Moving i photo to external drive

Hello
I need to clear up space on my mac book pro, so I purchased an external hard drive to copy my photos on to.
I just dragged i photo library icon from pictures, to my external drive icon in devices. It copied over, took a while as i have many photos. but, just to do a test I deleted an album of i photo from my mac book. When I plugged in my external, and opened i photo from it, the same album was gone.
So are they linked still?
Is there a way to have i photo just running from my external so I can delete it on my mac book drive?
Lucky I didn't delete the whole thing.
Thanks

1. Quit iPhoto
2. Copy the iPhoto Library from your Pictures Folder to the External Disk.
3. Hold down the option (or alt) key while launching iPhoto. From the resulting menu select 'Choose Library' and navigate to the new location. From that point on this will be the default location of your library.
4. Test the library and when you're sure all is well, trash the one on your internal HD to free up space.
Regards
TD

Similar Messages

I photo and external drive

how do i save photos to external drive and possibly set it up that all photos go to external drive so i can save room on my hard drive

Hello Myron,
It can be very handy to store your iPhoto library (and your iTunes library for that matter) on an external drive. Make sure the drive is formated for Mac (MacOSExtended) rather than for Windows (MS-DOS, etc.). Storing Mac data on a windows formated drive reduces performance and can damage data over time.
Apple documents moving the library to other locations on their website: http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?path=iPhoto/7.0/en/6331.html
You can check to make sure your drive is formated correctly and re-format if needed following another knowledge base article:
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=306143
Please be aware that if you do have to reformat the drive it will ERASE any information currently on the drive.
Cheers!

Unable to access photos on external drive

I have Aperture 2.1.3 and I have been using Photo Mechanic to quickly import, edit, and save my photos to one of my external drives. I have been using Aperture to adjust some of these images by importing them into Aperture but the stored files have remained on the external drive. Suddenly, when I try to import the photos from external drive for Aperture manipulation the photos are not available for import. But the photos are viable on my external drive, and If I use Photoshop or Photo Mechanic, I CAN access and import these same files .
I hope this makes sense! I need advise!
thanks to all!
Tony P
Radical Sports Photos

.plist is the preference file. Go to your User/Library/Preferences and take com.apple.Aperture.plist (the preferences are in alphabetical order) and put the file on your desktop. Then restart Aperture. Aperture will return to its default settings and there will be a new preference file in the Library/Preferences folder.
If this clears your problem, then your old plist file was corrupt and you should put it in the trash and rebuild your own preferences.
If you still have the problem after restarting Aperture, then it's not the plist file, and you can trash the new plist and restore your old one from the Desktop back into the Library/Preferences folder.
Have you tried to reboot the machine. Sometimes things go wrong in the connection with an external drive and rebooting the machine clears the problem. You could also reset the PRAM (on boot, hold down Command-Option-P-R and wait for the second chime). Sometimes the PRAM gets corrupted and this affects the relationship with external drives.
You could also import the RAW files into Aperture, instead of using them as referenced files.

Need help moving photos to external drive

Hi, all--here's hoping one or more of you Aperture veterans can help.
Here's my situation: I'm not new to photography, but I'm new to Aperture. Just bought 3.3 and still getting to know what it can do. I'm an emigre from iPhoto, and one of the reasons I upgraded within Apple is that I was tired of the non-intuitive nature of PS Elements. I like to take pictures, not spend endless time in the dim glow of a screen digging through sub-menus for stuff, and from what I read, Aperture seemed more intuitive.
But now I've got a seemingly very basic problem that hours of poring over discussion threads and searching through the hundreds of pages of the manual has done little to address with any clarity:
How do I move (not just copy) older photos in projects to external drives, but in such a way that Aperture still keeps track of them, even when the drives are not connected? (The Aperture marketing I read/viewed clearly said Aperture could do this, and I'm running out of space on my MacBook Pro (15" from about 2008, running Lion) with lots of CF cards piling up.)
Info that may help:
-I need to move not just original (imported into iPhoto directly from the camera) photos, but also those I've adjusted in Elements, then re-exported into iPhoto (I would say "and now into Aperture," but as you know, there's no longer an import process b/w iPhoto and Aperture).
-I shoot mostly RAW.
-I have no idea whether the pictures are "Referenced" or "Managed" (for space reasons, I have yet to import any files directly into Aperture; all existing photos are from iPhoto, and if I was given an option when I set up Aperture, I don't now recall it).
-I have external drives with plenty of space to move older pix to (I also have multiple backups, including Time Machine, additional external hard drives, and DVDs)
Can somebody who knows how to do this safely please explain in clear language how to move photos as projects onto external hard drives so that Aperture keeps track of them via viewable thumbnails, even when the photo files themselves live on a hard drive that is not connected at the time?
Thanks in advance!

