Canon R7 Raw files recovery with Photorec

Data loss can be painful. And I think everyone has experienced it at least once. Recently it happened to me - my SD card reader, which I use to transfer photos from my Canon R7, reformatted my card, rendering all RAW and JPG files disappeared.

I had previous experience with data recovery, so I was not really afraid. I launched Photorec, my Swiss Army knife tool, to get the data back. I quickly learnt that the recent format CRAW used in Canon R7 is not supported yet. Well.

I have decided not to give up and keep reading about the internals of Photorec. I found this - how to add your own extensions to Photorec - to learn that I need to find a place where a file starts.

I launched the hex editor, and I did start to compare other CRAW files created with Canon R7. And I found this string:

cr3 0 0x000000186674797063727820000000016372782069736f6d0000

I created a special file photorec.sig, started Photorec again, and had my files back!

I also recorded a mini tutorial which you can watch in a multimedia way. Enjoy: