Lost Photos with iPhoto update

I just updated to the most recent iPhoto software with my software update on my MacBook and lost all photos. I take so many photos thus do not keep them on continuous feed with iCloud and had not backed them up elsewhere! HELP!!!! Where have the photos on my harddrive gone? How can I recover these?!

what version of the OS and of iPhoto do you have? why do you think you have lost your photos? Exactly what do you see and exactly what happened and happens?
And with no backup sooner or later you sill lose everything including all of your photos - if they have any value at all to you you will get a large (2 to 2 1/2 times the size of your main drive) and start running TimeMachine all of the time - today
LN

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When trying to import photos with iPhoto from photoshop.. won't let me keeps saying that the photos are already in the iPhoto library but they are not... need to fix this

When trying to import photos with iPhoto from photoshop... won't let me keeps saying that the photos are already in the iPhoto library but they are not

If you are using Photoshop from within iPhoto the following may help with the workflow. However, we do need to know the answers to the questions posed by Terence and Larry to be able to help you.
Using Photoshop or Photoshop Elements as Your Editor of Choice in iPhoto.
1 - select Photoshop or Photoshop Elememts as your editor of choice in iPhoto's General Preference Section's under the "Edit photo:" menu.
2 - double click on the thumbnail in iPhoto to open it in Photoshop. When you're finished editing click on the Save button. If you immediately get the JPEG Options window make your selection (Baseline standard seems to be the most compatible jpeg format) and click on the OK button. Your done.
3 - however, if you get the navigation window
that indicates that PS wants to save it as a PS formatted file. You'll need to either select JPEG from the menu and save (top image) or click on the desktop in the Navigation window (bottom image) and save it to the desktop for importing as a new photo.
This method will let iPhoto know that the photo has been editied and will update the thumbnail file to reflect the edit..
With Photoshop Elements the Saving File preferences should be configured as shown:
I also suggest the Maximize PSD File Compatabilty be set to Always. In PSE’s General preference pane set the Color Picker to Apple as shown:
Screenshots are from PSE 10
Note 1: to switch between iPhoto and PS or PSE as the editor of choice Control (right)-click on the thumbnail and select either Edit in iPhoto or Edit in External Editor from the contextual menu. If you use iPhoto to edit more than PSE re-select iPhoto in the iPhoto General preference pane. Then iPhoto will be the default editor and you can use the contextual menu to select PSE for your editor when desired.
Note 2: editing a RAW file with either PSE or PS creates a new file which must be saved outside of iPhoto, i.e. the Desktop, and imported as a new photo into the iPhoto Library.

Lost photos after iPhoto library rebuild - what happened?

After noticing that there were albums entitled Recovered photos in my iPhoto library, I deleted those albums. As expected, i got a message that i was not really deleting the originals, just getting rid of such albums. There were about 5 of those "recovered albums": one contained about 30 photos; three had zero and another had over 1000 photos. Subsequent to that, thinking of making this library totally clean, I decided to do a "libraty rebuild" using the option-command rebuild procedure of iphoto. I checked all the options presented for that procedure. To my surprise, when the process was finished I had less events, and less photos. A careful visual check of the display pane of events and photos confirmed that i had lost actual photos. I tried to reclaim those lost photos with another rebuild -- this time using iphoto library manager, but without success. What happened? Is there any way to reclaim those lost photos?
I do have a backup, but would prefer to correct the problem in the original library to avoid having to assemble and clean up duplicates that i had before.
I'm using the newest version of iPhoto: 8.1 and OS X 10.5.8 on a MacBook 2.4 Ghz - 2Gb Ram - 250 GB HD, 42 GB available. My iPhoto library has over 12000 photos

