Iphoto help

[aunkster]

Ok ,i hope im in the right forum and can explain what im looking to do ,so here it goes.

I want to copy my entire iphoto library to an external hard drive ..

i then want to delete the existing photos on the library on my mac to get me back some of my hard drive space..

then what i want to do is be able to sync any of the future photos i place on iphoto without haveing to do the entire process over.

I hope this makes sense and someone can help..

Thank you ..

 

[OldMacs4Me]

iPhoto? Boy we are talking an ancient OS here. But it seems fairly simple. Close iPhoto if it's open. Go to; Home/Pictures folder and just drag and drop the iPhoto Library onto the external drive. Then add (old) to the name of the original library in your home folder. Now while holding down the option key, open iPhoto and select the iPhoto Library that's on your external drive. Then close iPhoto

At this point you can just move to the Trash the iPhoto Library that is in your home folder. Do not empty the Trash. Log out and back in then start up iPhoto to be sure it is now directing itself to the new Library and that all is working as it should. Take some time doing that step. If all is OK then you can go ahead and empty the Trash.

 

[aunkster]

iPhoto? Boy we are talking an ancient OS here. But it seems fairly simple. Close iPhoto if it's open. Go to; Home/Pictures folder and just drag and drop the iPhoto Library onto the external drive. Then add (old) to the name of the original library in your home folder. Now while holding down the option key, open iPhoto and select the iPhoto Library that's on your external drive. Then close iPhoto

At this point you can just move to the Trash the iPhoto Library that is in your home folder. Do not empty the Trash. Log out and back in then start up iPhoto to be sure it is now directing itself to the new Library and that all is working as it should. Take some time doing that step. If all is OK then you can go ahead and empty the Trash.

Im not sure what you mean by ancient ,its on my m1 24 inch imac ?

 

[OldMacs4Me]

I assumed when you said iPhoto you meant a system from about the Snow Leopard or maybe Lion era. I know by the time elCapitan rolled out it was being called Photos, although the advice stands for Photos as well. Will leave it up to others to say if my advice still applies to the more bleeding edge Macs as my handle pretty much sums up where my knowledge base lies.

 

[aunkster]

I assumed when you said iPhoto you meant a system from about the Snow Leopard or maybe Lion era. I know by the time elCapitan rolled out it was being called Photos, although the advice stands for Photos as well. Will leave it up to others to say if my advice still applies to the more bleeding edge Macs as my handle pretty much sums up where my knowledge base lies.

Sorry ,i should have said photos

 

[chown33]

Here's an Apple support article about what you requested:

Move your Photos library to save space on your Mac - Apple Support

To save storage space on your Mac, you can move your Photos library to a different storage device.

support.apple.com

If you have any questions after reading that article, and before trying what it describes, feel free to ask them here.

 

[Fishrrman]

Moving your Photos library to an external drive is easy, as described above.

BUT... something you MUST be aware of:
Now that you're using an external drive for storage, you must also BACK UP that drive to a backup drive as well.

Having data that exists on ONE drive IS NOT ENOUGH.
You need at least one backup... or... in a moment of failure... all your photos could be... gone.

I recommend buying another drive of the same size.
You don't have to leave the backup connected all the time.
Use either CarbonCopyCloner or SuperDuper to regularly "clone" the contents of the source drive to the backup.
Then... you'll be protected.

 

[OldMacs4Me]

Or since you now know where your Photos Library resides, a simple drag and drop to that second external is another super easy possibility.

 

[aunkster]

Moving your Photos library to an external drive is easy, as described above.

BUT... something you MUST be aware of:
Now that you're using an external drive for storage, you must also BACK UP that drive to a backup drive as well.

Having data that exists on ONE drive IS NOT ENOUGH.
You need at least one backup... or... in a moment of failure... all your photos could be... gone.

I recommend buying another drive of the same size.
You don't have to leave the backup connected all the time.
Use either CarbonCopyCloner or SuperDuper to regularly "clone" the contents of the source drive to the backup.
Then... you'll be protected.

this is what im trying to figure out because I use time machine ,so I need to have my photo library in the cloud and I want to be able to somehow sync the photos from my iMac hard drive to my iCloud external drive...sorry..this is so hard to explain ..