The case of the missing photos: Urghhh!

So I have been using iPhoto for years with little to no problem. Until Now! I have been importing my photos from my Nikon D40 (often lots) editing them and satisfied. The next time I open iPhoto all the photos are missing! No thumbnails/photos/ no photos I had trashed from the last import in the trash. Since I have sent a bunch to my girlfriend post editing by then I have her send them back and add them to iPhoto. And they are in their under "last import". The next time I open iPhoto they (the "emailed back to me" photos) are once again gone. This has happened to all photos imported since early March when it began? I have done nothing new, changed no preferences, everything is up to date, and I have rebuilt the iPhoto library twice between occurrences. This after much time spent editing children's photos too of which I cannot replace all. Please anyone......Thanks. dennis

First, do you keep your library in the default location, your User/Pictures folder? If so then try the three fixes below in order as needed:
Fix #1
Launch iPhoto with the Command+Option keys depressed and follow the instructions to rebuild the library. Select all options.
Fix #2
Rebuild the library using iPhoto Library Manager as follows:
Using iPhoto Library Manager to Rebuild Your iPhoto Library
1 -Download iPhoto Library Manager and launch.
2 -Click on the Add Library button, navigate to your User/Pictures folder and select your iPhoto Library folder.
3 - Now that the library is listed in the left hand pane of iPLM, click on your library and go to the File->Rebuild Library menu option
4 - In the next window name the new library and select the location you want it to be placed.
5 - Click on the Create button.
Note: This creates a new library based on the LIbraryData.xml file in the library and will recover Events, Albums, keywords, titles and comments but not books, calendars or slideshows. The original library will be untouched for further attempts at fixing or in case the rebuilt library is not satisfactory.
Fix #3 - Last Ditch Scenario
Start over with a new library and import the Originals folder from your original library as follows:
Creating a new library while preserving the Events from the original library.
1. Move the existing library folder to the desktop.
2. Open the library package like this.
3. Launch iPhoto and, when asked, select the option to create a new library.
4. Drag the Originals folder from the iPhoto Library on the desktop into the open iPhoto window.
This will create a new library with the same Events as the original library if you have the Finder checkbox unchecked in the Events preference pane.

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Sometimes after creating an event folder on iPhoto, all my pictures in that event will be gone the next time I open iPhoto. Why is this happening? Is there a way to retrieve the missing photos?

Sometimes after creating an event folder on iPhoto, all my pictures in that event will be gone the next time I open iPhoto. Why is this happening? Is there a way to retrieve the missing photos?
Most events I make on iphoto will still be there the next time I open iPhoto, while other event FOLDERS will be there, but pictures in it gone.

What version of iPhoto? Assuming 09 or later:
Option 1
Back Up and try rebuild the library: hold down the command and option (or alt) keys while launching iPhoto. Use the resulting dialogue to rebuild. Choose to Repair Database. If that doesn't help, then try again, this time using Rebuild Database.
If that fails:
Option 2
Download iPhoto Library Manager and use its rebuild function. (In early versions of Library Manager it's the File -> Rebuild command. In later versions it's under the Library menu.)
This will create an entirely new library. It will then copy (or try to) your photos and all the associated metadata and versions to this new Library, and arrange it as close as it can to what you had in the damaged Library. It does this based on information it finds in the iPhoto sharing mechanism - but that means that things not shared won't be there, so no slideshows, books or calendars, for instance - but it should get all your events, albums and keywords, faces and places back.
Because this process creates an entirely new library and leaves your old one untouched, it is non-destructive, and if you're not happy with the results you can simply return to your old one.
Regards
TD

I have 162 photos in the cloud but only 153 download to my phone. The missing photos are videos

I have 162 photos in the cloud only 153 download to my phone. Missing photos are videos. Help!

iCoud (photo stream) doesn't sync videos, it only syncs (streams) photos. If you have an iCloud backup, that would include your videos and restoring the backup to your phone should recover them.

Case of the missing photos

The problem was this. No photos were available to my other iApps (iMovie, iDVD, etc). Music was fine but not photos. When I loaded iMovie (version 6.01) and clicked Media and then the Photo button the grey message in the window was to load iPhoto to populate the window.
Now, I'd used iMovie before to make movies and slideshows and I know it had worked, even after upgrading to iPhoto 6.
I found many discussion threads online, and one page of help from Apple. Only one solved my problem, but it wasn't the one I was hoping for. I had a fairly large iPhoto database the folder was 25 gigs. and Included photos from as far back as iPhoto 1. Here's the saga.
First I check forum and the first suggestion was to rebuild database (for iPhoto 6 hold Command + Option when starting iPhoto) and I did -- Four times, eventually.
Then I searched for special characters in, not only album names, but photo names (& #/, among others are reserved in the Unix system) I found many with the "&" and changed the file names and checked all albums (there were no characters in the albums).
Still no joy in iMovie.
Then I backed up most of my photos to DVD's (16 gigs worth) and delete half my photos, but still no photos in iMovie.
Finally I tried to create a new iPhoto database by renaming the old one and in iPhoto, chose to create the new one. Then I imported photos and voila...
IT WORKED.
I still don't know what the problem was: size of the database, bad characters. I just don't know. But it's fixed for now.