Why these things happen is always difficult to answer. My experience with iPhoto is using it since v1 on with a single library that's upgraded each new versions and migrated from G4 iMac to G5 iMac to Intel iMac and then a second Intel iMac. I load photos in, my wife does and my 12 year old does too.
And never had a problem.
The database gets corrupted when the app is interrupted when writing to it. The usual causes of this include a crash, a force quit or a lost connection to the Library on an external disk. More rarely minor disk or directory damage might be a cause.
I wondered when I read your report
Subsequent to that, thinking of making this library totally clean, I decided to do a "libraty rebuild" using the option-command rebuild procedure of iphoto. I checked all the options presented for that procedure.
The options presented for that procedure include various items that require the app to read the database file plus this one
Rebuild iPhoto Library Database from automatic backup.
+I Wonder+ - I stress, I wonder, no more - if reading to rebuild various thumbnails from a file that is being vacuumed +while at the same time+ is being replaced by a backup is what caused the issue.
If it is, then the Rebuild from Back Up option should be sandboxed and not possible while the other events are going on.
But that's just a guess.
Regards
TD

How do I recover lost photos in iPhoto?

How do I recover lost photos in iPhoto? Instead of photos I have dotted borders or, in a few cases white boxes.

You could try rebuilding the database ...
Launch iPhoto while holding down the Command + Option keys.
The Photo Library First Aid window should open.
Select: Repair Database
Click: Repair
If that doesn't help, open the Finder. From the Finder menu bar click Go > Go to Folder
Type or copy paste the following:
~/Library/Preferences/com.apple.iPhoto.plist
Click Go then move the com.apple.iPhoto.plist file to the Trash.
Quit and relaunch iPhoto.
If that doesn't help, copy paste the following:
~/Library/Caches/com.apple.iPhoto/Cache.db
Click Go then move the Cache.db file to the Trash.
Quit and relaunch iPhoto.
If you do not currently have a wawy to backup your iPhoto library, you need to do that so that you can recover your photos in the event of a hard drive problem.
Help here > Mac Basics: Time Machine
message edited by: cs

How do i get my pics back from iphoto. Lost them with the update to MAC OS 10.9.4

How do I get photos back from I photo? IPhoto not compatible after MAC OS update to 10.9.4

What version of iPhoto are your running? What do you see when you open your library? Any messages?
This screenshot shows which previous versions of iPhoto are compatible with Mavericks. It also indicates which versions qualify for a free upgradeto iPhoto 9.5.1 and which require a purchase:
Note 1: every day more users are reporting problems with iPhoto 8.1.2 so I've included it in the non compatible category.
Note 2: If your previous version of iPhoto was iPhoto 7 (08) or earlier you'll need to download and run the iPhoto Library Upgrader 1.1 application on the library before opening it with iPhoto 9.5.1

How can I find a group of lost photos from iPhoto?

When a recent Mac OS X update was installed on my computer which included the new Photo App, my iPhoto upgraded to this new app and was replaced by it on my desktop. In beginning to use the new Photo App, I discovered that it did not have the same editing functions as my iPhoto did. I decided then to go back to iPhoto, but when I opened up my iPhoto I realized in my album list that I had lost about a year’s worth of photos all the way back to the middle of 2013. I then decided to restore my computer to an earlier time using Time Machine so that hopefully my iPhoto would be restored with all of its photos. I went ahead and did this and had to do a rebuild of my iPhoto library to recover the lost photos. When I did this, I was not aware, that I had still lost some other photos out of albums from early September 2014. Before I was aware of this, I also erased my external hard drive and then did a backup because I kept getting messages in my computer that the computer could not do additional back up’s because there was not room on the external hard drive.
Earlier today, I tried to retrieve some photos out of albums from that. In early September 2014 and found that the album listed the photo number but there was no thumbnail and when I clicked on the photo it just brought up a silver triangle on black with an exclamation point in the middle indicating that that photo could not be found. I did a command option press and opened up iPhoto and I completed all of the various rebuilding and restoring options all the way up to and including restored iPhoto database. When I had completed all of this I found that I was still missing those photos, several hundred. I am wondering if these photos are still on my hard drive someplace. I could not restore them from the external hard drive because I had erased earlier backup versions, as I indicated. Is it possible for me to find and restore these photos? Any assistance would be greatly appreciated. Thank you.-MP

You created a mess and there is no solution - with the actions you have taken those photos are gone unless you have access to them from some other source - they existed in two place - in your iPhoto library and on your backup drive - you have traded the backup drive and restore an earlier iPhoto library so all you have is what you have
LN

Updting iweb/crashes/iphoto also crashed & lost photos/iweb & iphoto probs.

