Question about Aperture library size

I am storing my photos on a secondary drive. However, my Aperture library is just as large as the original source folder even though I am not copying the images into the library.
Shouldn't the library be smaller since it only references the images from another location?

If you changed the size and quality of your preview settings, it's not enough to just "Update Previews". You will have to DELETE the old previews and generate new ones.
(That's what my findings where)
To my understanding, previews are used
- if you use the Aperture "Quick Previews" functionality
- for synching with your e.g. iPhone
- in the Media browser dialog of e.g. iWork applications
(am I correct and complete?)
In my first days of Aperture 2 I increased the size to unlimited and the quality to 12, since "of course" I wanted to see the best possible quality of my pictures.
Now I learned that previews are not used in normal Aperture workflows, so I reduced the size to the lowest possible value of 1280 and the quality to 12.
This way I reduced the size of my library (30k JPEG photos, all referenced) from 108 GB to 33 GB.

Similar Messages

Reducing Aperture Library size

Sorry if this has been dealt with before (I did a search and found nowt).
I'm fairly new to Aperture, and my Library has grown to 14GB (14,000 files). All files are referenced on an external drive (31GB of referenced files). I use a MacBook Air with SSD, so I start with 56GB after formatting. There were lots of duplicate photos (because I merged my iPhoto library with some offline archives I had). So, it was time to get rid of the dupes.
I deleted about 3,000 photos, but the library didn't get any smaller. I deleted all of the previews, but that only freed up 2GB. When I regenerated the previews, it went back to 14GB. After recovering from a prolonged bout of consternation, I searched the web. It appears that thumbnails are not deleted when photos are removed. This strikes me as a bug, or at the very least, poor design. So, I went in and removed all of the thumbnails as described here:
http://brettgrossphotography.com/2008/04/24/aperture-library-slimming-the-size
After regenerating thumbnails and previews, my library was down to 6GB!
My question is: how do people on this forum deal with this unnecessary library bloat? I typically only keep a few percent of the photos from each import, so my library volume will again outpace the actual number of photos.
One possible approach is to create a new Aperture library from a vault. Because my files are referenced, it should create a new library from scratch and then generate the thumbnails and previews. Has anyone tried that? Seems preferable to opening packages and manually deleting files.
-Rick

After a weekend of investigation, here's some more info on Aperture library size:
1) I deleted another 1,000 or so photos, updated the vault, moved the library and then restored from the vault. The library size went from 6GB up to 7GB!
2) Looking inside the old library and the restored one revealed:
a) AP.Thumbnails files in the restored library were generally twice the size of the ones in the old one.
b) Looking at the AP.Thumbnails files with File Juicer revealed that the restored library had created thumbnails of the master files as well as the versions. The original library had thumbnails for some master/version pairs, but nowhere near as many.
3) I then deleted all of the AP.* files in the restored library, and got Aperture to regenerate the thumbnails. This reduced the library size to 5GB. The AP.Thumbnails files were much smaller.
So, my conclusion is that the best way to trim your library is to go in and delete all of the AP.* files, then regenerate the thumbnails. Restoring from a vault is not as effective.
Anyone have any intuitions as to why Aperture generates thumbnails for master files when there is an edited version? I'm fairly new to Aperture and have yet to see Aperture display thumbnails of masters if there is an edited version.

Several Questions about Aperture Problems

Having used Aperture for some time, and being a Mac user since 1985, I have a list of questions about Aperture that I need help with.
1. Periodically operating the sliders will make an image turn black. Sometimes this is early in a session, sometimes late. Various workarounds will bring the image back, but once this starts, quitting seems the only option. Can anyone help me with why this happens and how to stop it?
2. About 20% of the RAW files from my supported camera display the Unsupported Image Format error screen. These files operate perfectly in the manufacturers software and in other image management software that does not use the OS RAW libraries. Can someone help me with the cause of this and the solution (not a "workaround" but a way to make it stop happening).
3. ALL of my RAW files from my supported camera, when I try to lift metadata, return the error message that there is no metadata to lift. But in fact, the metadata inspector displays metadata. How can I stop this from happening and experience normal metadata lifting?
4. When I use the DNG format from my supported camera, a great many EXIF fields do not display, such as lens data. Can someone help me with DNG files, since these never generate the UIF error screen (cf. #2 above) as the manufacturer's RAW files do. I'm forced to use DNGs to have all my shots, but the EXIF data is not fully displayed.
5. Today I opened Aperture and no previews would display. Aperture froze while updating thumbnails. I'd not done any non-routine edits or imported any unusual files or formats. Aperture then would not quit. Is it safe to attempt to restart Aperture?
6. At times Aperture slows to the point of not working at all. Long pauses simply in trying to enlarge the selection circles for redeye removal, for example. What would cause Aperture to slow down without warning at any point in the workflow? How can I experience a more consistent operating speed from Aperture.
7. How do other image management programs like Lightroom compare on these points? Is Aperture typical or should I seek a change in my workflow, improvement in my hardware, or some adjustment in my installation?
Info: MacBook Pro, 4 GB RAM (apple), 320 GB drive, 45 GB free on drive; library of 3800 images. Fewer than 12 projects.
Thanks for your assistance.

