Iphoto cannot find original photo

I cannot open photo files in iphoto from pictures I have imported the photos several years ago. I'm just sick...these are old family pictures I want to use. iPhoto can't find the original...what the heck...it's popping up for me to see I just can't do anything. I don't have the original files that were used to import. HELP!

What are you seeing when you try to view a full size photo? An exclamation point in a triangle or just a black window?
Make a temporary, backup copy (select the library and type Command+D) and apply the two fixes below in order as needed:
Fix #1
Launch iPhoto with the Command+Option keys held down and rebuild the library.
Since only one option can be run at a time start with Option #1, followed by #3 and then #4 as needed..
Fix #2
Using iPhoto Library Manager to Rebuild Your iPhoto Library
Download iPhoto Library Manager and launch.
Click on the Add Library button, navigate to your Home/Pictures folder and select your iPhoto Library folder.
Now that the library is listed in the left hand pane of iPLM, click on your library and go to the File ➙ Rebuild Library menu option
In the next window name the new library and select the location you want it to be placed.
Click on the Create button.
Note: This creates a new library based on the LIbraryData.xml file in the library and will recover Events, Albums, keywords, titles and comments but not books, calendars or slideshows. The original library will be left untouched for further attempts at fixing the problem or in case the rebuilt library is not satisfactory.
OT

Similar Messages

Error message when compiling book "file is corrupt" referring to a photo. Or "cannot find original photo". Can you use photos that have been "edited" out of "Book Mode"?

Error message when compiling book "file is corrupt" referring to a photo. Or "cannot find original photo". Can you use photos that have been "edited" out of "Book Mode"?

I did copy it to my desktop, but it still won't let me open it. I think the file on the disc might be corrupt or something like that though the cd itself checks out fine as far as viruses go. I was able to verify the disc, but that's about it. My husband tried it on his iMac and we have the same issue. It's unzipping the folder, but won't let us open the folder on both the Mac Book Pro or the iMac by double clicking, going to file/open or right clicking. It just keeps saying the same message as I posted above. I think I'm just going to have the client put the pictures on either a memory card or a USB memory stick so she won't have to compress the files for zipping purposes. It's been too frustrating trying to open this folder on this cd she gave me. She said she created/zipped the cd on her Mac Book Pro but it sure won't open on mine.

I downloaded 200 photos, an event folder was created, I could see all the photos and was in the process of editing them when I got a message that iPhoto unexpectedly quit. I cannot find the photos anywhere on my computer now. Is there anything to do?

I downloaded 200 photos, an event folder was created, I could see all the photos and was in the process of editing them when I got a message that iPhoto unexpectedly quit. I cannot find the photos anywhere on my computer now. Is there anything to do?

Option 1
Back Up and try rebuild the library: hold down the command and option (or alt) keys while launching iPhoto. Use the resulting dialogue to rebuild. Choose to Repair Database. If that doesn't help, then try again, this time using Rebuild Database.
If that fails:
Option 2
Download iPhoto Library Manager and use its rebuild function. (In Library Manager it's the FIle -> Rebuild command)
This will create an entirely new library. It will then copy (or try to) your photos and all the associated metadata and versions to this new Library, and arrange it as close as it can to what you had in the damaged Library. It does this based on information it finds in the iPhoto sharing mechanism - but that means that things not shared won't be there, so no slideshows, books or calendars, for instance - but it should get all your events, albums and keywords, faces and places back.
Because this process creates an entirely new library and leaves your old one untouched, it is non-destructive, and if you're not happy with the results you can simply return to your old one.
Regards
TD

When I try to open iPhoto, a message comes up saying "What photo Library do you want iPhoto to use?" I cannot find my photos anywhere now!!! HELP!!!

When I try to open iPhoto, a message comes up saying "What photo Library do you want iPhoto to use?" I cannot find my photos anywhere now!!! HELP!!!

Hi Thomas,
I actually just found my photo library in the trash????? I have no idea how they got there, but I have moved them back to the Picture folder and all is well again.
Thanks for replying to my post.
Cheers,
Kathryn.

