Missing photos

[AKroliko]

While transferring photos from my iPhone (taken with said iPhone) I came across a significant problem. When I connected the phone to my MacBook Air, the default Photos application did not detect a number of photos (about 40%).
When I connected the same phone to a computer running Windows10, the same photos were missing from DCIM catalogues (100APPLE….105APPLE).
Some of the photos that do not show up on the computers I managed to send to myself via e-mail and copy them to my PC, as well as send them to my MacBook using AirDrop.
I then turned off iCloud Photo Library on my iPhone. After that, the photos that could not be seen on the computers vanished from my iPhone as well.
Turning iCloud Photo Library back on on the computer did not cause the photos to reappear on my iPhone. The missing photos are not in my iCloud, which, at the time when the Library was turned off, reached its maximum capacity of 5GB. Buying additional space in iCloud has not solved the problem.
The photos are of great importance to me since they document the first year of my Son’s life. I would like to ask for your help in recovering them.

 

[Minorite]

Have you tried enabling iCloud Photo Library, tick "Download and keep originals" and leave the phone with a robust Wi-Fi connection?

If photos won't reappear on your phone, in "Deleted photos" folder (on iPhone Photos > Albums tab > Recently deleted album) there are two possible options:

1) iCloud backup
If you have it, try restoring it to some old phone and look for the photos (but as I understand you don't ).

2) iTunes backup
If you have an iTunes backup that may contain these photos, download any backup extractor (most popular are iMazing, Dr.Phone and PhoneView) and try to find these photos. All of them have a preview version so no need to pay before you'll make sure that they are there.

Also, keep in mind that as you use iCloud Photo Library photos may not be saved in full resolution, so even if you'll find them try to export 3-5 photos before purchasing anything.

Hope this helps.

 

[AKroliko]

Have you tried enabling iCloud Photo Library, tick "Download and keep originals" and leave the phone with a robust Wi-Fi connection?

If photos won't reappear on your phone, in "Deleted photos" folder (on iPhone Photos > Albums tab > Recently deleted album) there are two possible options:

1) iCloud backup
If you have it, try restoring it to some old phone and look for the photos (but as I understand you don't ).

2) iTunes backup
If you have an iTunes backup that may contain these photos, download any backup extractor (most popular are iMazing, Dr.Phone and PhoneView) and try to find these photos. All of them have a preview version so no need to pay before you'll make sure that they are there.

Also, keep in mind that as you use iCloud Photo Library photos may not be saved in full resolution, so even if you'll find them try to export 3-5 photos before purchasing anything.

Hope this helps.

Thank you for your help! After i had read your post, I enabled iCloud Photo Library, ticked "Download and keep originals", switch off mobile data and photos started to reappear! Iphone have been actualizing photos till today (2 days). Now in default Photos application is no message (about actualizing). Is there any chance that it will reactivate acttualizing? Unfortunatelly half of the missing photos didn't reapear.
I don't have any backup with those photos

 

[Minorite]

Try restarting device and Wi-Fi router, there is a chance that there was a connection glitch. Another idea is that they are just stuck somewhere and you will need to wait a bit longer, there is no progress bar for loading photos. Also, I would recommend contacting Apple and ask for an advice just in case.

p.s. It's really important to backup your device once a month at least with iTunes. You never know what can happen with your data even if you use only Apple software Just remember to download all photos from iCloud Photo Library before the local backup or only thumbnails will be included.

 

[AKroliko]

Try restarting device and Wi-Fi router, there is a chance that there was a connection glitch. Another idea is that they are just stuck somewhere and you will need to wait a bit longer, there is no progress bar for loading photos. Also, I would recommend contacting Apple and ask for an advice just in case.

p.s. It's really important to backup your device once a month at least with iTunes. You never know what can happen with your data even if you use only Apple software Just remember to download all photos from iCloud Photo Library before the local backup or only thumbnails will be included.

I've restarted the Wi-Fi router and the iphone but I can't see progress bar for loading photos
I contacted with Apple support several times. You can contact with them only by phone. First consultant said that it's impossible to recover those vanished photos, because they had been in a queue and after disabling iCloud Photo Library they had been deleted. Second consultant said that disabling iCloud Photo Library hadn't caused the photos to be deleted but only to stop sending them to iCloud. He couldn't see vanished photos (those in the queue) in iCloud and couldn't explain to me what happened. Third consultant (after your advice) said that photos were in the recover process. They all were nice and tried to help but I have a feeling that they don't now what is going on.

Yes, you are right. Now I know that I should have made backup of those photos earlier

 

[Minorite]

There is no progress bar for iCloud photo library, so just leave the phone charging for the night (6-8 hours) and make sure that it has Wi-Fi connection (better restart everything one more time before this, but just because I'm paranoid ). If photos are stuck or anything similar they should continue downloading and you will see at least some of them in the morning.

Can't think of any other solution, unfortunately.

 

[AKroliko]

I have done like you said. After night nothing changed
Do you think that I should wait and don't do new photos because they can override vanished photos? Or they are in some part of iCloud that is inaccessible for me?

 

[Minorite]

Sorry but can't say for sure, rare bugs are always a mistery... In my opinion new photos shouldn't override old ones in any way if they are still somewhere there.

Regarding iCloud, if they are in some inaccessible part only Apple may help.

 

[AKroliko]

Thank you for your opinion.
Today in Photos application is again progress bar for loading photos but they load very very slowly (2 photos per 6 hours).