Photos app: Stuck at "Downloading original photo"

[ch475]

Select all your photos. Right Click (or control Click) and select "Play Slideshow". It will force to download. Solved.

Thank you bertan for the hint, selecting all (85'000) photos and starting a slideshow showed a lot of errors in the log console. Especially the raw photos from my Nikon Coolpix 5400 seem to be no longer supported in Catalina and prevent Photo to complete it's downloads. I'm now converting those unsupported NEFs to fine working DNGs and see if that helps. Probably I have to fix other photos that show errors in the log.

PS: Finding the affected photos in the Photos app is since macOS Catalina a bit demanding. In the log console and the library all assets (like photos, videos, etc.) are referenced with a UUIDs (e.g. A92A8F30-CA44-42CE-8F00-D5CFA4232768). Their corresponding filenames (e.g. DSCN2268.NEF) are "hidden" in Photos database (˜/Pictures/Fotos-Mediathek.photoslibrary/database/photos.db). But only this filename is searchable in the Photos app. So to lookup the corresponding filename I opened the photos.db with SQLiteStudio (and closed the Photos app before to avoid conflicts). The UUID seems to be stored in table ZGENERICASSET column ZUUID where column ZADDITIONALATTRIBUTES points to the primary key Z_PK in table ZADDITIONALASSETATTRIBUTES where column ZORIGINALFILENAME shows the original filename. Just to let you all know how to find assets in error that can prevent Photos from running normal...

PS2: Be aware that when reimporting those NEFs as DNGs all GPS metadata is lost (at least in my workflow). I had to embed those GPS tags with exiftool into the DNGs from their XMP sidecar files... (e.g. exiftool -fixBase -m -tagsfromfile %d/%f.xmp ./*.dng -o output/)

This update to Catalina is keeping me quite busy...

 

[ch475]

I just realized, that finding matching filenames for certain UUIDs is much easier with the osxphotos tool from Rhet Turnbull

osxphotos query --uuid BAED1784-BD38-41B4-8710-38E9D5512D7A

 

[Razorbill]

Select all your photos. Right Click (or control Click) and select "Play Slideshow". It will force to download. Solved.

Thanks!!

 

[MsJasmine]

Select all your photos. Right Click (or control Click) and select "Play Slideshow". It will force to download. Solved.

You are SO AWESOME!! This has been driving me nuts! This fix totally worked!!! Thank you!

 

[Marla13]

I realise this is an older thread but I'm having the same problem (I'm using OS Mojave version 10.14.6)-have created a new Photos System library and it's been stuck on

since yesterday morning! Over 24 hours and it hasn't downloaded anything more. In iCloud I have in the region of 35,000 photos and over 4,000 videos so I know for certain that the job is not done! Does anyone have any suggestions? I have read below in other replies that some of you have found that by closing the lid of your laptop, this has solved the problem. I haven't tried that yet. I am using an external drive for my library-would closing the lid not cause my Macbook Air to think the drive has been ejected?

Do you have any other suggestions? Is it possible I might need to abort procedure and try to create a new system library with "optimise mac storage" ticked to see if this solves the problem? Truthfully, I have *always* had the latter box ticked-this is the first time I've created a system library with "download originals..." and it just seems to be stuck...but so stuck...for a day.

Thank you for any advice you can provide...

Hi,

I just noticed a bug in the Photos app. When I take a photo with my iPhone it gets uploaded properly and I also see it in the Photos app on my MacBook Pro but at the bottom it tells me "1 original photo downloading" (don’t know the exact translation). This message stays there for quite some time even when I have the MacBook Pro plugged in. The strange thing: Even when I take multiple photos with my iPhone it does NOT say something like "5 original photos downloading". Instead the app still only mentions 1 photo.

Anyone else also encountering this behavior?

Tested it also with my father's MacBook and his iPhone and there the original photos get downloaded instantly (right after the photo appears in the app it mentions "Up to date" at the bottom.

Best wishes
Chris

 

[MsJasmine]

I realise this is an older thread but I'm having the same problem (I'm using OS Mojave version 10.14.6)-have created a new Photos System library and it's been stuck on
View attachment 928971

since yesterday morning! Over 24 hours and it hasn't downloaded anything more. In iCloud I have in the region of 35,000 photos and over 4,000 videos so I know for certain that the job is not done! Does anyone have any suggestions? I have read below in other replies that some of you have found that by closing the lid of your laptop, this has solved the problem. I haven't tried that yet. I am using an external drive for my library-would closing the lid not cause my Macbook Air to think the drive has been ejected?

