Merge two iPhoto libraries into an Aperture library for my Macbook Air

Hey,
I've searched around a bit for this but can't seem to figure out how to to it.
I'm trying to manage my ~140GB photo library on my Macbook Air which has 128GB of HDD. On top of that, you can imagine that most of that 128GB is filled with system stuff.
My objective is to keep most of my library offline from the Macbook Air, but still keep it all together.
I kinda went "all-in" with iPhoto a few years back to organize my photos so gave up on Aperture. I'd always wanted to move to Aperture or Lighroom but the migration appeared to be a complete disaster. Now with "transparent" compatibility it seems like a no brainer to get the best of both worlds.
I thought that Aperture allowed you store files on external hard drives but still have "thumbnail" access to them even when the drive wasn't connected. Or did I misread that? (Is that Lightroom?)
Anyway with the new update I thought that I could merge my available iPhoto libraries into one Aperture library that I could always have access to, while offloading the actual photos somehow to an external HDD.
This would be a real winner for me. It seems tho that an iPhoto library stays an iPhoto library. So while merging might be helpful for someone with a big hard drive, it's completely useless for me as if anything, I need to split. Or create more. Or some other form of adding complexity.
Any ideas here?

Figured this out on my own.
Make a backup of everything - Aperture seems to require rebuilds and stuff and stories abound of "things going a bit wrong."
Did you make a backup? If you don't want to or can't, I wouldn't do this. After all, it's your photos!
Setup your Aperture library on a USB drive.
Update iphoto to the newest version. Open all your libraries in iPhoto to update them. This may take awhile depending on library size.
Import whatever iphoto libraries you have to Aperture. This make take awhile (hours!) - if your stuff is more than say 25 gigs I'd recommend setting it up for overnight.
Once everything is in Aperture - check its all working right. Then go ahead and maybe make another backup
Then migrate your photos out of the library. This takes all the originals and stores them elsewhere, called "offline". Once they're there, you can't move them around, so pick a good spot!! This also takes forever.
Once this is done your Aperture library should be smaller and just copy it to your MacbookAir
I'm still working on this as it looks like something went funky and I have to rebuild my thumbnails, another overnight processing thing. Like I said, keep a backup But I have a slimmed down Library on my Macbook Air now which is what I wanted.
This whole thing is kinda a mess and while it's feasible Apple hasn't made it easy. There's also some crazy stuff Aperture does with thumbnails and "previews" so that they take a bunch of space up (in my case almost as much as my photos), so you might have to work with that.
The guy at Apertureexpert.com is a genius.
Check out this post for more on slimming your Aperture Library:
http://www.apertureexpert.com/tips/2010/1/20/reducing-library-sizedramatically.h tml
Edit:As a side-note I put some HTML in my message and it looks like it isn't used in the forum - why does Apple bother having the formatting tools if they don't work? Kinda like the close-door button on an elevator?
Edit2: Haha it shows up in the answer but not in the normal thread. Strange, eh?

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Merging iPhoto libraries into one aperture library

Hi,
I am trying to merge my iPhoto library containing the photos of 2013 into one big library containing all pictures of the previous years.
Until now I used iPhoto Library Manager. It did not work today.
Apperture says it will not merge because the new library is a copy of the big one, which it is not.
I have also tried to export the new pictures as a new library and then import this one. Apperture crashes everytime.
Please can someone help me?
Thank you
Hex

Aperture says it will not merge because the new library is a copy of the big one, which it is not.
You can try to circumvent this, by turning the old library into a new one: Create a new, empty Aperture library and add one dummy image to it. Then import your iPhoto 2013 library into it with "File > Import > Library".
Now try to import this transformed iPhoto Library into your main Aperture library with the photos from the previous years.
I have also tried to export the new pictures as a new library and then import this one. Apperture crashes everytime.
That is not a good sign. You should try to fix these crashes first. Does it crash when you are exporting from your iPhoto library or when you are importing the exported library?

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IS IT POSSIBLE TO MERGE TWO IPHOTO LIBRARIES?

If you have Aperture 3.3 or later and iPhoto 9.3 or later you can merge libraries with Aperture.
Otherwise the only way to merge Libraries is with the paid ($20) version of iPhoto Library Manager
It's possible to turn off caps lock too.

HT4927 Can I merge two iphoto libraries?

Can I merge two iphoto libraries? Somehow when I restored one of my libraries from my time machine backup, I got two libraries instead of one. Can I combine these?