The latest iPhoto update bringing it to 6.03 did not fix the problem with my "older" database. still can't share it with iMovie, et al.

Apple employee backup my phone before reloading the software. When I checked my photos they were gone. Is there a way to get the missing photos down loaded?

An Apple emplyee in a Seattle store backed up my phone data before clearing it and reloading the software. He was trying to resolve a problem that I was having with the phone. When I checked my photos I discovered that they were all gone. Also lost a lot of new contacts. It appears that only older data was restored. Is there a way to find out if my photos are backed up any were? As a note, I have had this problemsince I got the phone. I bought it at Best Buy but they said that they could not fix the problem. They told me to talk to the phone company. AT&T looked at the phone and said that it was an Apple problem. There is no Apple store where I live in southern Oregon so I had to wait until I got to Seattle to try and get it fixed. Apparently on one owns the problem. Its my problem to fix. The next step is to get another phone. Probably not from Apple. That is my story and sany info would be appreciated. Cathy

Thanks for the reply however this does not help. When I check the cloud it shows that I have only 20 photos. In reality I had a lot more than that. All the photos on the cloud are those that I have taken since I was at the Apple store. When I check cloud storage usage on my phone it says that I have 5.1 GB of photos. This is a lot more than the 20 that I can see. I am not sure what the Apple employee did to my phone.
Still looking for answers. It is really too bad that I can not talk to an Apple person to get help since they messed up my phone.

IOS 6, factory reset and the missing photos - where are they now?

I installed IOS6 then did a factory reset on my ipad, and afterwards all photos bar the seven in the photostream disappeared. They're still in the device somewhere as they're still taking up space under the 'Usage' section.
Anyone know how to recover them, or delete them entirely to free up that memory for other things? (All are backed up elsewhere so deletion is not a problem).

Have you been using your phone as recommended? If so, you've been importing photos in your camera roll onto your computer for safe keeping. Just as you would with a standalone digital camera. Your photos would then reside safely on your computer for archival.
While camera roll photos ARE part of the backup, not everything always goes smoothly as you've seen, which is why the recommendation to import photos as soon as possible to your computer.
If you have a recent backup of your iPhone, you can restore and hopefully many of your photos will be on this backup. Any photos or data added to your phone since this last backup are, of course, gone forever.
http://manuals.info.apple.com/en_US/iphone_user_guide.pdf

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

IPhone sync - restoring missing photos in iPhoto from the phone

I have recently restored from a Time Machine backup, and several recent photo imports are now missing from iPhoto. (Yes, I have tried to rebuild the library, but they are still missing.) The photos still exist on my iPhone, but when I plug it in, it only allows me to import from the 'Camera Roll' album, and not the 'Photo Library' album, where the missing photos still exist. So:
Question #1 - If I allow iTunes to perform a photo sync, will it replace the whole 'Photo Library' album, thereby deleting the photos that only exist on my phone? Or is this a two-way sync, which would happily reinsert my missing photos back into iPhoto? (Wishful thinking I'm guessing).
Question #2 - Is there a way to pull those photos from the iPhone manually, so I can re-import them into iPhoto?

Yes and Yes (using third party software or emailing them, or uploading them) but remember that the ones on the iPhone are compressed optimised versions just for the iPhone display - not the originals.

After my photo in photo stream exceeded 1000photos, what happen to the old photos? Is it automatically deleted from my photo stream? How do i get it back those photos?

can anyone help me on this matter?

Once they're deleted, you can't get them back. You're supposed to save them before this happens. To do this, save them to your camera roll (by tapping Edit, tap all the photos, tap Share, tap Save to Camera Roll), then import them to your computer as explained here: http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4083.
If the missing photo stream photos were in your camera roll when you last backed up, then would be included in the backup. Restoring the backup should recover them.

The New Photo App Not Syncing Properly

I've been pulling my hair out over the last week or so with the new Photo's in the iCloud and how the online database won't sync properly.
This is how I went about the upgrade.
I have a Mac Mini which has been for the past several years drawing down my family's photo's and video etc from all out devices using iPhoto. This has worked very nicely. I've been adding pictures from my stream into albums etc with about 200 or so. All files are stored locally of course in organized folder which is then back up on to a external drive.
After the latest update I opened the new Photo app and it started to convert my library over and started to upload all the photos, some 15000 pictures and a few hundred videos. I started to check my iPad and iPhone which is where I started to see problems, missing albums, missing photos, duplicates etc. Before anyone asks I emptied my trash in iPhoto before I updated as I had read about the new app pulling all the photos from trash in too.
After several days of stopping and starting my iPhone and iPad looked like it should with my albums and the correct amount of files. I checked the online iCloud Photos through my browser which also match, but I had all the old iPhoto months and daily libraries still showing despite me organizing my libraries not to group the photos in these old style albums.
At this point I also looked back on my Mac Mini to find that all the libraries had totally disappeared and there seemed to be a couple of thousand files missing, ie my ipad, iphone and online coun which is at something like 15,634 files and the Mac Mini Photo app was showing about 13,450. Plus, it was now saying uploading some 24,000 files but was in fact doing nothing.
At this point I decided to turn my main iMac on and see if I could get the databases to pull down from the iCloud to see if it matched. Three days later it's stuck at some 3200 files and saying it's still adding 15,000 files. I then went back on to my Mac Mini and started a fresh version of Photo and it's now stuck in the same state as the iMac saying it's adding file but nothing is changing.
Please help.

