MY PICTURES folder on Mac

I imported all my photos in MY PICTURES (and its subfolders) to iPhoto - and then spent many hours re-organizing them into iPhoto Folders. I am happy with the result.
But the folder MY PICTURES on my Mac is a mess. What I would like to do is blow the whole thing away and duplicate the iPhoto subfolders into MY PICTURES. Can I do this, and if so, how?
TIA.

jap0nica
In what way is your Pictures folder a mess?
It is strongly advised that you do not move, change or in anyway alter things in the iPhoto Library Folder as this can cause the application to fail and even lead to data loss
What I would like to do is blow the whole thing away and duplicate the iPhoto subfolders into MY PICTURES. Can I do this, and if so, how?
No you cant. iPhoto simply does not work that way.
iPhoto is a database, and like any database it needs you to manipulate the data via the app itself, not through a back door like the Finder.
The usual reason people like to try and organise the iPhoto Library Folder is because they fear they will be unable to find a file if they need it.
There are three ways (at least) to get files from the iPhoto Window.
1. Drag and Drop: Drag a photo from the iPhoto Window to the desktop, there iPhoto will make a full-sized copy of the pic.
2. 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.
3. Show File: 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.
Finally: a Note about the iPhoto Library Folder:
In this folder there are various files, which are the Library itself and some ancillary files. Then you have three folders
Originals are the photos as they were downloaded from your camera or scanner.
(ii) Modified contains edited pics, shots that you have cropped, rotated or changed in any way.
This allows the Photos -> Revert to Original command - very useful if you don't like the changes you've made.
(iii) Data holds the thumbnails the the app needs to show you the photos in the iPhoto Window.
Regards
TD

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The important thing to remember is there is no "supposed to" or "best way". There's what works for you and you photos. This may be iPhoto or some other app.
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https://discussions.apple.com/docs/DOC-4491
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https://discussions.apple.com/thread/3062728?tstart=0
and for someone new to iPhoto and The Mac you can lose data very easily with a Referenced Library.
However you store the files, importing is the same: easiest way: drag a folder of images to the iPhoto Window and iPhoto will import it and create an Event from it.
If you have a managed library then it will copy the files into its own Library. You filing structure is then pointless. You can trash it - but don't do it immediately. iPhoto is a great app, but it's not necessarily for everyone. When you've lived with it for a few weeks and are sure it's for you, that's when you can trash your own filing structure.
The problem with what you have now - files-in-folders-and-subfolders - is that it is limited. Searching is trcky as you don't have a whole lot of things to search on. I append the following to show you some of the options available in iPhoto.
I use Events simply as big buckets of Photos: Spring 08, July - Nov 06 are typical Events in my Library. I use keywords and Smart Albums extensively. I title the pics broadly.
I keyword on a
Who
What
Where basis (The When is in the photos's Exif metadata). I also rate the pics on a 1 - 5 star basis.
Using this system I can find pretty much find any pic in my 44k library in a couple of seconds.
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File -> New Smart Album
set it to 'All"
title contains Seattle
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keyword is snow
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Or, want a chronological album of John from birth to today?
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add Rating is greater than 4 stars
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In the end, organisation is about finding the pics. The point is to make locating that pic or batch of pics findable fast. This system works for me.

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Before installing iLife 11, my photo stream synced to the (Finder)Pictures- Photo Stream - which I very much liked.
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Aperture keeps creating a new empty library in my Pictures folder

Hi, I am a noob with Aperture, so forgive me if this seems like a stupid question. I have searched through the manual, threads here and Apples help pages but have not found my problem described or my question addressed.
First the problem:
I have set preferences in Aperture to set up and point to the Library on my External Firewire Drive. I exited as instructed and went back in the program and my new library came up without issue. I was able to import files from camera, iphoto, and some from files relatively easily and created new projects for them w/o much trouble. I closed the program and did not use it until the next day.
When I opened the Aperture from the dock the next day, a BLANK library greeted me pointing to my picture folder of my Mac user account. Sure enough I opened my pictures folder under my user account on the finder and there is a brand new Aperture library without any files in it. I checked my Firewire hard drive and (thankfully) the Aperture library I created there is still intact. When I clicked on the aperture library icon in my firewire drive, the program opened with my library listed. I then closed it, opened Aperture from the dock again and it opened to my firewire's drive library again...
So now I'm thinking this must have been a weird glitch. I deleted the Aperture library in my pictures folder on my user account and thought that would be that as the program continued to perform well all day...opening my created library when I opened from the dock each time...
Then, again the next day, I open Aperture and am greeted with a blank library...again pointing at my picture folder in my user account...sure enough the Aperture library icon is back in my pictures folder!
Does anybody know why this keeps happening. I want the default library to be the one I created on my firewire drive, but it keeps creating a new empty library in my user account picture folder, and defaulting to that when starting the program from the dock.
I am the only user account on this computer and the only person using the Aperture program.
Short of creating a desktop shortcut to my wanted firewire drive library and starting Aperture that way, is there any other workaround...as the blank library in my pictures folder keeps coming back even if I delete it.
Now the question:
If I want to create 2 different Aperture libraries (not 2 projects, but 2 distinct libraries) on my firewire drive, is there any way to access one then switch to another within the main program without having to go all the way out and start up by selecting the icon from the wanted one to do so?
Thanks for your anticipated help and (hopefully) your patience with a noob user.
Intel Core Duo iMac 20" Mac OS X (10.4.7) 2GHz/2GB 256VRAM