n #3. It looks like you're absolutely right on this. I went back and checked on photos I'd edited and there was the altered metadata. +Many thanks for dispelling that concern!+ I love being a happy camper. Check that one off the list!
On 1, I've followed the black-screen issues and pretty much all we know is that a workaround exists--usually selecting the crop box restores the picture, but a lot of times it blacks out again. Having used Apple products over 25 years, all of which was in my adult professional life, I haven't seen Apple willing to just let users tolerate an irritating "workaround." I think this is something that needs fixing.
On 6--I don't understand how the rotational speed would produce erratic performance issues. I can go a month of reasonable performance, and then suddenly things bog down. Also, if that is the reason, this really ought to be part of the System Requirements, or at least, a recommendation. Maybe it is already--I should check to be sure. I confess this is one aspect I had not thought about.
Thanks so much for thinking about these. I love my Apple products and have owned almost every generation of Mac since the "Fat Mac" (512K RAM! 800Kb Floppies!) and hate to stare at the screen and think I've been given a truly poor product--not in my DNA--but these things break my heart.
Message was edited by: LawsonStone
Message was edited by: LawsonStone

Question about Aperture slide shows

Question about Aperture slide shows. How can I eliminate banding in a blue sky when photos are displayed in Aperture Slide shows?

What kind of banding? Do you have a screenshot?
It could be jpg compression related, I think the previews are all jpgs.

IPhoto vs Aperture library sizes

I installed the Aperture tral, left the photos in iPhoto and created a book. Didnt add any new pictures to either library. I then deleted the trial and purchased Aperture from the app store. Copied over the photos from iPhoto. iPhoto had 1 book and Aperture 1 book. The iPhoto library size is 110Gb and the Aperture library size is 90Gb, a 20Gb difference. It appears that all my photos are in both libraries. So no issues. I was surprised and the 20Gb diffeerence. Comments or thoughts if there is an issue pending that I may not be aware of.

Hve you synced with an iPod, ipad or iPhone? The cache for these devices can easily account for that amount of disk space.
Regards
TD

Vault size vs APerture library size and related questions

My aperture library is 50GB for some 65,000 referenced pictures...how does this compare with others? To me, it seems a bit big.
Also odd. The vault backup of my libarary is 9.1GB ONLY! How come?
I think that all of my pictures are referenced.....is there an easy way to check?
If I make a new fresh library and restore from the vault, what will I loose, if anything? Will I need to reconnect pictures or anything?

that seems about right to me. what's taking up space are previews and thumbnails. afaik, the vault doesn't hold any of those, only the database, albums, projects and configuration files.
if you restore from a vault, all the previews and thumbnails have to be rebuilt. you can save a little space that way, because the thumbnail files don't shrink when you erase photos or move them to another project, but personally i don't think it's worth the time and effort.
j

Aperture Library size different after restore from TM and rebuild Thumbnails

I have just completed an erase-install-migrate from Time Machine using Setup Assistant.
The size of the managed Aperture Library originally was 397.8Gb
After completion of the migrate back in I opened Aperture and as expected it rebuilt the thumbnails (TM does not backup the Thumbnails).
After doing this I tested the Library as far as possible and all seems well, and the number of photos is exactly the same as before (49,883).
However, the size of the library is now 357.8 Gb.
The only logical explanation (to me) is that the restore process has eliminated previews and thumbnails from photos which I have deleted over the years.
I still have a backup of the original (397.8Gb) version which I could put back with the Finder, but if the restored library has cleared years of redundant previews and thumbnails I would prefer to stay with that.
All done with Mavericks and Aperture 3.5.
Any insights very welcome.
Thanks

Just had the idea of looking at sizes in the Library package contents, and the explanation for the change in size is due to three things:
Thumbnails old: 44.95 Gb
Thumbnails new: 15.13 Gb
There is also an iPod photocache of 14.6 Gb which is not yet present in the new.
However Previews old was 27.95 Gb and Previews new is 33.18 Gb, so I assume some previews were smaller in the original Library.
Masters is 304.3 Gb in the original and new libraries.
I am beginning to feel more confident about the new library.

