Apple Photos Multiple Libraries

[fivemufc]

Objective :-

Download a full backup (Full Resolution) of iCloud Photos to External HDD and All Photos with Optimised Storage on Local HDD


Steps :-
Open Photos Normally and Download all my photos in full resolution.
Copy the Photos Library to External Drive.
Remove the Photos library from Disk and Point the Photos to external HDD.
Open Photos app with Option Key and Create a new Photos Library with iCloud Photos Turned on with Optimise Storage.
Periodically Plug the HDD (Once a month) and download the originals to external HDD.

Will this Work?

 

[skyhawkmatthew]

I don’t think it will work as described, as you can only have one Photos library ”attached” to iCloud at a time (the System Library). So when you create the new library with Optimise Storage enabled, the library on the external drive will no longer be the System Library and so will no longer sync with iCloud.

 

[fivemufc]

Thanks mate. Any ideas how can I achieve the desired result?

 

[skyhawkmatthew]

If your objective is simply to have an archive of the original image files, you can periodically export the originals you’ve accumulated since the previous export from the optimised library to the external drive.

if you want to have a full library with the originals and edits, metadata, etc, which would be the better option IMHO, I’d recommend a utility like PowerPhotos which will allow you to copy photos from one library to another, so again periodically you can transfer new photos from the iCloud-synced library into the offline full “backup” library on your external drive. I recently used PowerPhotos in the opposite direction to pull all of my old photos (30,000 or so) from assorted separate libraries into my system library for use with iCloud and it worked perfectly.

 

[zorinlynx]

Create a second account on the Mac solely to handle the complete library on the external drive. Log into that account, sign into iCloud and disable everything except Photos. Then create the library on the external drive with "Optimized storage" off and let it sync.

Once done, log out and disconnect the disk.

Your main account will use optimized storage with the library on your local machine. When you want to update your backup of your library, connect the external drive and log into the other account. It's wonky, but it's really the only way to accomplish this with one machine.

 

[fivemufc]

Thank you mate. This sounds like a good plan. Appreciate it.

 

[RhetTbull]

If your desire is to create an offline copy of your library, take a look at my free/open source command line tool osxphotos which is built to do exactly this. It has a ton of options to allow you to fully customize the export. Check out the tutorial and let me know if you have any questions. You can optionally pair this with the exiftool tool (also free) to embed all metadata such as keywords, persons, etc. in the exported photos.