you can try this data recovery software, i have used it to recover my pic from disk. it is not expensive but easy to use. but for the important photos, you should better back them up, when disaster comes,you can one click to recover them from image files. what is more, the most backup software...
i have using todo backup free tool for over two years on my vista. it never disappoint me. it has a user-friendly interface, as a layman, i can use it without problem.