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richard13

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Aug 1, 2008
979
658
Odessa, FL
I have been storing all photos (ones I have shot, or scanned) and ones that I have found, picked up over time in there. But I'm wondering if that's what other people do. It sort of "feels wrong" to have random photos of products I've owned, etc. in there with family and friend photos.

Do you keep these separate outside of the Photos app? Or do you keep them there and in separate albums?
 
OP: you can easily have multiple libraries with Photos (app). One could be your family & friends and another can be products you've owned, etc. Create however many libraries you want. Then load the library relevant to the next import so that the new photos or grabs go to the right place.

I have a primary library for family, another for business, etc. IMO: it's good to keep such libraries lean vs. dumping everything into one gigantic library.

If you are interested in this, go into your user Pictures folder and locate your "Photos Library". Duplicate that one and rename it whatever you want your new subset library to be called. For example, Photos-Business. Right click on it, choose open with... Photos. After it opens, delete all of the pics that are not business. When you are done, close Photos. Now open the original Photos Library and delete all of the photos you just preserved in the other library. End result would be a personal pics library and a business pics library. If more splits like that make sense to you, create another library to segregate more. Eventually, you might have 3 or 4 smaller libraries instead of one big one.

If you happen to have a stash of photos that don't naturally belong in any of those libraries, create a folder in Pictures and store them as picture files there. You could do this with MANY folders if it makes sense to you. For example, if you work with multiple clients that involves pictures and/or videos, perhaps you store them in folders with the clients name. When your work with the client is complete, maybe those move into some longer-term archive storage vs. permanently eating space in Pictures even though you are unlikely to open them any more.
 
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I keep everything together and organize things in albums.

Thank you!

OP: you can easily have multiple libraries with Photos (app). One could be your family & friends and another can be products you've owned, etc. Create however many libraries you want. Then load the library relevant to the next import so that the new photos or grabs go to the right place.

I have a primary library for family, another for business, etc. IMO: it's good to keep such libraries lean vs. dumping everything into one gigantic library.

If you are interested in this, go into your user Pictures folder and locate your "Photos Library". Duplicate that one and rename it whatever you want your new subset library to be called. For example, Photos-Business. Right click on it, choose open with... Photos. After it opens, delete all of the pics that are not business. When you are done, close Photos. Now open the original Photos Library and delete all of the photos you just preserved in the other library. End result would be a personal pics library and a business pics library. If more splits like that make sense to you, create another library to segregate more. Eventually, you might have 3 or 4 smaller libraries instead of one big one.

If you happen to have a stash of photos that don't naturally belong in any of those libraries, create a folder in Pictures and store them as picture files there. You could do this with MANY folders if it makes sense to you. For example, if you work with multiple clients that involves pictures and/or videos, perhaps you store them in folders with the clients name. When your work with the client is complete, maybe those move into some longer-term archive storage vs. permanently eating space in Pictures even though you are unlikely to open them any more.

Thank you. Yes, there are some good options here. The question being should I put everything in Photos or should I keep stuff in folders under the Pictures folder? The latter is what I was doing before moving to the Mac years ago. It seems better for quick access but you don't get all of the functionality of the Photos app. On the other hand, if I keep all my stuff in Photos I have to launch the app and hunt to find what I'm looking for. But I guess if I'm good with Albums that should be mitigated. I also like your idea of multiple libraries.

The other thing I'm a little concerned about with the Photos app is storing all my photos in what is essentially a database file. If that one file becomes corrupted I loose everything (vs. keeping them loose in the file system). But I guess the odds of that happening are low and if I have good backups it should be ok.
 
Thank you. Yes, there are some good options here. The question being should I put everything in Photos or should I keep stuff in folders under the Pictures folder? The latter is what I was doing before moving to the Mac years ago. It seems better for quick access but you don't get all of the functionality of the Photos app. On the other hand, if I keep all my stuff in Photos I have to launch the app and hunt to find what I'm looking for. But I guess if I'm good with Albums that should be mitigated.

Yes, Albums are your friend here... and "smart albums" too. Your Mother or Grandmother used to organize the family photos collection in physical photo albums. That was much harder to do than digital photos organized in virtual albums. Take the time and get them organized.

I also like your idea of multiple libraries.

Seems like towards ideal for your wants.

The other thing I'm a little concerned about with the Photos app is storing all my photos in what is essentially a database file. If that one file becomes corrupted I loose everything (vs. keeping them loose in the file system). But I guess the odds of that happening are low and if I have good backups it should be ok.

Backups are TREMENDOUSLY important. Time Machine is built into macOS or tools like Carbon Copy Cloner or Superduper work great too. And be sure that at least one backup is fresh and stored safely OFFSITE... to protect against fire-flood-theft scenarios.

In some crazy worst case where you have no way to recover from ideally multiple backups, you can also extract the photos from the libraries manually and re-import them again. But be sure you have solid backups so you don't have to jump through those kinds of hoops.
 
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Have used photoshop ever since my first digital camera in 1999. Never used any of Apple's photo software on the Mac, have always just had my own system of storing pictures in folders. They get backed up, along with all my other files, with Time Machine on a network drive, BackBlaze in the cloud and regular Carbon Copy clones to external SSD's.
 
My main photo library is family/personal only. Anything else gets exported and filed elsewhere. I keep a separate photo library for photos of things I resell on eBay. I use Eagle to store any images I collect from the web.
 
Have used photoshop ever since my first digital camera in 1999. Never used any of Apple's photo software on the Mac, have always just had my own system of storing pictures in folders. They get backed up, along with all my other files, with Time Machine on a network drive, BackBlaze in the cloud and regular Carbon Copy clones to external SSD's.
I used to use this great application called iView Media Pro that would let you leave your photos and videos exactly in whatever folder structure you wanted, but would build a really nice gallery view of the whole thing with tagging and rating tools, basic edits. Sadly got acquired by Microsoft and bit the dust probably 10 years ago.
 
It sort of "feels wrong" to have random photos of products I've owned, etc. in there with family and friend photos.
Those are good examples of photos that I do not keep in any photo library. I keep that sort of image in Finder in folders with other content (e.g. product description and manuals) related to the product.
 
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