Can someone please help me....... I updated my iwebsite this morning by adding a blog (only 5 blogs in total on site) and importing a photo from iphoto plus changing a couple of words on a photo page.
I then published which was fine.
I then went to do an additional change and publish.
A grey screen came down on the screen followed by 'restart computer' panel in 3 languages.
I restarted to find that iweb would not open and that all photos in iphoto had disappeared.
I then spent over an hour on the 'phone with the applecare protection plan customer help - we rebooted, went into an alternate account and did various other things but I was told the photos were lost and that I should reinstall iweb.
I noticed that the iphoto info still showed 602 mb (aperture shows 305 & this application is fine). Having gone through all my programmes I have now found all my photo files in Adobe Bridge.
1.Can anyone advise how I can import these back into iphoto. (Fortunately most were backed up - just the last week's work wasn't and individual files for an exhibition)
2. Can anyone advise what to do re iweb reinstallation and importing the saved iwebsite back in.
Sorry this is longwinded - should have done this in the first place rather than go to the apple care centre which hasn't resolved issue.
A big thank-you for any help or advice (I'm not a techy but can follow clear instructions!!)
Cheers
G5 Mac OS X (10.4.4) iphoto 6.06(322) iweb purchased seperately/not packaged
G5 Mac OS X (10.4.4)

If you look in your Pictures folder you should find the iPhoto Library folder. Check inside for an Originals folder and confirm that it contains your full sized image files. If so then you'll have to start afresh with a new library and import your photos from the old library as follows:
Creating a new library while preserving the rolls from the original.
Move the existing library folder to the desktop.
Launch iPhoto and, when asked, select the option to create a new library.
Drag the Originals folder from the desktop into the open iPhoto window.
This will create a new library with the same rolls as the original library. However dates on the rolls may be different but can be edited as you would the roll title.
Once this is completed you can delete the Originals folder from the desktop and the iPhoto Llibrary folder. If desired, you can keep the older library folder to try other fixes on it.
In the future I recommend you make a backup copy of the Library6.iPhoto file after each import and after doing a lot of editing and organizing in the library. Then if you experience a similar crash all you need to do is replace the damaged database file with the backup copy and you'll be back to the same place in the library as when you make the backup. See the tip at the end of my signature.
As for iWeb, locate the User/Library/Application Support/iWeb folder and look inside. Is there only one .sites file in there. If there is more than one Control-click on the largest and select the "Show Package Contents" option in the contextual menu. Check to see if the files used to build your site are there. If so move the other file out of the folder and make sure the file is named Domain.sites. Then try opening it with iWeb.
To prevent iPhoto from this again check out this tip:
TIP: For insurance against the iPhoto database corruption that many users have experienced I recommend making a backup copy of the Library6.iPhoto database file and keep it current. If problems crop up where iPhoto suddenly can't see any photos or thinks there are no photos in the library, replacing the working Library6.iPhoto file with the backup will often get the library back. By keeping it current I mean backup after each import and/or any serious editing or work on books, slideshows, calendars, cards, etc. That insures that if a problem pops up and you do need to replace the database file, you'll retain all those efforts. It doesn't take long to make the backup and it's good insurance.
I've written an Automator workflow application (requires Tiger), iPhoto dB File Backup, that will copy the selected Library6.iPhoto file from your iPhoto Library folder to the Pictures folder, replacing any previous version of it. You can download it at Toad's Cellar. Be sure to read the Read Me pdf file.

Lost photos in iPhoto? Please help?

