Hi Phil,
I was looking through an old drive with NEF files from a Nikon D5000, and I found many that are corrupted. Most likely they were corrupted by the use of Nikon transfer. When I open the files in ViewNx-i, they have all the camera information and I can see the jpg preview, but the NEF file itself is corrupted. I read in your Fix Corrupted Nikon NEF Images web page a reference to a post by someone who had the same problem with a D5000, but unfortunately that model is not listed as supported by your tool. Is it possible to add support for the D5000 in your fix tool? I was able to find a good NEF file from that camera, so I can send you a good file and a bad file.
Thanks in advance,
Neil
Hi Neil,
Sure. Send me the files and I'll see what I can do. (philharvey66 at gmail.com)
- Phil
I got the files. Unfortunately, this doesn't look like a corruption by Nikon Transfer. Those types of files have the SubIFD1:Compression changed from "NEF Compressed" to "JPG (old-style)". But the SubIFD1 tags look good in the corrupted file you sent:
> exiftool -subifd1:all -a tmp
======== tmp/corrupted.nef
Subfile Type : Full-resolution image
Image Width : 4352
Image Height : 2868
Bits Per Sample : 12
Compression : Nikon NEF Compressed
Photometric Interpretation : Color Filter Array
Strip Offsets : 1275368
Orientation : Horizontal (normal)
Samples Per Pixel : 1
Rows Per Strip : 2868
Strip Byte Counts : 9655122
X Resolution : 300
Y Resolution : 300
Planar Configuration : Chunky
Resolution Unit : inches
CFA Repeat Pattern Dim : 2 2
CFA Pattern 2 : 1 2 0 1
Sensing Method : One-chip color area
======== tmp/ok.nef
Subfile Type : Full-resolution image
Image Width : 4352
Image Height : 2868
Bits Per Sample : 12
Compression : Nikon NEF Compressed
Photometric Interpretation : Color Filter Array
Strip Offsets : 1702756
Orientation : Horizontal (normal)
Samples Per Pixel : 1
Rows Per Strip : 2868
Strip Byte Counts : 10886644
X Resolution : 300
Y Resolution : 300
Planar Configuration : Chunky
Resolution Unit : inches
CFA Repeat Pattern Dim : 2 2
CFA Pattern 2 : 1 2 0 1
Sensing Method : One-chip color area
1 directories scanned
2 image files read
And none of the Compression tags have been changed:
> exiftool -compression -a -G1 tmp
======== tmp/corrupted.nef
[IFD0] Compression : Uncompressed
[SubIFD] Compression : JPEG (old-style)
[SubIFD1] Compression : Nikon NEF Compressed
[PreviewIFD] Compression : JPEG (old-style)
======== tmp/ok.nef
[IFD0] Compression : Uncompressed
[SubIFD] Compression : JPEG (old-style)
[SubIFD1] Compression : Nikon NEF Compressed
[PreviewIFD] Compression : JPEG (old-style)
1 directories scanned
2 image files read
So I don't know if there is anything that may be done for these files. :(
- Phil
Thanks for looking into it. The problem must be somewhere else in the metadata. I attempted the procedure outlined in the blog post by Felipe Ceotto, the one referenced at the top of your web page, and it seems to work. After running the script, I can open the bad NEF file. The script seems to use your tool to do a brute force replacement of the metadata, so some of the original settings are overwritten, but at least the file opens. I was hoping you'd be able to pinpoint exactly where the error was introduced in the bad file and devise an easy fix.
Neil
I'll take a look at this again when I get a chance.
- Phil