200gb iphoto library, how can I reduce this?

[franco265]

Hi all, I am migrating my daughters macbook pro to a macbook air which has a much smaller hard drive. The iphoto library on the pro is more than 200gb and the photobooth library is also nudging up to 100gb.

I can get her to delete some videos - but what is the best way to do this in iphoto?

Also, I have more than a terrabyte free in icloud storage. Is there a way to take advantage of this to resolve it? And if I upload to icloud, will she still be able to access the videos on the smaller hard drive since she wouldn't have the space to download them if she decided she needed them...

Be grateful for any help / advice on this...

Many thanks

F

 

[James_C]

I can help but can I check which App you are using. Are you using iPhoto that Apple discontinued a few years ago, or are you using Apple Photos ?

 

[ian87w]

Hi all, I am migrating my daughters macbook pro to a macbook air which has a much smaller hard drive. The iphoto library on the pro is more than 200gb and the photobooth library is also nudging up to 100gb.

I can get her to delete some videos - but what is the best way to do this in iphoto?

Also, I have more than a terrabyte free in icloud storage. Is there a way to take advantage of this to resolve it? And if I upload to icloud, will she still be able to access the videos on the smaller hard drive since she wouldn't have the space to download them if she decided she needed them...

Be grateful for any help / advice on this...

Many thanks

F

From my understanding:
1. Add your daughters' iCloud account into your Family sharing. https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT208147
2. Then on their old Macs where the photos reside, turn on iCloud Photo library, and let it upload all the photos to iCloud. https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT204264
3. I have no experience with Photo booth app. Worse come to worse, you probably need to import them to the Photos app first, and then let it upload to iCloud.
4. Once everything is on iCloud, on the new Mac, you just need to turn on iCloud photo library and Optimize Mac storage, and macOS will automatically download/delete photos as needed, so you don't have to worry even if your local storage is less than your photo library in iCloud. https://support.apple.com/guide/photos/from-icloud-photos-phtf5e48489c/mac

 

[James_C]

Hi - I assume you are using Apple Photos - The easiest way to identify any video clips in your library is to select 'Videos' in the Media Types under Albums. I have put together a short screencast video for you here.

As far as PhotoBooth is concerned you can either delete the photos and videos in the App itself or use the finder, which may be your best option if you have a lot of images. I show how you can do that here.

@ian87w above has some great advice on using iCloud Photos to store all the images and videos and actively manage the storage space on your new MacBook Air so that if space is short, lower (smaller files) resolution files are held on the local hard disk and the original kept in iCloud until you download it.

 

[zorinlynx]

All I can say is find a way to not delete if you can. Those silly photos will become precious memories in 25 years.

 

[Madonepro]

Hi all, I am migrating my daughters macbook pro to a macbook air which has a much smaller hard drive. The iphoto library on the pro is more than 200gb and the photobooth library is also nudging up to 100gb.

I can get her to delete some videos - but what is the best way to do this in iphoto?

Also, I have more than a terrabyte free in icloud storage. Is there a way to take advantage of this to resolve it? And if I upload to icloud, will she still be able to access the videos on the smaller hard drive since she wouldn't have the space to download them if she decided she needed them...

Be grateful for any help / advice on this...

Many thanks

F

Have you considered just buying an external drive, and simply drag dropping the photos/videos onto it. Then you can upload what you want onto iCloud, but also have a backup of them.

 

[mj_]

iCloud Photo can store photos in the cloud and only keep small previews on your local drive. That way I was able to reduce my Photos library from 78GB, which I keep in its entirety on my iMac, to less than 5GB on my MacBook with limited storage.

 

[ignatius345]

From my understanding:
1. Add your daughters' iCloud account into your Family sharing. https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT208147
2. Then on their old Macs where the photos reside, turn on iCloud Photo library, and let it upload all the photos to iCloud. https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT204264
3. I have no experience with Photo booth app. Worse come to worse, you probably need to import them to the Photos app first, and then let it upload to iCloud.
4. Once everything is on iCloud, on the new Mac, you just need to turn on iCloud photo library and Optimize Mac storage, and macOS will automatically download/delete photos as needed, so you don't have to worry even if your local storage is less than your photo library in iCloud. https://support.apple.com/guide/photos/from-icloud-photos-phtf5e48489c/mac

Side benefit: if your daughter has an iPhone, she'll be able to see all of her photos there regardless of how much storage is available on the device.

 

[franco265]

Hi - I assume you are using Apple Photos - The easiest way to identify any video clips in your library is to select 'Videos' in the Media Types under Albums. I have put together a short screencast video for you here.

As far as PhotoBooth is concerned you can either delete the photos and videos in the App itself or use the finder, which may be your best option if you have a lot of images. I show how you can do that here.

@ian87w above has some great advice on using iCloud Photos to store all the images and videos and actively manage the storage space on your new MacBook Air so that if space is short, lower (smaller files) resolution files are held on the local hard disk and the original kept in iCloud until you download it.

Hi James, sorry for my delayed reply, I just wanted to say a huge thanks for your help.

 

[franco265]

Side benefit: if your daughter has an iPhone, she'll be able to see all of her photos there regardless of how much storage is available on the device.

Hi Ignatius, sorry for not replying sooner - thanks so much for this, it's a huge help!

 

[franco265]

Have you considered just buying an external drive, and simply drag dropping the photos/videos onto it. Then you can upload what you want onto iCloud, but also have a backup of them.

Thanks for the tip madone

 

[mpainesyd]

Consider purchasing Powerphotos to split your photos into several libraries then store the resulting "archive" (Rarely used) libraries on external drives:

PowerPhotos - Merge Mac Photos libraries, find duplicate photos, and more

fatcatsoftware.com

The good thing about Powerphotos is that it retains albums and other data from the Photos library.