Every time I open iPhoto a window opens telling me that there are 3 photos that have not been imported. Recovered folders are opened with no photos and I cannot find which photos have not been imported. Help please!

Every time I open iPhoto a window opens telling me that there are 3 photos that have not been imported. This happens twice. When I answer yes then nothing happens and if I answer no then a recovered folder is opened with no photos in it. These recoverable folders keep opening with no photos in them. I cannot find which photos have not been imported. Can anyone assist please?

Go to your Pictures Folder and find the iPhoto Library there. Right (or Control-) Click on the icon and select 'Show Package Contents'. A finder window will open with the Library exposed.
Look there for a Folder called 'Import' or 'Importing'.
Drag it to the Desktop. *Make no other changes*.
Start iPhoto. Does that help?
If it does then look inside that folder on your desktop. Does it contain anything you want? If not you can trash the folder.

IPhoto cannot find older pictures in hi res

After recent update(s) iPhoto '11 cannot find older photos in hi res. The thumbnails are still there but the original photos are not. At least not visible for iPhoto. Where do I find them? It doesn't help trying to use other libraries. Finder shows two identical iPhoto Libraries but none of them contain hi res pictures.

That seems to suggest the possibility that the iPhoto preferences were set to run as a "referenced" library during that time?
If you have the names of some of them you can try searching for them using Find Any File. FAF can search areas that Spotlight can't, like in packages, invisible folder, etc.
Run a search on your boot drive first. If no full sized photos with that name are found change the searched drive to your Time Machine drive and try again. This search will much longer than on your boot drive do to the TM organization.
This can tell you if there's any copy of that photo in your TM. If not there's nothing you can do. .
OT

Ugh tI have gray thumbnails of my photos. I cannot find my photos through the finder. what do I do?

I have gray thumbnails of my photos. I cannot find my photos through the finder. what do I do?

I have gray thumbnails of my photos. I cannot find my photos through the finder.
Gray thumbnils:
Back Up and try rebuild the library: hold down the command and option (or alt) keys while launching iPhoto. Use the resulting dialogue to rebuild. Include the options to rebuild the thumbnails. It may take three or four goes to work.
Finding the Photos through the Finder.
It's not supported. Accessing the files via the Finder can lead to a corrupted Library.
There are many, many ways to access your files in iPhoto: You can use any Open / Attach / Browse dialogue. On the left there's a Media heading, your pics can be accessed there. Command-Click for selecting multiple pics.
(Note the above illustration is not a Finder Window. It's the dialogue you get when you go File -> Open)
You can access the Library from the New Message Window in Mail:
There's a similar option in Outlook and many, many other apps. If you use Apple's Mail, Entourage, AOL or Eudora you can email from within iPhoto.
If you use a Cocoa-based Browser such as Safari, you can drag the pics from the iPhoto Window to the Attach window in the browser.
If you want to access the files with iPhoto not running:
For users of 10.6 and later: You can download a free Services component from MacOSXAutomation which will give you access to the iPhoto Library from your Services Menu.
Using the Services Preference Pane you can even create a keyboard shortcut for it.
For Users of 10.4 and 10.5 Create a Media Browser using Automator (takes about 10 seconds) or use this free utility Karelia iMedia Browser
Other options include:
Drag and Drop: Drag a photo from the iPhoto Window to the desktop, there iPhoto will make a full-sized copy of the pic.
File -> Export: Select the files in the iPhoto Window and go File -> Export. The dialogue will give you various options, including altering the format, naming the files and changing the size. Again, producing a copy.
Show File: a. On iPhoto 09 and earlier: Right- (or Control-) Click on a pic and in the resulting dialogue choose 'Show File'. A Finder window will pop open with the file already selected. 3.b.
b: On iPhoto 11 and later: Select one of the affected photos in the iPhoto Window and go File -> Reveal in Finder -> Original. A Finder window will pop open with the file already selected.

I cannot find a photo I did a lot of work to create. I have several library files that look similar but I found that at least one photo is not in both. Can I somehow merge these libraries. Can someone tell me how.