My mac: OS X 10.8.2
My iphoto: iphoto '11 version 9.4.2
I uploaded some photos from my Canon eos 50D to iphoto. They were there that day, I was able to send a few to my friends and even watched the slideshow. So, they were definitely there.
However, today I checked the album again and they are gone.And funny how only 1 photo is left.
I checked the Masters folder and it's true that only that 1 photo is left in that folder.
I saw some other discussion about iphoto lost Canon photos.
Here are a few things I think may cause the problem:
     - I copied the iphoto library to a portable hard-drive ( WD elements ). When I connect the Canon camera to my Mac, I import the photos in the library that is IN that USB. I even remembered import the photos in my Mac, then copy that album in the USB, then delete the original album on mac from the Trash folder. Does this permanently delete those?
     - I remembered reset the date on my camera. Does this make the previous photos change somehow, and iphoto couldn't recognize them by dates?
     - I do have back up on Time Machine, but I can't restore those lost photos using the back up.
Thank anyone if you can help me with this problem

There are 9 different versions of iPhoto and they run on 9 different versions of the Operating System. The tricks and tips for dealing with issues vary depending on the version of iPhoto and the version of the OS. So to get help you need to give as much information as you can. Include things like:
- What version of iPhoto.
- What version of the Operating System.
- Details. As full a description of the problem as you can. For example, if you have a problem with exporting, then explain by describing how you are trying to export, and so on.
- History: Is this going on long? Has anything been installed or deleted? - Are there error messages?
- What steps have you tried already to solve the issue.
- Anything unusual about your set up? Or how you use iPhoto?
Anything else you can think of that might help someone understand the problem you have.

Lost photos from iphoto library

I backed up my iphoto library from my old macbook to an external hard drive and now imported it to my new imac. When I open iphoto all thumbnails show up, but when I click on a photo a black picture with an exclamation mark shows up. Some photos open fine, most won't.
I tried rebuilding iphoto with iphoto's own rebuild and with iphoto library manager, both with same results: only 2000 of my 9000 photos showed up!
I did have a problem when first time trying to move files from the external hard drive - Lacie 1tb usb- once it was unplugged without first being ejected, and also it made my computer crash few times and I had to reboot the imac. I suspect this had something to do with the lost photos.
Is there a way to get these photos back?

Welcome to the Apple Discussions.
The photos should still be in the library package file.
You may need to start over with a new Library:
Try these in order - from best option on down...
1. Do you have an up-to-date back up? If so, try copy the library6.iphoto file from the back up to the iPhoto Library (Right Click -> Show Package Contents) allowing it to overwrite the damaged file.
2. Download iPhoto Library Manager and use its rebuild function. This will create a new library based on data in the albumdata.xml file. Not everything will be brought over - no slideshows, books or calendars, for instance - but it should get all your albums and keywords 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.
3. If neither of these work then you'll need to create and populate a new library.
To create and populate a new *iPhoto 08* library:
Note this will give you a working library with the same Events and pictures as before, however, you will lose your albums, keywords, modified versions, books, calendars etc.
Move the iPhoto Library to the desktop
In the iPhoto Preferences -> Events Uncheck the box at 'Imported Items from the Finder'
Launch iPhoto. It will ask if you wish to create a new Library. Say Yes.
Go into the iPhoto Library (Right Click -> Show Package Contents) on your desktop and find the Originals folder. From the Originals folder drag the individual Event Folders to the iPhoto Window and it will recreate them in the new library.
Regards
TD
When you're sure all is well you can delete the iPhoto Library on your desktop.

Recovering all the lost photos after iPhoto 11 destroyed my iLife!!!!!

So here I am trying to import 10,000 photos back onto my overcrowded harddrive on a macbook because iPhoto doesn't like external drives. I am so ****** at Apple for dumping this piece of crap on us all. I tried to save space by moving iPhoto library onto an external drive (yes, TD, it was Mac Extended Journal, but no it was not a hard drive stuck into my macbook, it was a perfectly legitimate GoFlex Max drive on etherneted to my home network. For crissake it works for Time Machine, why not iPhoto.
The clearest thing I can figure out is the the team that dumped this crap on the market were the interns while everyone else was working on iCloud. Well, guess what, folks, if you can't figure how to share static photographs over a home network, why would you ever think I would trust my photos on the iCloud.
Thanks. I'm just hoping that between Time Machine and a little luck and can recover nearly a decade of photographs.