Aperture library size vs iphoto

My aperture library and iphoto library have the same photos in them. Photos seem to be the same size and quality (I imported all photos from aperture into iPhoto). iPhoto's library is 20GB, Aperture is nearly 60. I'm guessing that while Aperture might be a hair bigger because of the previews (default settings there), 3x the size means something is wrong.
Is there a way to rebuild the Aperture library without losing all my albums/libraries?
While 60GB isn't the end of the world, I'm trying to move my photos to my laptop. And between photos and music, I'm really pushing my hard drive's capacity. That 40GB difference is going to mean I'll use iPhoto (09) vs Aperture (2), and I'm still partial to Aperture.
Any help would be appreciated. Thanks.
Message was edited by: unleashed

Thanks everyone for their help. Redoing the previews helped. I think I had the previews set to "do not limit" on my dekstop and had just pulled the aperture library to my laptop. Redoing those previews took 20GB off my library size.
I see where you're coming from with the referenced images, but for now, it just keeps things simpler for my to keep it all managed. It's a brilliant solution though, if I need to in the future I might go that route. Especially when you think about possibilities with having the referenced images on Time Capsule or something. I don't take that many photos, and I upgrade my computer every year or two. I'm hoping the laptop hard drive space will expand gradually with my photo and music library, and by the time I have to worry about it, there will be another solution.
As far as how I went from Aperture to iPhoto (Ernie), I did (from iPhoto) file > show aperture library > then pulled them all in. I know there are issues with this though, you might check the iPhoto forum if you have trouble, there are work-arounds I believe.

Aperture library size vs iphoto size

Good Morning. I imported my iphoto library to aperture and plan to dump the iphoto library. There is a significant size difference in the two libraries so I am worried that the aperture library didn't import something although all my photos appear to be there. The iPhoto library is 168 gb but the aperture library is 120gb. Is there something different about aperture that makes it a more efficient storage space? Thanks Dave

Terence,
When I originally imported iPhoto into Aperture I selected the leave in original location. If I want to make Aperture stand alone now, all I have to do is consolidate the masters correct? After, which I could delete the iPhoto library, or should I just leave things as they are and not worry that the iPhoto library holds the masters? Seems like this is just a user preference as I have not seen anything state one way is better than the other.
Thanks

Aperture Library Size slowing iMac even when Aperture is closed

I recently purchased an iMac 22 quad core running Lion, with all updates. It currently has 12GB of Ram, and 190GB free on the hard drive.
The iMac would load programs like Outlook within a few seconds and was very fast.
I purchased Aperture and migrated about 38,000 images, using the exisitng file structure from my PC. This took about 12 hours yo process, update images, etc...
Even if Aperture is closed, all programs now load much more slowly. Outlook can take 20-30 seconds to open, and lists of email and contacts now take as much as a minute to load.
This is only true for the user account with the Aperture library, as programs for other users seems to work fine.
I tried running disk utilities, restarting machine, but no difference.
Activity monitor shows no unusual memory, CPU or disk activity.
I started a new user account, and all worked fine again...until I again created an aperture library, and again, even if Aperture is not started, everyting else runs slowly.
Is there a file indexing feature that is overwhelmed by the addition of a large aperture library? (Deleting the Aperture library doe snot solve the problem-only startign a new user accountdoes).

dphughes wrote:
...in both cases maintaining referenced files stored outside the catalog/library. The Aperture library is 500% the size of the Lightroom catalog - even with restricted preview sizes and no vault.
If this is true, there must be a logical explanation that is giving Aperture users some benefit for the increased Library size. Sorry been a long time since I looked at Lightroom. Does it store the same size previews and thumbnails as Aperture? Since you are using referenced files and Aperture is using non-destructive edits and even new versions do not create duplicate files (only a new set of pointers to the referenced masters), one would think previews and thumbnails must be handled differently. Since you use both, what could it be?
The Aperture Vault is a separate library than the Aperture Library so having a Vault of course should not impact the size of the Aperture Library.

