how do i delete my camera roll to free up usage space

ishiboy's solution worked for me. Deleted all of the photos on my camera roll, but it still showed 2.8mGB of usage for it. Connected ipad to mac, opened iPhoto, went to iPad device. Clicked import, even though there was nothing to import. Got the "delete photos?" dialogue and clicked yes. Camera roll usage went to zero.

Thank you Tim!! This problem was bugging me for a while...

Right, for anyone still unsure exactly what to do...

1. First download iExplorer from www.macroplant.com.

2. Once this is done, open the programme and select 'Continue to run demo version', and connect your iPhone/iPad to your PC/MAC.

3. Once your devise is visible in iExplorer, select the dropdown arrow beside 'Media' on the left hand menu, and then select the DCIM folder.

4. I'm not sure whether the amount of photos you had determines the amount of sub-folders in the DCIM folder, but for me, there were 4 folders called APPLE100 - APPLE104 (from memory).

5. Open these folders and all your photos (that are causing the usage to show photo content) should be there. To delete these, RIGHT CLICK and select DELETE. You can delete the whole folder of photos without effecting the device function. This is all available in the demo version, as this is what I did.

6. Check your usage, hopefully you should see the 2858203GB of non existant photos has disappeared!

This iExplorer tricked worked for me too. unreal. been dealing with this nonsense forever. it opened up 14GB of space. I can't even believe how many photos were secretly stuck in my phone with me not being able to get rid of them.

follow steps above me and you should be good to go.

one last thing..There is some OTHER usage that is saying I have 9GB of messages saved. does anyone know what that is referring to and how to get rid of some of that. I deleted a ton of texts but it has to be something else. maybe emails that have been cached???

I'm having this problem now, I was importing a video and my ipad crashed midway through. Seems like the space has been taken up without the video appearing in my camera roll and now it says photos and videos take up 4gbs with 56 photos!

I'm travelling at the moment and don't have a computer...am I going to have to deal with this until I'm home and have access to my iMac again before I can clear out these dead photos? So frustrating!

I resolved the backup problem and the Camera Roll emptying by turning off the Camera Roll backup in the Usage / Manage Storage section. After you turn off the camera roll back-up complete a backup and turn it back on. It works!

Now my camera roll's is empty and it does not show 4.9 GB of used space even when I had no pictures in it.

to free up sotrage of iPhone, you can also reduce the size of photos. for example, a 2MB photo can be compressed 500KB. Compress photo can not only save photos but also free up the space of iPhone, and you can download more music or interesting apps on iPhone.

The steps described by cooknaris, above, worked perfectly for me, with one tweak. I found the /Media/DCIM directory he describes, and it did contain two subdirectories (100APPLE and 101APPLE), but they were already empty. I ultimately located the offending files in /Media/PhotoData/Metadata/DCIM. Thanks to all!

(P.S. I have an iPhone 4 with iOS 7.0.4)

I must be totally off in the woods or I'm unable to correctly use an iPad (not). NONE of the suggestions in here works for me. I am on an iPad2 (i know ancient), running iOS 8.4.1. I. I can't believe that there isn't a simple function somewhere where you hit 'Select All' or easily select many then Delete..... Here is what I've tried:

Since an update earlier this year, the iPhoto app is gone and only the Photos app is left. In the Photos app, except for the technique of tapping each photo to delete then delete, there appears to be NO option to select and delete photos in mass.

If I go to Settings > General > Usage > Manage Storage > Photos & Camera, there is no response to swipe, tap or hold that would allow me to delete the data.

If I go to Settings > Photos & Camera, again no options to delete anything.

I am connecting my iPad to a PC running Windows 7 Pro. In iTunes, I can't find any option that allows me to manipulate or even upload the Camera Roll.

In Windows Explorer I see the iPad devices. The folders are: Internal Storage > DCIM > then many folders with random strings for filenames such as: 807CIQGG, 807DODTU, 8110MTDG.... I can view the contents and it appears to be import groups, but have no ability to manipulate the folders or files. I can't even view any type of security or any other properties of the folders or files. So deleting them here is out.

I installed the lastest iExplorer by Macroplant LLC from iTunes on the iPad. This app has a feature to 'Import from Camera Roll', but no options I can find to delete them from Camera Roll. Or in mass from iExplorer. I shouldn't need to and I will resist the need to purchase an app to accomplish this fundamental function..

What have I overlooked.....?

Frustrated...

John

I'm facing the same problem too. I have no idea what's going on:

I've even restarted my ipad.

You have to delete the photos in the camera roll itself. Tap the Camera Roll album, then the edit button, select (tap on) the photos that you want to delete and then tap Delete.

If you sync to iTune, it should recover the space.

The culprit for my case turns out to be thumbnail files. I used iExplorer to remove them, forcing rebuilt.

So, do we need to buy an app for deleting photos? Any other way?

Thanks, Tim - this worked for me!