The setting is in Aperture-->Preferences. Just select the library you want to use, then exit the Prefs. Quit Aperture. Relaunch. It will use the library you selected.
If you double clicked on a library to open Aperture, it will make that setting in Prefs for you so the next time it should open that library again (assuming it's available at the time, not sleeping as externals often do).
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Aperture was clearly using the Pictures file in my home directory; why was it not using the masters I relocated?
How can I move the Pictures file to my external HD? I now have the relocated master file on my external HD, a copy of the Pictures file from my home directory, and also the Pictures file in my internal HD, which takes up a lot of space.
Where can I find the original pictures from the deleted Iphoto library; they are all in the Picture file, and with normal size of several MB per picture, but Aperture can not seem to find them.
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In order to have more space on my hard disk, I bought an external HD where I wanted to store my Itunes and Aperture library.
Formatted the exteral HD as Mac OS extended journaled, in order to back it up using Time Machine to my Time Capsule.
I used Iphoto before going over to Aperture.
Did you import your iPhoto Libraries or exported your photos from iPhoto? What version of iPhoto did you migrate from? If you imported your iPhoto Libraries, how did you do it? Referenced, as described in this support article? http://www.apple.com/aperture/iphoto-to-aperture/how.html.
In order to move my files I selected all my projects in Aperture, and then used relocate masters to move them to my new HD.
This added 92 GB to my new external HD.
I made a check by removing the external HD, and as expected saw that if I wanted to adjust pictures in Aperture, the section adjustment was grey.
After plugging in the HD it worked again as it should.
So I thought all had gone well.
o.k.
I noticed that not all the pictures were found though, and I saw that the pictures that were not found had a keyword " iphoto original"
After moving from Iphoto to Aperture, I had deleted all Iphoto files, so did not expect to find any reference to Iphoto.
Do you mean, you deleted the old iPhoto Libraries? If yes, do you have a backup of them?
I open these pictures, but Aperture can not find the originals.
The Pictures folder in my home directory was still on my internal HD under users, and contained 90GB; all missing pictures are there as well.
I copied that folder to my external HD, and moved the original folder to the trash.
When I opened Aperture no pictures were there at all.
Of course I put the pictures back from the trash, but now I am wondering:
Aperture was clearly using the Pictures file in my home directory; why was it not using the masters I relocated?
Aperture will only relocate original that it is using. You seem to have had a mixed library, part of the originals in your "Pictures" folder, part of them in your iPhoto Library.
If not all original masters have been relocated, you may not have had selected all images when relocating. I suggest to simply flag all images, that are still on your internal drive and then to relocate them as well.
To be able to flag the, disconnect again your external volume and search for images that have the filestatus "online".
A smart album with the smart rule "Add rule: Exif: Filestatus is online", and set the source of the smart rule to "Library". Then flag all images.
Now connect your drive again and select all images in the "Flagged" album and relocate them to your external drive.
Do they now move over?
You can check the location of referenced images by using the command "File > Show in Finder".
Regards
Léonie

Odd message when trying to save to alias of Pictures folder

Hi. Maybe someone can help me. When I try to save an image to an alias of my Pictures folder that is located on the desktop, the image *does* get saved to a folder *within* the Pictures folder called Original Images. Then I get an error message reading "File alias [path to alias] [name of picture file] wasn't found." I click OK on this dialog box and it reappears seven or eight times. Note that this occurs *both* when I save to the Pictures folder itself as well as when I save to its alias. I deleted the alias and made a new one, again placing it on the desktop, yet the problem persists. This usually happens when I come across a picture file on the Web that I wish to save.
I am running Mac OS 10.7.5 on a MacBook Pro with 4 GB of RAM. I've recently repaired the file permissions. This behavior started a few days ago. The Web browser I use is Firefox version 15.
I'm just really puzzled about why all of a sudden these new, saved images are now automatically being placed in this subfolder called "Original Images." And the error messages are disconcerting. Any thoughts? Thanks in advance.
Message was edited by: Brutalbrutus

Thanks, everyone, but I fixed the problem. I had accidentally turned on an Applescript to keep the Pictures folder organized.

MY PICTURES folder on Mac

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