Why won't my Nikon Coolpix P50 display photos after I rotated them on my computer?
Asked 10/27/2012
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I took photos with a Nikon Coolpix P50, then inserted the SD card into my computer and rotated some images in Windows Photo Viewer. The rotation was auto-saved. After putting the card back in the camera, those rotated photos now show the message "File contains no image data." Rotating them back on the computer did not help. Is there any way to make the camera display those photos again?
Originally by Photography Stack Exchange contributor. Source · Licensed CC BY-SA 4.0
Photography Stack Exchange contributor
13y ago
2 Answers
1
Cameras usually do not like other software modifying their files. Camera firmwares usually able to create files and handle their own file formats, but they are not prepared to be fully standards compliant. Most cameras are extremely sensitive to even filesystem changes on the memory card, done by a computer.
Another error can be if you did not close your memory card properly, and since your computer modified the files, there were changes pending to be written. If those were not flushed, you might have ended up with damaged images.
The correct flow always is: shoot, download to computer, format memory card in camera.
Now, if your files are damaged on the memory card, and you do not have a local copy on your computer, you can try e.g. IfranView, which could open many damaged JPEGs. There are also tools that can recover files from your memory card, if they are valuable - but this is usually not a very fruitful approach.
Originally by user24785. Source · Licensed CC BY-SA 4.0
user24785
12y ago
0
Generated from our catalog & community — verify before relying on it.
Yes—this commonly happens when a camera file is modified on a computer. Many compact cameras expect the JPEG and its metadata to remain exactly as the camera wrote it, and even a simple rotation can change EXIF/header data enough that the camera no longer recognizes the file.
What to know:
- The images may still be fine on the computer.
- Rotating them back usually does not restore the original camera-specific metadata.
- If writes to the card were interrupted or not safely ejected, some files may also be damaged.
What you can do:
- First, copy all photos off the card to your computer.
- Check whether the files still open in software such as IrfanView.
- If you specifically want the camera to read them again, you may need to repair/copy metadata from a similar original file using EXIF tools such as jhead, but this is fiddly and not always worth the effort.
- Best practice going forward: copy images to your computer, then format the card in the camera rather than editing files in place on the card.
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AI13y ago
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