First things first:
You can easily check if an image is managed or referenced by ctrl-clicking on an image version and selecting "Locate referenced files...". If Aperture says "No Referenced Files", your originals are managed by Aperture and stored within the library itself, otherwise it should show you the location of the original, and give you some options to verify the references and so on. I don't know which method is used when importing from iPhoto.
Now, here's something you need to ask yourself:
Does it make more sense for you to keep the library on your laptop and the originals on an external drive, or does it make more sense to move both the library and the originals to the external drives?
In the first case, you can open and look at the thumbnails, but there's not a whole lot else you can do with your images when the external drive is off line.
If you have vast amounts of originals, spread across multiple drives, it might make sense to keep the library on your laptop and connect whichever external drive you need at the time. However, it might also make more sense to split such a huge library into mutiple libraries, stored with their respective originals (which could be either managed or referenced).
In my case, it makes sense to keep multiple libraries, with managed originals, but your mileage may vary.
Here's a tip that might help you decide: A small library is quicker to navigate and work with than a huge one, although performance has improved vastly with later versions of Aperture.
Once you have decided on the appropriate organization, you can start moving things around (after you've created the appropriate backups):
If your library contains all managed originals already, and you want to move the entire library off to the external drive:Simply drag and drop the library itself (using Finder) to the new location.
If your library use referenced originals, and you want to keep it that way, or your library manages your originals, and you want to start using referenced originals:
Select all your images
Click on the File menu and select Relocate Originals...
Locate the destination for your originals, and pay special attention to the "Subfolder Format" and "Name Format". I'd suggest choosing "Project Name" and "Original File Name" for the two.
Click on Relocate Originals, and twiddle your thumbs while Aperure moves all your originals to the new location.
If your library uses referenced originals, and you wish to let your library manage the originals:
Select all your images
Click on the File menu and select Consolidate Originals...
Decide if you want to Copy or Move the originals into the library. If you're running out of space, it might be best to Move.
Click Ok, and wait for the operation to complete.
(Optional) If you wish to move your entire library to the external drive, drag and drop the library to the new location.
I hope that answers your question.
Message was edited by: KluZz (oops, premature submission)

Moving photos from external drive to iPhoto '11

OK. I'm going nuts. I recently purchased an iMac and I migrated all of the photos from my old G5 with no problems. All of my photos and their Album structures came along. Now, I also have a lot of different photos on a MacBook that is also running 10.6.6 and iPhoto '11. The MacBook is backed up onto an external drive which I am trying to use to move the photos to the iMac. I have tried what Terrence Devlin suggests. I tried to drag the MacBook iPhoto library into the iMac Pictures folder, but it asks me if I want to replace the existing iPhoto library. I most certainly do not. I don't want to lose anything that is already on the iMac.
I tried manually exporting folders from the external drive by clicking individual albums in iPhoto and "exporting" them to the iMac desktop, but not all of the photos come in the export, no matter which folder I try to export.
Yesterday, before I updated the laptop to iPhoto '11, I created a new iPhoto Library on the iMac and dragged the entire iPhoto Library from the MacBook into that new Library. It worked, however it all came over into one big album and my previous album structure was gone. There are waaaaay too many photos for me to go back through and sort them again. Did that happen because I was going from an older version of iPhoto to a newer version or will it happen again if I drag the MacBook iPhoto Library into a NEW library on the iMac? (I only ask before I try because it took several hours the first time.)
So what do I do? I want all of my photos on the iMac with my existing Album structure. If I have to do it Album by Album fine, but how? Selecting every photo from an album and dragging it to a folder on the desktop doesn't work either. I can always take every photo minus one. Weird.
Thanks,
John