I cannot find a photo I did a lot of work to create. I have several libraries that look similar but I found at least one photo that was in one and not the others. Can someone tell me if I can merge these libraries, and how, and what to watch for that might cause problems.

the paid version of iPhoto library manager can merge libraries safely
Why do you have several libraries? Why are you not just using the one that has what you want?
LN

Lost all photos on my iPhoto and get the ERROR WRITING TO DISK when trying to reload from Time Machine. iPhoto cannot import your photos because there was a problem writing to the volume containing your iPHOTO LIBRARY . Looking for solution.

Lost all photos on my iPhoto and get the ERROR WRITING TO DISK when trying to reload from Time Machine. iPhoto cannot import your photos because there was a problem writing to the volume containing your iPHOTO LIBRARY . Looking for solution.

Problems such as yours are sometimes caused by files that should belong to you but are locked or have wrong permissions. This procedure will check for such files. It makes no changes and therefore will not, in itself, solve your problem.
First, empty the Trash, if possible.
Triple-click anywhere in the line below on this page to select it, then copy the selected text to the Clipboard by pressing the key combination command-C:
find ~ $TMPDIR.. $ -flags +sappnd,schg,uappnd,uchg -o ! -user $UID -o ! -perm -600 $ 2>&- | wc -l | pbcopy
Launch the built-in Terminal application in any of the following ways:
☞ Enter the first few letters of its name into a Spotlight search. Select it in the results (it should be at the top.)
☞ In the Finder, select Go ▹ Utilities from the menu bar, or press the key combination shift-command-U. The application is in the folder that opens.
☞ Open LaunchPad. Click Utilities, then Terminal in the icon grid.
Paste into the Terminal window (command-V). The command may take a noticeable amount of time to run. Wait for a new line ending in a dollar sign ($) to appear.
The output of the command will be a number. It's automatically copied to the Clipboard. Please paste it into a reply.
The Terminal window doesn't show the output. Please don't copy anything from there.

HT1386 When trying to down load photos I get this message: iPhoto cannot import your photos because there was a problem downloading an image. What should I do to restore syncing my phone?

I can't sync my iPhone 4 photos with my deck top. It all just stoped working. When trying to sync photos I get the following message:
iPhoto cannot import your photos because there was a problem downloading an image.
What do I need to do to get the syncing process back to normal?

Hi there obywon!
I have an article for you that can help you find some other ways to import those pictures from your iPhone onto your computer. You should try a couple of different programs that would import the photos into your computer. This first article can tell you the different programs that you will want to try when attempting to import photos:
iOS: Importing personal photos and videos from iOS devices to your computer
http://support.apple.com/kb/ht4083
If you are still having issues with importing those photos, you will want to see this article for next steps on resolving this issue:
iOS: Unable to import photos to computer
http://support.apple.com/kb/ts3195
Thanks for using the Apple Support Communities!
Cheers,
Braden

I am unable to download all photos to computer. At a certain photo I get the following message: IPhoto cannot import your photos because there was a problem downloading an image. How can I go around this image

I am unable to import all photos to IPhoto on computer. At a certain photo the following message appears: IPhoto cannot import your photos
because there was a problem downloading an image. How can I circumvent this particular image and import all other photos?

I'm having the same issue. i have imported everything but the offending photo from my iPhone. problem is, with over 5000 pics, i have no idea how to find THAT ONE pic that won't import (bc I just get a greyed out pic image - with no data in iPhoto)
any idea how to get "date taken" info of THAT ONE pic out of iPhoto (or any metadata) so I don't have to search 3 years of pictures?
and I do apologize for hijacking.

I have IPhoto version 9.5.1. I cannot export pictures, the following message appears: "iPhoto cannot import your photos because there is not enough free space on the volume containing your iPhoto library." What am I suppose to do? I have a Mac mini.

I have IPhoto version 9.5.1. I cannot export pictures since the following message appears: "iPhoto cannot import your photos because there is not enough free space on the volume containing your iPhoto library." What am I suppose to do? I have a Mac mini which properly used can perform any reasonable task, the problem is I do not know what to do.
Any help will be appreciated.

