I selected several photos from a folder to move using drag and drop to another folder. After that I used ctrl + z wanting to move them back to the first folder. I used search for the photos and they were no where to be found (they all contained 2014 in them). Please tell me if there is any way to recover them with out the use of a program or if I have to start running an undeletion one (the drive is 300 GB half occupied, so it will take some time to check it).

If you move the files from a folder to other, it will not be there in the original folder. However, as you have used the CTL + Z to redo the actions, it should show in the folder from where you have moved the files.

I would suggest you to make sure the files and folder are not hidden.

Press Windows key + X, click on Control panel.
Click Folder Options.
Click the View tab.

Under Advanced settings, click Show hidden files, folders, and drives, and then click OK.

If the files are not showing up, then you need to manually search for the files.