What you want to do is merge the two Libraries? The only way to do this is to use the paid ($20) version of iPhoto Library Manager
I created a new iPhoto Library on the iMac and dragged the entire iPhoto Library from the MacBook into that new Library. It worked, however it all came over into one big album and my previous album structure was gone
Never import one Library to another. Every version and thumbnail is imported like a distinct photo, you lose all your Albums, Keywords etc., the link between Original and Previews is destroyed, the non-destructive editing feature is ruined and so on. In summary: it's mess.
Regards
TD

Moving catalog and photos with external drive, Elements can't see catalog database

Tried searching, but couldn't find my situation.
I have an old computer with a second hard drive (1.5 TB). I pulled it from my old computer and put it in the new computer.
I also copied my "My Catalog" folder which contains the catalog database file (catalog with a type "PSE8DB").
Got the second drive installed fine in my new computer.
Reinstalled Elements 8.
But the File / Catalog dialog box can't seen the existing catalog database. I can browse to the folder, but it doesn't show up.
Old computer was Windows XP. New computer is Windows 7.
Both are using Photoshop Elements 8.
Any help would be greatly appreciated.
John

solodarwest wrote:
Tried searching, but couldn't find my situation.
I have an old computer with a second hard drive (1.5 TB). I pulled it from my old computer and put it in the new computer.
I also copied my "My Catalog" folder which contains the catalog database file (catalog with a type "PSE8DB").
Got the second drive installed fine in my new computer.
Reinstalled Elements 8.
But the File / Catalog dialog box can't seen the existing catalog database. I can browse to the folder, but it doesn't show up.
Old computer was Windows XP. New computer is Windows 7.
Both are using Photoshop Elements 8.
Any help would be greatly appreciated.
John
John,
1 - Where are your photo files located ? What is the drive letter assignment of this second drive ?
My suspicion is that the photos (and perhaps also video files) reside on that second hard drive which you physically moved and installed in the new computer.
2 - Where is the PSE Catalog file (both on the old XP system and on the new W 7 system) ? Is that folder containing the PSE Catalog on the C drive or on that second hard drive which is now installed on the new W 7 system ?
3 - FYI - I agree with the DJ Paige recommendation to "In Windows, double-click on the *.pse8db file" as a means of starting the Organizer with the Catalog that you previously had under XP . This generally works on most versions of PSE although I did have an experience with PSE 8 where it did not work initially.
4 - FYI - If your photo files were stored under My Pictures under XP, then I think that the other suggestions about PSE not being able to find photosand needing to do a PSE Backup are relevant -
"You catalog will be holding the absolute location of the files in the catalog. These will no longer be valid when porting to Win7 from XP"
However, if your photo files are stored on that second hard drive, I am skeptical about that conclusion.
5 - FYI - I have seen a report of successfully moving a physical second internal drive from old XP PC to new Windows 7 PC with PSE 10. I think that you should be able to do the same with PSE 8.

Moving music and photos from external drive

Bought a new 27inch iMac for Xmas this week. Today my G5 imac wouldn't boot and has a video RAM error code 2NYD/1/4:2103 and I can't boot in safe mode or from and external drive with carbon copy cloner backup. I am resigned to the G5 being toast. This of course removes transferring files using Migration Assistant.
My question is can I bring all my iphoto pictures and itunes songs/ library to the new iMac from the external drive and what is the best way to do this ?? Will there be issues with the backup being 10.5 and the new iMac being Snow Leopard ??
Thanks for any help.

Read the article I provided and it will give you all you need to run Setup Assistant successfuly. You will need a cable to connect the two machines, the G5 probably only has FW400 and the new machine only has FW800 so you will need a cable like this one. Your local computer store should have one or possibly your local Radio Shack. If you can't find one at either place just order it from Amazon.
NOTE: There will be no need to drag and drop any files from the external HD to the new machine, SA will take care of it all. SA is also smart enough to not overwrite newer applications on the new machine. For example if the Clone has iLife 08 on it and the new machine has iLife 11 on it the new machine will only have iLife 11 on it after running SA.

Migration of catalog file only to a new computer, keeping photos on external drive

I have PSE 10 on an old computer, and have all of my photos stored on an external hard drive. I now have a new computer with PSE 11 on it, and I'd like to move the catalog file, which sits on the old computer to the new computer so that I can use it to see all the photos on the external drive now. I do not want to do a full backup and restore, since the photos are staying on the same external hard drive. I just want the file that has all the tags and organizational information to move to the new computer. How do I do that? The system information process on the old computer said that the catalog is named My Catalog and is in a particular directory (C:\ProgramData\Adobe\Elements Organizer\Catalogs\My Catalog\), but I don't see a file by that name when I look there, even though in control panel I have the system set to no hidden files. Thanks for any help - I'm getting incredibly frustrated.