Terence, my question is how do I recover a decade's worth of photographs accumulated through several generations of iPhoto that have now been corrupted by iPhoto 11. I have had numerous problems with iPhoto 11 since upgrading with the latest iLife package. My Macbook runs on 10.6.8, and has a 250GB HD. My first problems were encountered after upgrading were phantom events with grey boxes where about two dozen photos from about 2000 once were. After struggling to find out why the thumbnails disappeared, and several attempts to rebuild the library, I gave up. Since 10,000 photos was taking up a chunk of my harddrive, I next decided that moving it to an external drive might solve space problems, so I followed instructions on moving an iPhoto Library to an external drive. In this case, I used a GoFlexHome NAS (Mac formatted) which is ethernet connected to a Verizon FiOS router and used a wireless connection to move it from the Macbook to the GoFlex. It took an overnight move, but it worked for several weeks. I could work with photos. After the last iPhoto update, I encountered several more mysterious problems. I imported 22 jpeg photos from a small Nikon Coolpix and they would show up in Photos and Last Import, but not in my Events. This evening I realized that the last update of iPhoto rearranged Events to "Manual" rather than "by date," so in fact, the Events were there. After reading cautions in the past few days that the external drive could not be a network drive and had to be hardwired to the macbook, I am now attempting to get the photos back on my crowded black Macbook, where I hope to regain uncorrupted access to my photos. My problem is that there are so many photos, it now says I don't have enough room on my macbook: 86GB of data in the iPhoto Library on the GoFlex, and only 79 GB on my macbook.
I am a disappointed that this last version of iPhoto has had so many problems, hence more of a rant than a question. Any advise you or others could offer would be welcome.

I can't access edited photos with iphoto

I am new to iphoto 08.
I have preferences set up to edit iphoto images with photoshop CS3. After editing a photo, I use the option save in same folder but iPhoto does not show the edited photo, just the unedited photos. I can see the location of the new photo using spotlight (the path indicates that the photo is in the same folder as the unedited photos in iPhoto) but am unable to see the photo in iPhoto.
Any ideas? Thanks, David

David:
Maybe this will help:
Using Photoshop (or Photoshop Elements) as Your Editor of Choice in iPhoto.
1 - select Photoshop as your editor of choice in iPhoto's General Preference Section's under the "Edit photo:" menu.
2 - double click on the thumbnail in iPhoto to open it in Photoshop. When you're finished editing click on the Save button. If you immediately get the JPEG Options window make your selection (Baseline standard seems to be the most compatible jpeg format) and click on the OK button. Your done.
3 - however, if you get the navigation window that indicates that PS wants to save it as a PS formatted file. You'll need to either select JPEG from the menu and save (top image) or click on the desktop in the Navigation window (bottom image) and save it to the desktop for importing as a new photo.
This method will let iPhoto know that the photo has been editied and will update the thumbnail file to reflect the edit..
NOTE: With Photoshop Elements 6 the Saving File preferences should be configured: "On First Save: Save Over Current File". Also I suggest the Maximize PSD File Compatabilty be set to Always.
If you want to use both iPhoto's editing mode and PS without having to go back and forth to the Preference pane, once you've selected PS as your editor of choice, reset the Preferences back to "Open in main window". That will let you either edit in iPhoto (double click on the thumbnail) or in PS (Control-click on the thumbnail and seledt "Edit in external editor" in the Contextual menu). This way you get the best of both worlds
2 - double click on the thumbnail in iPhoto to open it in Photoshop. When you're finished editing click on the Save button. If you immediately get the JPEG Options window make your selection (Baseline standard seems to be the most compatible jpeg format) and click on the OK button. Your done.
3 - however, if you get the navigation window that indicates that PS wants to save it as a PS formatted file. You'll need to either select JPEG from the menu and save (top image) or click on the desktop in the Navigation window (bottom image) and save it to the desktop for importing as a new photo.
This method will let iPhoto know that the photo has been editied and will update the thumbnail file to reflect the edit..
TIP: For insurance against the iPhoto database corruption that many users have experienced I recommend making a backup copy of the Library6.iPhoto (iPhoto.Library for iPhoto 5 and earlier) database file and keep it current. If problems crop up where iPhoto suddenly can't see any photos or thinks there are no photos in the library, replacing the working Library6.iPhoto file with the backup will often get the library back. By keeping it current I mean backup after each import and/or any serious editing or work on books, slideshows, calendars, cards, etc. That insures that if a problem pops up and you do need to replace the database file, you'll retain all those efforts. It doesn't take long to make the backup and it's good insurance.
I've created an Automator workflow application (requires Tiger or later), iPhoto dB File Backup, that will copy the selected Library6.iPhoto file from your iPhoto Library folder to the Pictures folder, replacing any previous version of it. It's compatible with iPhoto 6 and 7 libraries and Tiger and Leopard. iPhoto does not have to be closed to run the application, just idle. You can download it at Toad's Cellar. Be sure to read the Read Me pdf file.
Note: There now an Automator backup application for iPhoto 5 that will work with Tiger or Leopard.

