IPhoto ate all my media

Question

I don't like iPhoto and I don't use it. I had a directory of 3000 photos and movies. Apparently after a recent update, iPhoto ate all of those media. They then appeared in iPhoto and NOT on my disk. When I tried to export them back to my disk, iPhoto repeatedly popped up warnings that the original item could not be found. After 10 minutes about 40 photos had been exported. My Time Machine backup apparently does not go far enough, because the older Pictures directories are not accessible, even though my backup drive has 450 GB free.
I understand none of this behavior. How can I recover my media?
Thank you.

Answer 1

There is no way that iPhoto can eat your media. It has no ability to import data at all without user intervention - simply, either you or someone else imported the material to iPhoto.
Next: When it was imported, your original files weren't touched. iPhoto copies files on import (in the Managed state) so at worst you would have two copies. It simply has no way to move them. But in this case the warnings you're getting about being unable to find the original items tells us that when these images were imported they were imported in Referenced mode - i.e. a link to the files was created in their location, they were not copied.
So, iPhoto did not import these images by itself, and even if - miraculously - it had, it eould not have moved, altered or changed your original files in their own location.
So, I'm not sure what problem you're having, but it has nothing to do with iPhoto. I'd ask for help on a Time Machine forum.