Do you have any other suggestions? Is it possible I might need to abort procedure and try to create a new system library with "optimise mac storage" ticked to see if this solves the problem? Truthfully, I have *always* had the latte box ticked-this is the first time I've created a system library with "download originals..." and it just seems to be stuck...but so stuck...for a day.

Thank you for any advice you can provide...

Did you try the select all and create slideshow method listed above? It forces them all to download. I had the same problem, also running Mojave, and it worked for me right away.

 

[Marla13]

Did you try the select all and create slideshow method listed above? It forces them all to download. I had the same problem, also running Mojave, and it worked for me right away.

Hi MsJasmine-thanks for your reply. Yes, I did try that but nothing happened. What I find odd is that the "size" in GB of my Photos library keeps increasing, very incrementally and slowly (super slowly) in Finder....but I don't see the # of photos or videos increasing at the bottom of "Moments" or "Photos". 🤷‍♀️ I'm at a loss.

NB: I just tried to create and play slideshow (again) & this time Photos "unexpectedly quit". I'm going to re-open and try again. Will report back shortly or in the morning (I'm in the UK). Thanks for your help.

 

[Marla13]

OK-so it didn't work. Photos App kept "quitting". I'm going to abort procedure and create a new Photos System library and this time choose optimise Mac storage and see what happens. I'll update over the next day or so.

 

[Marla13]

So I created a new Photos library yesterday, left it to download overnight, and woke up to find this: it says "updating" and nothing has downloaded from the cloud yet. This process has never taken this long in the past-by now I would have seen "something". I'm not sure what to do-I've ordered a new external drive, thinking it maybe my drive? I'm still using Mojave (just as a reminder).

 

[Thescoot]

Add me to the list. And it is using a ton of data downloading “something”. Way over my 1.2tb limit on xfinity this month because of it.

 

[Marla13]

Hi Thescoot, sorry to hear you're having similar problems. In the end, I reverted back to my original library and as per the recommendation of the Apple advisor-I left it to do its thing-for two weeks! and finally, all of my photos downloaded from the cloud. Maybe give it some more time, though I can see you're having a data allowance issue too. Not sure what to suggest.

 

[garethjs]

From some testing I've found that if I take a photo on my iPhone with my MacBook Air awake and plugged in the photo appears in the photos app and is downloaded at the same time so I don't get the downloading original message.

Now if I'm taking photos on the go and then come back home and wake up my Mac, it updates the library with the low quality version (which is by default what most people have it on in settings, "optimise storage") but if I have it set to download originals, this is where you get the message 'downloading x originals" but then I believe based on various factors downloads it at its own timing. Perhaps battery % matter despite even being plugged in.

I'm at 50% right now and its plugged in so I'll observe a couple of minutes when my 3 original photos will finish downloading.

I suppose photos figures the low-quality version is there regardless so if u wanted to view it u would click on it and you will be presented with the full Quality version so what's the rush

When this happens, the download x originals becomes one number lower.

edit:

somewhere between 60-65% it downloaded the originals 3

I took 5 photos with my iPhone now. With photos open on the Mac, it pulled it all in and no downloading x originals message.

 

[WilliamDu]

Incredible that anyone caring about their iTunes files, artwork or photos still keeps upgrading to Catalina with these forums available, reporting what happens when you try it.
Fortunately, my iMacs are old enough that they won't run Big Sur, so I won't be tempted to touch that either.
Mojave works fine.
If it ain't broke, don't fix it.
Walls are harder than heads.

 

[garethjs]

So after a few days of testing on my MacBook Air 2020...

Regardless of battery % and even at 100%, if the device is NOT connected to the charger photos will not download the original full sized versions. It will however download the thumbnail and will pull down the full quality version if you open the image. So this is where you will see the "downloading x original... pause downloading"

Perhaps the wording used could be better, such as "connect to power to resume downloading" but the unpause/pause does nothing whilst it is on battery.

I'm going to bet the same applies for iOS and iPadOS if "download original version" is selected in settings.

Now with the MacBook plugged in and the battery % above a sufficiently charged figure (~60%) will the downloads of the full res version resume.

I suppose this does make sense. You wouldn't want unnecessary drainage whilst on battery. And if need be, high res versions are available on demand.

 

[Mattyman]

my macbook pro behaves in the exact same way. I thought something was wrong but this is reassuring. It is not clear anywhere you need to connect to power for full downloads.

BR

 

[WTFadelic]

My clean install of Mac OS Big Sur on an M1 Macbook Air was stuck "Downloading 6 Originals". It would not download new photos.

I was able to solve this issue by clearing my recently items deleted.

Photos>Erase Deleted Items