Not with iPhoto - Aperture can o rthe purchased version of iPhoto library Manager can
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Can I blend together two iPhoto libraries? I have a library on another MAC and would love to move it to my laptop merging with the existing iPhoto. How I can do that? I just afraid to overwrite the original library.

marinamcdonagh\
Welcome to the Apple user to user assistance forums
Can I blend together two iPhoto libraries? I have a library on another MAC and would love to move it to my laptop merging with the existing iPhoto. How I can do that? I just afraid to overwrite the original library.
You need iPhoto Library Manager - http://www.fatcatsoftware.com/iplm/ - to merge iPhoto libraries
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How do I merge two Iphoto libraries

Actually it can be done on the command line. This will be quite tedious if the library you are transferring is large.
Log into the computer on which you want the merged library to reside.
Then, go to Applications->Utilities, and launch the Terminal.
At the prompt, cd to the following directory:
Lydias-MacBook-Pro:~ lydiachet$ cd Pictures/iPhoto\ Library/Auto\ Import
Now launch an ftp session with the computer where your other library resides:
Lydias-MacBook-Pro:Auto Import lydiachet$ ftp 192.168.1.36
Connected to 192.168.1.36.
220 192.168.1.36 FTP server (tnftpd 20080929) ready.
Name (192.168.1.36:lydiachet): carolchet
331 User carolchet accepted, provide password.
Password:
230 User carolchet logged in.
Remote system type is UNIX.
Using binary mode to transfer files.
On the remote computer, cd to the Masters directory in the iPhoto library:
ftp> cd Pictures/iPhoto\ Library/Masters
The directory tree from here down is listed by year, month and date, so actual directories will vary: in the example I'm looking in a directory from July 21, 2012:
ftp> cd 2012/07/21
250 CWD command successful.
ftp> ls
229 Entering Extended Passive Mode (|||62595|)
150 Opening ASCII mode data connection for '/bin/ls'.
total 0
drwxr-xr-x 12 carolchet staff 408 Jul 21 11:29 20120721-112923
226 Transfer complete.
Now cd to the only directory found here:
ftp> cd 20120721-112923
View the photo files using the ls command:
ftp> ls
229 Entering Extended Passive Mode (|||62596|)
150 Opening ASCII mode data connection for '/bin/ls'.
total 5
-rw------- 1 carolchet staff 231082 Jul 21 11:04 IMG_0035.JPG
-rw------- 1 carolchet staff 249389 Jul 21 11:04 IMG_0036.JPG
-rw------- 1 carolchet staff 253379 Jul 21 11:04 IMG_0037.JPG
-rw------- 1 carolchet staff 270819 Jul 21 11:05 IMG_0038.JPG
-rw------- 1 carolchet staff 253501 Jul 21 11:05 IMG_0039.JPG
-rw------- 1 carolchet staff 243288 Jul 21 11:05 IMG_0040.JPG
-rw------- 1 carolchet staff 248939 Jul 21 11:05 IMG_0041.JPG
-rw------- 1 carolchet staff 287363 Jul 21 11:06 IMG_0042.JPG
-rw------- 1 carolchet staff 248358 Jul 21 11:07 IMG_0044.JPG
-rw------- 1 carolchet staff 268819 Jul 21 11:08 IMG_0045.JPG
226 Transfer complete.
ftp>
from this point you can copy the files to the local computer using mget
ftp> mget *.JPG
If you have lots of pictures this will be tedious as you then need to navigate through the diretory trees until you have copied all the photos.
Good news is, next time you launch iPhoto on the local computer, it will automatically import all of the new files.

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Thanks for helping!

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If one imports one library into another library every image file in the first library, originals, thumbnails, face files, etc, get imported as an original photo. You will end up with a total mess. DO NOT IMPORT ONE LIBRARY INTO ANOTHER LIBRARY!
If you have backup copies of your libraries get them back and use iPhoto Library Manager to merge them.
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I've got a big library of photographs on my G5 and on my iBook.
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Hello....
I have recent photos on my laptop that I want to import into my main library which I have on a different desktop computer. I do not want to overwrite my main library but rather add the recent photos to it. I want them to be in a single library. Can you tell me how I would import photos from my laptop library into my desktop library? I have searched for hours on what I believe should be a very basic concept to no avail. Please help! Thanks

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TD

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OS X version 10.6.8 and iPhoto version 9.1.5 on a Macbook Pro.
Basically I just took one iPhoto library and dragged it on top of another one. I'm not sure why it even let me do this. Now I have 238gb of pictures that are in the wrong order and duplicated in some cases. I already used duplicate anihilator which seemed to get rid of some duplicates.
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Merge two iPhoto libraries into an Aperture library for my Macbook Air

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