Consolidating photos

[bzeguy]

Greetings and Happy Independence day from Belize.
There are no Apple stores or decent Mac techs in this tiny country.
I am hoping someone will walk me through this.
I have had several, (Like 10) macs in Belize.
The humidity and salt air here on this island does them in.
I have 8 hard drives and 2 externals full of thousands of photos.
I currently have a 2017 Macbook Pro, Mojave 10.14.6
The plug on my Seagate external conveniently fits on all the hard drives.
When I plug any of the drives into my current Mac, I can see a lot of the photos that I had exported.
I cannot however get into the albums themselves, Iphoto or newer Photos.
i have a 128 GB Photostick.
I would like to extract all photos from several backed up albums I have, one at a time to the stick, weed them out by selecting largest file, (many duplicates) then upload them to this laptop and a Samsung 500GB SS hard drive.
if someone will walk me through this I'll give you a free week in a condo on a Caribbean Island!
Thanks! Dennis

 

[HDFan]

I cannot however get into the albums themselves, Iphoto or newer Photos.

How did you export - to folders? You can't get into the folders? What happens when you try?

 

[bzeguy]

i can only see the Icons for the albums, they will not open.
I have tried to install Iphoto on newer laptop with photos, Apple says they no longer support it.
This is consumerism on steroids, they have all my photos locked up in intentionally obsolete apps.

 

[James_C]

i can only see the Icons for the albums, they will not open.
I have tried to install Iphoto on newer laptop with photos, Apple says they no longer support it.
This is consumerism on steroids, they have all my photos locked up in intentionally obsolete apps.

Hi,

First question is how are the photos stored on the various hard disks. iPhoto and the newer Photo's App stores photo's in a self contained library. Did you export the Photo's to the external drives as images or do you simply have separate iPhoto Libraries on multiple hard disks ?

I am working on the assumption that you simply copied the library from a Mac to External hard disk but not sure.

On your new Mac you can open an old iPhoto Library into Photos by holding down the Option ⌥ Key as you start Photo's

You can the choose the iPhoto Library and you should be able to open it. Photos will then convert it into the new Photo's format, so I advise you make a backup copy before you start.

However the problem comes when you want to merge multiple libraries, if that is what you have and want to do. Unless you buy a utility to merge libraries there are some downsides to losing some information. The reason is you can't merge multiple libraries without buying additional 3rd party tools. You can only export the photos from one library and consolidate them by importing into a single master library. The problem here is you have to make a choice to export either the edited version of the photo or the original master. If you export the edited version you will not be able to revert back to the original, and if you export the original you will lose all your edits and other metadata you may have created.

I suspect you may need a tool to merge multiple Libraries - I have not used it but take a look at PowerPhotos.

 

[bzeguy]

Hi,

First question is how are the photos stored on the various hard disks. iPhoto and the newer Photo's App stores photo's in a self contained library. Did you export the Photo's to the external drives as images or do you simply have separate iPhoto Libraries on multiple hard disks ?

I am working on the assumption that you simply copied the library from a Mac to External hard disk but not sure.

On your new Mac you can open an old iPhoto Library into Photos by holding down the Option ⌥ Key as you start Photo's

You can the choose the iPhoto Library and you should be able to open it. Photos will then convert it into the new Photo's format, so I advise you make a backup copy before you start.



View attachment 931807
However the problem comes when you want to merge multiple libraries, if that is what you have and want to do. Unless you buy a utility to merge libraries there are some downsides to losing some information. The reason is you can't merge multiple libraries without buying additional 3rd party tools. You can only export the photos from one library and consolidate them by importing into a single master library. The problem here is you have to make a choice to export either the edited version of the photo or the original master. If you export the edited version you will not be able to revert back to the original, and if you export the original you will lose all your edits and other metadata you may have created.

I suspect you may need a tool to merge multiple Libraries - I have not used it but take a look at PowerPhotos.

Hi!

Hello James!
Just taking a minute to thank you profusely, working 2 jobs here, hard to get help in Belize!
I rarely get help from forums with this, I have tried.
This problem has plagued me now through several Mac deaths and subsequent hard drive removals.
I have at least 8 albums of both types and several copies..
i am ignorant and have dupliicated things in error several times, hence the Photo Stick.
probably talking 200,000 photos.
in addition to the originals HD's I have a 1TB Seagate and a 500GB Hitachi.
As to your question I just followed the prompts, exported the albums i think?
i am going to have to try and follow some of your directions now and see, have little free time.
i have blundered into the screenshot above by trial and error with just the 2 albums on this mac.
This one is on it's second screen and that let go, have it plugged into flat screen TV.
now that I know this "keyboard shortcut' I will have to hook everything up and try it with External pluggged in.
Wanted to thank you for the attempt, I will return, hopefully with progress.
Thanks a million, again, Dennis (Bzeguy)

 

[James_C]

Dennis,

Thank you for your comments - I have put together a screencast that shows you how to convert your iPhoto Libraries, your export options and then reimporting into a 'Master' Apple Photo's Library.

 

[bzeguy]

Hi James,

I gathered my courage and plugged the Seagate in, I have been foiled so many times it is daunting.
I discovered something by accident, you can drag the albums out of the External to Desktop, where they are automatically imported to Photos album?
How convenient, on my second of many to go now.
I'll be back with progress report, many thanks!

 

[mpainesyd]

Powerphotos ( https://fatcatsoftware.com/powerphotos/ ) might be useful for some of your tasks.

 

[leahyphoto]

Hi James,

I gathered my courage and plugged the Seagate in, I have been foiled so many times it is daunting.
I discovered something by accident, you can drag the albums out of the External to Desktop, where they are automatically imported to Photos album?
How convenient, on my second of many to go now.
I'll be back with progress report, many thanks!

For this to work I think you need to go to System Preferences/Apple ID/iCloud Drive/Options, and check that 'Desktop & Documents Folder' is enabled. You may have been advised to turn this off by Tyler Stalman on YouTube.

 

[leahyphoto]

For this to work I think you need to go to System Preferences/Apple ID/iCloud Drive/Options, and check that 'Desktop & Documents Folder' is enabled. You may have been advised to turn this off by Tyler Stalman on YouTube.

 

[jparker402]

Dennis,

Thank you for your comments - I have put together a screencast that shows you how to convert your iPhoto Libraries, your export options and then reimporting into a 'Master' Apple Photo's Library.

Wow! Really nice presentation got answer a question! I don't have the problem but glad I watched!!