those images?

posted by mermaidcafe to Computers & Internet (3 answers total)

How small are the tiny files? Are they thumbnails, or lower resolution versions (e.g. 1024, 2048)?

I'd guess either something like Balckbalze/Onedrive either freed up space by moving the originals onlines and leaving placeholder small images in their place, or you edited them and the default output of that program was a much smaller JPEG.

Ideas:

If it was edited, say Picasa, that leaves an original in a subdirectory of the file location, check that.

If Backblaze has a web interface where you can browse the backup, check there, and see if their original size or small size. Also it might have a history/archive option where you can restore older, fullsize versions.

Use Everything (https://www.voidtools.com/), which will index your entire hard drive instantly, search for the resized filenames and see if there's an original version anywhere.

Do you have the old laptop still? Likewise search that. Try not to write anything to that laptop, you could try running Recuva or similar software on it and see if they can be recovered (unlikely if they'e been gone a while). If doing that, try to run it froma USB, so you don't have to install it. Not sure if that works with an SSD though, but it's a long shot anyway.
posted by Boobus Tuber at 5:57 AM on August 15, 2020

I'd guess either something like Balckbalze/Onedrive either freed up space by moving the originals onlines and leaving placeholder small images in their place

Backblaze just copies files from your drive to their servers. It doesn’t change or remove files on your drive.

If Backblaze has a web interface where you can browse the backup, check there, and see if their original size or small size. Also it might have a history/archive option where you can restore older, fullsize versions.

You can restore older versions of files for up to 30 days, unless you pay extra for their new feature which extends the period.
posted by fabius at 6:23 AM on August 15, 2020

Response by poster: Hooray! Found them in my Backblaze.
posted by mermaidcafe at 12:06 PM on August 19, 2020