Question about Domain file size...

I have a dot Mac account, and my iDisk capacity is 1 Gb.
As I regularly back-up my Domain file from my G5 iMac to a FW external drive that sits on my desk, I have just noticed that the file size is now just over 1 Gb.
Can someone please explain to me why I still have almost 700Mb left on my iDisk, yet my Domain file size is over 1 Gb?? Obviously, there must be 'internal' files that aren't copied to the iDisk.
Thanks,
Rachel.

Wow, that's quite a discrepancy. 1gb Domain vs. 300mb site? Well suffice it to say that the Domain file contains all the information that is needed to generate your site. But it makes me curious too why you have such a large discrepancy. Do you have a lot of video on your site?
My site is only about 50-60mb and my Domain is roughly the same size. When I first started using iWeb, I used to poke around inside the Domain file quite a bit more than I do now. You can open up your Domain file by Control-clicking it and selecting "Show Package Contents." At one point early on when I was blithely dragging and dropping stuff into iWeb and publishing just for experimentation, I noticed that even after I deleted images or EVEN WHOLE PAGES, that sometimes the Domain file would still contain images and quicktime movies left over from the deleted pages. I didn't know what was going on and actually tried to delete the "old" items from the Domain file, but I ended up with a non-functional Domain file...lots of error messages saying it was missing this and that. So I started over completely with a new Domain file. I also noticed at the time that my Domain file was several megabytes larger than my site.
Since then, I have been very careful only to drag items to iWeb that will actually be used. The Domain-to-site size ratio has stayed pretty much 1:1. So I chalked up my earlier experience as a fluke. I don't know. Maybe there is an inconsistency somewhere. In fact, do a search here on "Domain file optimizing" or "Domain file bloat" and you may be able to find my questions about the issue. I never did get any responses, though.

Aperture library size 0

My aperture library is obviously corrupted. In the finder, it shows up with size 0 bytes. However, something seems to be there because the finder becomes very slow when browsing to the containing directory and it takes Aperture several minutes to show an error message when I try to open it. Showing the package content does not work, either. Any suggestions what I could do (apart from restoring a backup)? I did nothing special to the library, so I assume an Aperture crash might be the reason for the damage.

Ack.
Too much time with the voodoo that is Photoshop optimization has infected people. Thankfully, Apple's applications don't need the same micro-management; which really for Adobe's application serves nothing more than employing people who defend their unnecessarily complicated products.
Seriously, the difference between block sizes will make like 1 ns of difference in loading an image. You're not going to notice a difference, speed wise.
Leave the block size at its default, is my recommendation.

Workflow Questions - Same Aperture Library on two machines - Sync ?

Ok, So now that 1.1 is out I copied my Aperture library to my new MacBookPro, updated to v1.1, loaded the program ... and Bam, my library is there and working perfectly (after the Migrate process).
So now, I have my libarary on my Desktop Dual Power PC machine at home and also on my MBP in the field ... I'm in heaven!
My question is this. If I make a bunch of updates to the library (adding new images, new projects, new albums, rating new and existing images, assigning keywords, etc) on my MBP while sitting at Starbucks or laying on the beach is there any way to go home and sync these changes with the library on desktop machine?
I realize that if I do all my work on the MBP in a new Project and then export that project I can then import it into the machine at home ... but that only solves 1/2 my problem ... how do I deal with projects and albums that already exist on both machines?
Copying the entire Aperture Library back and forth is an option but at 40GB and growing that does not seem like a lot of fun.
Any ideas? Even a 3rd party app would be cool if it worked. Would something like ChronoSync see inside the Aperture Library container and deal with changed items?
Thanks,
A happy v1.1 MBP user
Power PC G5, Dual 2 Gz, 3.5 GB RAM Mac OS X (10.4.3) MacBookPro, 2.16GHz, 2 GB RAM

