Photo management/organization on MAC desktop

[mattspace]

FWIW I just store my photos in folders with a y/m/d hierarchy for each type of camera (or negative scanner) I have used over time, then use saved searches (kind:document) made in the appropriate place* to create filters (as needed) to view my archive in Finder:

*Go into a camera's root folder, search there, it will include subfolders, then save the search itself to wherever you want it kept - in this case the root of the Photo archive drive. Also, Finder tags are your friend for searching & organising.

 

[Alwis]

But if DAM is important, Lightroom rules. Want to see images in different folders, on different drives, control click on what you want and it all shows up in the browser window.

It probably depends, on how many photos you have, I could not live without a DAM. I used to use Aperture, now I am using C1. But regarding the DAM Aperture is still way better than C1.

I have my phots in a folder structure an my SSD, on the top level I have some main categories, like traveling, beneath that a structure by year and date. In C1 I only reference the images in the folders, which was very important to me.

The reason why I use a DAM is, that I take way more photos than I will later edit and view, for example on a long trip to Greenland I took 6000 images, of which I have edited about 600. The DAM allows for pre-selection, eg. with colors and star rating. And I can search photos e.g. by location and keywords mad limit this to the pre selection.

If you only want to use the file system I would consider Neofinder (https://www.cdfinder.de/index.html), which I use for documents and also photos.

 

[lkalliance]

I am looking for software that can be used to organize & manage my 10k photo collection (just personal pictures from multiple years not anything professional). For many years, I have used iPhotos then Photos but DO NOT want to "curate" my photos within each library. Also, I DO NOT want to store them on the Cloud. I want to load & store my photos onto my Mac's hard drive for easy access anytime. I want to categorize them into folders or albums myself for easy viewing. I want to then be able to access them for transferring to other devices & create my own backups for later retrieval. I am not so interested in editing as much as storage & access. thanks for your recommendations.

I don't understand why Photos would require any more manual curation than maintaining a file structure. You do not need to store media from Photos in iCloud, it works fine just locally. You could also store them on a networked drive, I suppose, to give multiple Macs in the house access to the same library. And you get for free any AI categorization, face detection, etc., if you choose to use it. Plus editing, markup, display, and over-the-air display.

You also should be able to load whatever media you like to your phone or tablet over the wire. You can also sync photos from your phone's camera back into Photos over the wire, too, no cloud required.

Plus Photos has a file export that would enable you to easily export the backup into a heirarchical folder structure.

I would imagine all of this is also true of some of the other software packages mentioned.

 

[mattspace]

I don't understand why Photos would require any more manual curation than maintaining a file structure. You do not need to store media from Photos in iCloud, it works fine just locally. You could also store them on a networked drive, I suppose, to give multiple Macs in the house access to the same library. And you get for free any AI categorization, face detection, etc., if you choose to use it. Plus editing, markup, display, and over-the-air display.

You also should be able to load whatever media you like to your phone or tablet over the wire. You can also sync photos from your phone's camera back into Photos over the wire, too, no cloud required.

Plus Photos has a file export that would enable you to easily export the backup into a heirarchical folder structure.

I would imagine all of this is also true of some of the other software packages mentioned.

Photos.app has a couple of weird limitations, last I checked:

• It can't import from device to a referenced library, necessitating importing to disk, then importing again to Photos.
• It destructively renames files when importing them to a managed library, which is then not available to other library viewers.

 

[lkalliance]

Photos.app has a couple of weird limitations, last I checked:

• It can't import from device to a referenced library, necessitating importing to disk, then importing again to Photos.
• It destructively renames files when importing them to a managed library, which is then not available to other library viewers.

Good point, I agree that for someone wanting to primarily manage a hierarchical library of their own organization, particularly if you're importing first to the hierarchy and then to Photos afterwards...but from within Photos you can select any number of images and choose to export them into a hierarchical arrangement, renaming them into a formulaic name of your design, and exporting the original unmodified file in its original format.

That does assume that you have arranged you hierarchy to match what you can organize with this Photos export, and this user has an already-existing hierarchy structure, so that would be a big ask.

 

[notrack]

I use ApolloOne for that.

 

[mattspace]

I use ApolloOne for that.

I'd be tempted to look at it, if they had even a single screenshot of the app on the site...

 

[arkitect]

I'd be tempted to look at it, if they had even a single screenshot of the app on the site...

Agree, not a great showcase for their app.

There is however some decent screenshots on the App Store and it looks very capable.

But, yeah, that website. 🥴