Stop using the card immediately—recovery is only likely if the deleted data has not been overwritten by new photos or writes from a computer.

Best practice is to protect the card from further writes, ideally using the SD card’s write-protect switch, then make a full image/copy of the card before attempting recovery.

Tools mentioned that should help:

• PhotoRec: good for recovering image files directly from the card data.
• TestDisk: useful for scanning the file system and locating deleted files.
• Recuva (Windows): a simple Windows option that may recover deleted files.
• On Linux, a lower-level approach is to clone the card with dd and then use Sleuth Kit tools such as fls and icat.

A sensible strategy:

1. Lock the card read-only if possible.
2. Create a full image of the card first.
3. Run recovery tools against the image, not the original card.
4. Save recovered files to another drive, never back to the SD card.

If more photos were taken after deletion, recovery chances drop significantly because the old data may have been overwritten.