Sydney · Australia-wide
GoPro footage is usually still on the card.
Deleted clips, a card the camera wants to format, a clip that shows 0 KB or will not play: in each of these the video data is often still there. The card is the job, not the camera. Stop recording, take the card out, and keep it out.
Before you do anything else
Protect the only copy.
- 01
Power it down
Every minute a failing drive runs can overwrite the bytes you need.
- 02
Skip consumer scanners
Desktop recovery apps write as they scan. That is the opposite of imaging a dying disk.
- 03
No repair, no format
chkdsk, First Aid and reinstall fix the disk; they do not preserve what was on it.
- 04
Call, then decide
Free triage: lab job, cleanroom referral, or Recovery Studio.
When / stop
Take the card out and leave it out.
Every new clip writes over the space the old ones used. Action camera files are large and a card fills fast, so one more session can erase what you want back. Check your phone and any cloud upload first: if the GoPro app or a subscription already copied the clip, you are done and it costs nothing. If not, power the camera off, take the card out, and do not put it back in to check. If the card has a write-protect switch, slide it on before it goes near a computer.
A clip that shows 0 KB, or copies across but will not play, is usually an interrupted recording. The camera writes the video stream as it goes and writes the clip's index (the moov atom) only when you press stop. Battery out, card full, or a crash before that point leaves the video on the card with no index. Do not delete it. Do not let a player or repair tool rewrite it. If the camera offers to repair the file on power-up, let it run once, then stop.
What we do
Image the card, then rebuild each clip from its own index.
We image the card read-only on a write blocker. Recovery runs on the copy, never on the card. Where the FAT or exFAT structures survive we rebuild them and pull the clips out whole. Where the directory is gone, we work from the clips themselves. The same imaging and rebuild steps apply to any card, and the general case is on the memory card recovery page.
A GoPro writes the full-size MP4 and a small LRV preview at the same time, so the card holds the two files in alternating pieces rather than one clean run each. A recovery tool that assumes a clip is contiguous stitches the wrong pieces together and hands you a file that opens but stutters or stops. The clip's own index says where every piece sits, so we use it to put the clip back in order and check each piece as it goes in.
Interrupted recordings with no index need the index rebuilt from the video stream itself. That is the same work we do on CCTV and DVR video. Cards that no longer read, or came out of a camera that was crushed or went in the water, are assessed first and quoted after. Recovery Studio is the Mac app we run in the lab; licences exist for people who want to work an image themselves and are on the Recovery Studio page.
We do not run a cleanroom. Mechanical failures (clicking, non-spinning, head crash) are referred after free assessment. We will not open the drive on a bench and make it worse.
Three common cases
What happened, and what it means.
| What happened | What it means | What to do |
|---|---|---|
| Deleted clip | The directory entry is marked free. The video data stays until something writes over it. | Stop recording. Take the card out. Send it as it is. |
| Formatted card | A quick format in the camera rewrites the filesystem tables and leaves the clips in place. | Do not record to it. Do not format again. Send it. |
| Camera destroyed | The card is a separate part. Water or impact that kills the camera often leaves the card readable. | Remove it. Do not dry it with heat. Bag it and send it. |
What it costs
Published band, then a fixed quote.
USB sticks and memory cards from $249 after free assessment. Fixed quote. No recovery, no fee. Assessment is free. The figure you agree is fixed before recovery starts. Full lab bands and Recovery Studio licences are on Pricing.
First response within 24 hours. Scan and initial feedback on what is recoverable within 72 hours. Recovery within 14 days, usually much sooner. Scanning is the long part, especially on large drives. The amount of data and the method decide the rest.
FAQ
Common questions.
Can deleted GoPro footage be recovered?
Often, if nothing has been recorded to the card since. Deleting a clip frees its space in the directory. The video data stays until a new clip lands on top of it. Take the card out and send it as it is. Assessment is free and tells you what is there before any quote.
Why does my clip show 0 KB or refuse to play?
The recording was interrupted before the camera wrote the clip's index. The video data is on the card. The player has no map to it, so it reports an empty or broken file. We rebuild the index from the stream on a copy of the card. Do not delete the file and do not let software overwrite it.
The camera is destroyed but the card looks fine. Can you help?
Usually the card is the job, not the camera. Remove it, do not put it in another camera, and send it. A card that is cracked, bent or will not read is assessed case by case after the free assessment.
My GoPro says it is repairing a file. Should I let it?
Let it finish once. The camera tries to write the missing index for the last clip, and that sometimes works. If the clip still does not play, stop there. Do not delete it, do not record again, and do not keep power-cycling the camera to make it try again. Each attempt writes to the card.
Next step
Tell us what failed.
Free assessment. Fixed quote before recovery starts. No recovery, no fee. Sydney drop-off or Australia-wide by tracked post.