OK one last question - I moved the catalog file to the new computer, but I put it on the desktop. I double-clicked it and it all worked like a charm. And now all the temp files and such live there.
Is there a good way to move it into the Adobe folder? I tried moving it all into the C:\Program Files\Adobe\Elements 9 Organizer, but there isn't a "Catalog" folder like there was on the old computer. So I just moved it in the C:\Program Files\Adobe folder and double-clicked it; i got an error saying the catalog was corrupt or something. So I moved it back to the desktop and all is fine.
So how do I move it off the desktop - and where should i put it?

How do i move photos from external drive to iphone

Currently i run on the Mac Pro Retina,
Since this doesn't have much storage i recently moved my entire 40Gb iPhoto onto an external drive. This worked great and love the new storage i have on my mac.
I plug my GoPro into my mac and it imports the photos onto the iPhoto on my external drive.
However the problem occurs when i try get those new photos onto my iPhone, i plug it in and go to photos on my phone in iTunes and it only shows my old iPhoto stuff, so i can't get those new photos across to my iPhone. I've tried the choose file option and chosen external drive but i doesn't seem to work?
And help as to how i can get these photos across would be greatly appreciated.

Have you tried to remove the iPod Photo Cache from your iPhoto library? Perhaps it is corrupted.
Try this: iTunes: Understanding the iPod Photo Cache folder
if removing the cache does not change anything, try repairing your iPhoto library by holding down the key combination option-command ⌥⌘ and launching iPhoto while holding down both keys firmly, until you are seeing the Library First Aid panel. Select the option "Repair Database" and press "Repair".

Help - moved itunes folders to external drive and now my itunes is totally

A few months ago, in order to free up space on my c drive, i had to purchase an external drive - everything i installed via itunes since that date has been on the hard drive and everything was fine.
Last night i needed more room on my C drive so i stupidly moved the remaining itunes folders from my C drive to my F drive - unfortunately, when i opened itunes it was blank.
i've tried a few things - including adding the folder from the F drive - and that retrieved about 80% of my music/videos and the last playlists i had - however, they were all missing songs - even if all the songs that should be included remained on my itunes
i began the tedious process of manually adding files back in but soon realized this doesn't help itunes consider this the same ipod as what's still on my actual ipod.
*What I'd like to do (if possible) is to wipe itunes clean and somehow restore everything on my ipod into itunes so that i retrieve not only the songs and videos but also the playlists that i've spent way too much time building. At this point i fear that the various components to my ipod are in too many files on my external drive to be easily restored another way (though if i'm wrong please let me know)*
sadly (as this story might suggest) I am borderline computer illiterate - I've read a few posts suggesting some sort of software online (something the apple help line also made an "off the record" remark about) - but I can't for the life of me figure out which i would use or how to do this without risking the contents of my existing ipod (which has the playlists and songs/video I want to reestablish).
*Can anyone possibly suggest how to best handle this and walk me through it in painstakingly basic and specific detail? I would be forever grateful.*
Thanks

iTunes uses the iTunes Library files - in particular the iTunes Library.itl file - to keep track of where your song files are located as well as playlist and related information.
Most likely in moving your folders around iTunes has been confused to such an extent that it created a new Library file. With a bit of luck you might still be able to find the old file which would restore your old Library.
So the first thing you want to do is look around your computer and make a note of any iTunes Library.itl files you can find. Generally speaking you'll find them in the iTunes folders on your system and depending on how you've been moving the folders - i.e. whether you "cut" them or "copied" them - you may still find at least one one on your F: drive and some on your C: drive.
Having noted where they are you know want to check each of them out as described in this article in the Apple Knowledge Base. In following those instructions you want to select the Choose Library option and use the pop-up window that appears to zero in on the various .itl files you've located.
Remember that each Library file will show a different Library in iTunes - perhaps slightly different, perhaps completely different - and if the first one isn't what you're looking for you'll have to close iTunes and repeat the procedure by selecting one of the other .itl's.
Post back for any clarification.

How do I move my photos to external drive

How do I move some of my photos to an external drive to free up space on my hard drive?