<...>
My question is this. If I make a bunch of updates to
the library (adding new images, new projects, new
albums, rating new and existing images, assigning
keywords, etc) on my MBP while sitting at Starbucks
or laying on the beach is there any way to go home
and sync these changes with the library on desktop
machine?
I realize that if I do all my work on the MBP in a
new Project and then export that project I can then
import it into the machine at home ... but that only
solves 1/2 my problem ... how do I deal with projects
and albums that already exist on both machines?
Copying the entire Aperture Library back and forth is
an option but at 40GB and growing that does not seem
like a lot of fun.
Any ideas? Even a 3rd party app would be cool if it
worked. Would something like ChronoSync see inside
the Aperture Library container and deal with changed
items?
<...>
Aha! That (file sync) is exactly the first thought I had when I read your post (though I personally was thinking RSyncX, Chrono Sync may be easier to use).
To many programs the Aperture library looks just like a directory, which it really is - Finder and a few other things treat is specially but usually the origins of file synchronization tools are more UNIX utilities that just see the Aperture library and projects therein as a series of directories.
In particular, what you'd be looking for this tool to update are:
* Import directories in exisitng projects with new images and updated sidecar/XML files.
* Added folders and albums
* (most important) new copy of the Aperture database.
All of these things are just files so it should be very easy for the sync utilitiy to find they are newer on the laptop and copy them over.
Now what will not work well with this approach would be to edit files on the laptop and the desktop at the same time, and then attempt to syncronize them - but if you are only using one at a time you should not have issues.
I would make a small sample library in both places to test this approach against but I see no reason why it should not work.
The only other approach really would be shuttling projects back and forth between systems, which you may have to do someday if your desktop library exceeds the capacity of the laptop.

Question about using library items in forms

After a long time I am again returning to this perpetual fountain of Dreamweaver knowledge.
I am converting a site from AGL to DW. In AGL I used a separate template for the forms (there are over 10) and used "components" to create the different forms. Each form shared features with other forms but were not identical, all together 5 components. When I converted over to DW the 5 compnents were made into 5 "library items" but neither the form template or the library items work, by that I mean they do not update if I make a change.
Hence I want to make 5 new library items to use in the forms my question is this: when I choose an item to put in the form like a text field or radio button I always get this window.
Though I read the documentation I am still not really clear about the "style" option so I just choose "no label tag." What is this used for? Any examples of how it is used?
Regarding "position" before or after the item, what is this all about? I have been choosing "after form item" but I don't really know what the difference is and what advantages or disadvantages acrue from these choices.
Regarding "Access key" and "Tab index" I sort of have the idea of what it is about but an example of how they work in action would clear up any nebulosity.
But my real puzzle is with the following which pops up at the end when I am inserting a form items.
Since the library items are not separate forms in themselves I have NOT added the form tag because my reasoning is that when I make the new form templates it will have the requisite form tags. Am I correct in this line of thinking? Or do I have to add form tags every time I add form elements to a form? I really don't want to have to do the whole thing over again if I get it wrong. So if one of you kind souls could guide me in doing it right the first time I would really appreciate it.
I am using a MBP, OS X 10.6.8, DW CS6
BvL

To declare constants create a Package-Specification in a pll and deifne all your constants there, something like:
PACKAGE PK_CONSTANTS IS
RC_SUCCESS CONSTANT PLS_INTEGER := 1;
RC_FAILURE CONSTANT PLS_INTEGER := 0;
RC_YEAR_DATA_NOT_FOUND := 50;
END;Then attach that pll to all your forms-modules, and use it like
IF rc = PK_CONSTANTS.RC_YEAR_DATA_NOT_FOUND THEN
END IF;A word about exceptions or errors: In my eyes its clearer (and in case of exceptions even better) to raise an exception than to hide it behind return-codes.

Aperture library size

HI all,
Can someone explain to me why after importing a 139Gb iphoto library into Aperture, the Aperture librbary file is 250Gb?
If I look at the 2 database they both have the same amount of originals and versions.
Is there any great advantage importing the iphoto library over just having Aperture open it as is?
thanks in advance.

and do I really need an aperture database if aperture can use the iphoto library database?
If you do not have any other libraries, that you would want to unite with your iPhoto libary, there is no need to convert the library by importing. The format is compatible.
iphoto previews folder (1.82 Gb)
aperture previews folder (123.3 Gb)
how do I reduce the size of the previews folder?
How many image versions do you have? That is an amazing difference in size!
You change the size of the "Previews" in the Aperture Preferences, the "Previews" tab. Generally it is recommended to set the pixel size of the previews to the screensize of your largest display and to pick a good quality setting. Compare the settings in the Preferences panel with your screensize.
After you changed the settigs for the Preview size and quality, delete the previews and update them.
To delete the previews select your images in the Browser, ctrl click, and use the command "Delete previews". Then check, if now the size size of the Previews folder is smaller.
Then create new previews by using the command "Update Preview". If that is not available, hold down the options-key and select "Generate Preview".
Regards
Léonie

Question about Aperture library size

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