Hmm... that was labelled:
As a Test:
In bold and all
Try repair the main Library:
Option 1
Back Up and try rebuild the library: hold down the command and option (or alt) keys while launching iPhoto. Use the resulting dialogue to rebuild. Choose to Repair Database. If that doesn't help, then try again, this time using Rebuild Database.
If that fails:
Option 2
Download iPhoto Library Manager and use its rebuild function. (In early versions of Library Manager it's the File -> Rebuild command. In later versions it's under the Library menu.)
This will create an entirely new library. It will then copy (or try to) your photos and all the associated metadata and versions to this new Library, and arrange it as close as it can to what you had in the damaged Library. It does this based on information it finds in the iPhoto sharing mechanism - but that means that things not shared won't be there, so no slideshows, books or calendars, for instance - but it should get all your events, albums and keywords, faces and places back.
Because this process creates an entirely new library and leaves your old one untouched, it is non-destructive, and if you're not happy with the results you can simply return to your old one.
Regards
TD

HT4890 i cannot find my photos on iCloud

i have photostream set up on my phone, i have wifi turned on on my phone. i log into icloud and cannot find my photos. i open iphoto on my macbook pro and cannot find my photostream photos from my phone. whe

Open iPhoto and click "Photo Stream" (under "Recent").

Cannot find photostream photos

I enabled photostream import in Iphoto. I can now see the photostream pictures in iphoto. I am trying to locate the files in my finder and i cannot find the photos imported from photostream anywhere. I cannot find any information on how to find them.

Welcome to the Apple Community.
The photos are kept in the iPhoto Library bundle, but you don't want to be messing around inside there. Why do you need to find the originals, if you simply need a copy outside of iPhoto just export the photos or drag them to your desktop.

I just upgraded my iPad from 4.3.3 to the newest - I think 6.1.3. I cannot find my photos and videos. I tried a restore, but after 3 hours, it's timing out. Pardon my ignorance on asking this question; but is there a way to find my photos?

I just upgraded my iPad from 4.3.3 to the newest - I think 6.1.3. I cannot find my photos and videos. I tried a restore, but after 3 hours, it's timing out. Pardon my ignorance on asking this question; but is there a way to find my photos? I do nto care about anythign else.
Here are the steps I though I took this morning:
Backup iPad
Connect to iTunes and downlaod newest version of iTunes and then newest iOS
restart Vista Laptop
upgrade to newest iOS
I knew somethign was wrong when it took about 6 hours to upgrade the iPad
at the end it errored with this message error (-50), but the upgrade worked
I was expecting to see all my photos but didn't see them
I have tried a restore to a back up 2 times. The first time took 3 hours and just sort of timed out - it kept saying that there was an hour to go
I tried it again 2 hours ago and same message.
They are very valuable to me and so now I am panicking
Your help is much appreciated

Hi Eric Ferguson,
Thanks for using Apple Support Communities.
For troubleshooting on this, take a look at this article:
iTunes: Specific update-and-restore error messages and advanced troubleshooting
http://support.apple.com/kb/ts3694
Error 13, 14, 35 and 50 (or -50)
These errors are typically resolved by performing one or more of the steps listed below:
Perform USB isolation troubleshooting, including trying a different USB port directly on the computer. See the advanced steps below for USB troubleshooting.
Put a USB 2.0 hub between the device and the computer.
Try a different USB 30-pin dock-connector cable.
Eliminate third-party security software conflicts.
There may be third-party software installed that modifies your default packet size in Windows by inserting one or more TcpWindowSize entries into your registry. Your default packet size being set incorrectly can cause this error. Contact the manufacturer of the software that installed the packet-size modification for assistance. Or, follow this article by Microsoft: How to reset Internet Protocol (TCP/IP) to reset the packet size back to the default for Windows.
Connect your computer directly to your Internet source, bypassing any routers, hubs, or switches. You may need to restart your computer and modem to get online.
Try to restore from another known-good computer and network.
Best of luck,
Mario

Iphoto cannot find original photo

Similar Messages

Maybe you are looking for