And what if I want some of my photos still on my internal drive?
Can I tell iphoto which events I want on the external?
I opened a new library on the external drive. This is working quite good - exept with AppleTV2
So I am looking for a way to have only one (my default library) on the hard drive, but have SOME of the actual date on the external drive...
Mr.Churchil here already suggested to create a new user with an own library. That sounds logical to me - but I don't knwo how to do it...
Can I transfer whole events or photos from one library to another than?

Trying to restore photos from external drive and realized TimeMachine had been turned off. Found in Imac backup folder in iPhoto library a modified folder with many of the missing pics. Can I restore these?

I recently had a hard drive crash on my iMac. After replacing the drive, I discovered that TimeMachine had apparently been turned off for six months, and all my photos from that period were missing after the restore. In looking on the external drive used by TimeMachine, I discovered a folder called Imac backup, and under iPhoto Library was a folder called Originals and subfolders for each year. To my surprise, there were photos covering the missing time period! Somehow I imported the 2011 folder from the external drive into iPhoto, and then I discovered they were small files of less than 100 KB each, not the 1-2 MB original photos. So now all of 2011 is screwed up, not just from May on. These photos also include faces pulled from many larger group photos.
I can get Jan - April restored using TimeMachine. But in continuing to explore the Imac backup folder, I found a similar folder in iPhoto Library called Modified. This folder has many of the missing photos in their original MB size in folders indexed by date for the missing period after April. Is there a way that I can get these modified photos back onto my new hard drive and into the iPhoto library without causing more damage? If TimeMachine was turned off after April, how did those modified photos and all those small images from the missing period find their way to the external drive?
Any wisdom greatly appreciated.

What you want to do is merge the two Libraries? The only way to do this is to use the paid ($20) version of iPhoto Library Manager
I created a new iPhoto Library on the iMac and dragged the entire iPhoto Library from the MacBook into that new Library. It worked, however it all came over into one big album and my previous album structure was gone
Never import one Library to another. Every version and thumbnail is imported like a distinct photo, you lose all your Albums, Keywords etc., the link between Original and Previews is destroyed, the non-destructive editing feature is ruined and so on. In summary: it's mess.
Regards
TD

Moving playlist to an external drive

Hi,
I just moved my mediathek to an Windows Home Server. Now I want to move also the playlists. Then I can stream the music with the playlists over an application on the WHS without my computer.
But my local ITunes also needs this playlists. So how can I connect the local ITunes with playlists stored on an external drive?
Thanks
Jörg

Found out how to do it. Simply export playlist as HTML file from the original library then import to the new!

Moving Files to an External Drive

I need some help.... I just bought a new external USB drive. (1 TB) and I am now wanting to move some of the bigger files (all my iTunes library, iPhoto library, and iMovie library) to the external drive. I want to do it with the littlest amount of disconnivence possible. In other words, I don't want any messages showing up telling me that it can't find the files. So I suppose what I am asking is what is the best, and easiest way to go about moving files to the drive. Thanks

if you don't want to move your entire home folder, then the easiest way to do this is by using symbolic links.
Use my [post|http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?messageID=7044223&#7044223] for instructions. It explains how to do it for the Documents folder but you can do the same with your Music or Movies folders.

Moving songs to an external drive

Hi,
I know this may sound like a stupid question, but I'm not an iTunes user, my husband is... My hard drive is completely full because he has downloaded too many songs. We have a huge external drive. How do I physically move the songs to my external drive so that they can play in iTunes?
Also, can I delete the songs after they are exported? HOw will I know they were moved successfully? How do I open the songs from the external drive in iTUnes?
Thanks in advance to whomever answers my questions! Happy July 4th!

The simplest way to move itunes on to an external drive is:
Close iTunes
copy your iTunes folder onto the external drive. (That's My Music\iTunes)
Start iTunes with the shift key held down and when asked to choose a library navigate to the itunes folder on the external drive and choose iTunes Library.itl.
If everything works OK, rename the iTunes folder on the internal drive and make sure everything still works.
Once you are ABSOLUTELY certain everything works OK you can delete the old iTunes folder, which you renamed.
Most peope's recycle bin is not big enough to hold all the music so don't delete things until your are sure everything is working OK on the external drive.
It is also a good idea to have a separate backup of your music.
Note that this procedure only works if you have a standard set up with all your music in iTunes\iTunes Music.

Moving i photo to external drive

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