Tip for Finding Lost Photos from iPhoto

Wow, what a surprise. After rebuilding my library and still not finding my lost photos, I installed Picasa for Mac, and voila, it found every photo on my hard drive I'd ever done and in warp speed! I couldn't believe it, I had just about given up! It was easy then to transfer them to iPhoto which I am much more familiar with for editing and emailing.

Bonnie,
thanks for your answer here about picasa which I have downloaded and watching all my images flash by. And I think I am through with iphoto. The hours I have spent every time it decides not to open and even all the hints here about rebuilding etc. nothing was useful or it was for one or two times. I'll just have to get used to picasa. I am sure the time will be better spent there than hours lost like today. I wanted to add pictures to a pages document only to find iphoto library empty and the one I had copied stopped at 2010. I am a photographer so you know I've done lots since 2010. You are a lifesaver. Much gratitude for you.

Impossible to sync photos with iPhoto

It is no longer possible to sync photos using iPhoto. With Aperture everything works well.
iPhone 3GS with iOS4 not JB, iTunes 9.2, MAC OSX 10.6.4

I found the problem. This is a new bug introduced in 8.1 of iPhoto.
According to iPhotoManager:
Another recently introduced problem, which appears to only happen with iPhoto 8.1, has to do with music that you've assigned to a custom slideshow. If you have created a slideshow in iPhoto, and using the "Settings" button, have assigned a song from your iTunes library to be played with that slideshow, then if that song has an ampersand (&) character anywhere in the path to the music file (this can include the name of the artist, the album, or the song itself), iPhoto does not write it out correctly to the XML file and you get an error. If you do have a music file assigned to a slideshow, you will either need to assign a different song, or remove any ampersands in the path to the song and re-select the same song in iPhoto to update it to the new location. (make sure to click "Apply" in the settings window to make your change "stick").
This was my problem. I had a song from Simon & Garfunkel in a slideshow and the Path to the song had the & that was malformed.
I removed the slideshow and I am now working.
Apple please fix this bug. I wasted over 5 hours until I went and purchased iPhoto Library Manager and it immediately pointed out the problem.

Lost Photos on iPhoto 09 upgrade

Hello,
Sorry if this is redundant, just upgraded to iphoto 09 from 08. Seems I've lost almost all of our photos with the upgrade. I don't see them in our previous library folder or anywhere on the HD for that matter. Hopefully I'm not looking in the correct place. Most are backed up on cd, but not all. Can I recover them somehow? Any help would be appreciated.
I upgraded from Tiger to Snow Leopard yesterday, then added the iLife package tonight. I Should have backed up the photos prior, but I didn't think. Any help?

Macblaque
I cannot restore the old Library, it says the iPhoto Library was created with a newer version of iPhoto and asks me to upgrade my iPhoto.
What is going on???
Where are you restoring from? Time Machine? Another back up utility?
This message is often a symptom of a damaged database file:
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 Rebuild iPhoto Library Database from automatic backup.
If that fails:
Option 2
Download iPhoto Library Manager and use its rebuild function. This will create a new library based on data in the albumdata.xml file. Not everything will be brought over - no slideshows, books or calendars, for instance - but it should get all your 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

How to get back lost photos on iPhoto?

I was trying to format new hard drive and somehow i have lost my photos on iPhoto. Will I be able to get them back. I haven't back them up on Time Machine.

If your REALLY lucky, open iPhoto and try command Z for each photo. This is a LLLLLLOOOOOOONNNNNNgGGGGG shot.

Lost Photos with iPhoto update

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