How did you import the photos?
Are the missing photos perhaps referenced? Then they cannot upload to iCloud.
You can check with a smart album, if you have any photos in the library, that cannot upload to iCloud.

TS3989 Only some of the photos I have taken on my iPhone appear in the photo stream on my iPad even thou they were taken at the same time. Why is this and how can I import the other photos from my iPhone to my iPad?

Only some of the photos I have taken on my iPhone appear in the photo stream on my iPad even thou they were taken at the same time. Why is this and how can I import the other photos from my iPhone to my iPad?

If older photos are missing it may be because photo stream photos are only held in iCloud for 30 days. After that they are removed from iCloud but will remain (up to 1000 photos) on your device until deleted. Also, only photos taken after enabling photo stream are added to your photo stream, and only when the camera is closed, your device is connected to wifi and you have at least 20% battery life remaining.
To transfer the missing photos you can either create a shared photo stream containing them and invite yourself to it (see http://help.apple.com/icloud/#mmc0cd7e99), import the photos to your computer and sync them to your iPad, or use an app like PhotoSync to transfer them to your iPad over wifi.

Why does the new photo app not allow all the photos on my iMac to appear on iPhone and iPad?

Imac with OS X Yosemite 10.10.3
New Photo App has over 9000 photos but only 180 or so appear on iPhone and iPad. Why. I have sufficient iCloud storage.

How did you import the photos?
Are the missing photos perhaps referenced? Then they cannot upload to iCloud.
You can check with a smart album, if you have any photos in the library, that cannot upload to iCloud.

TS3989 I have set up my new iPad Air by restoring from the latest backup from my iPad2. However i can only see the photos from before Jan this year and none of the photoI have taken since then. I cn see the new photos on my iPhone ne old iPad, ny ideas?

Could anyone help with my question above please?

Were the missing photos in the camera roll on your iPad 2? The backup only includes camera roll photos.
If they were, but were not restored from the backup, if you still have the iPad 2, import the missing photos to your computer (see http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4083) then put them in a folder and sync them to your new iPad by selecting the folder on the Photos tab of your iTunes sync settings and syncing. (The only downside of this approach is that the only way they can later be deleted from your iPad is to sync them off again using iTunes. To get them in your camera roll you would need to use an app like PhotoSync to transfer them from your computer to the camera roll on your new iPad using you wifi.)

Missing Photos Already in Catalog

Photos in one of my Collections are shown as Missing, and I can not update them because Lightroom thinks they are Already in Catalog. In fact there are two versions of all these photos in the Catalog grid view: one is shown as Missing and the other is not missing. How can I update the Collection photos without manually recreating the Collection?
In detail: I had some photos in my Lightroom Catalog. I added them to a Lightroom Collection. All was well.
Later, outside of Lightroom, I decided to copy the photos to a new folder on a new hard drive. Then I deleted the original photos and folder.
The LR Catalog now shows two instances of these photos, a good one and a Missing Photo. When I ask to Locate in Finder the good one, LR accurately shows it s location on my hard drive. Both instances of the photos have identical names and thumbnails. The LR Collection shows only one instance of the photos and they all show Missing Photos icons.
When I try to Locate the Missing Photo, I get this message "Already in Catalog. the file "xxx" is associated with another photo in the catalog. Each file can only be associated with one photo." In other words, I am unable to get the LR Collection to recognize the new location of the digital file.
If I delete the photo duplicate with the Missing Photo icon, the photo is removed from my Collection. This is not acceptable for two reasons: I have now 449 "Missing" images in this Collection and I do not want to manually list, delete and then replace each one. I think this is the job of an asset management database like Lightroom, and I depend on it to keep accurate track of everything.
It has been 17 days since I opened a Customer Support case and I have had numerous exchanges with the Adobe reps, including a 1.75 hr. phone conversation, and still no solution. Sometimes there seems to be a language problem but at other times a lack of product knowledge. Is there anyone out there that can help?

Ok, thanks for clarifying.
Lightroom does not create duplicates on its own. They arise usually because the user did something, perhaps accidentally. By any chance, did you ever tell Lightroom to "Synchronize Folders..." ?
Lightroom does not follow or find your photos if you move them outside of Lightroom. My recommendation for newcomers to Lightroom is to always move or rename files and folders from inside of Lightroom.
If I understand your situation properly, I think the solution to your mess is as follows: First ... in Windows or Mac Finder (the only time I ever recommend moving things in WIndows or Mac Finder is to fix or unfix previous moves in Windows or Mac Finder) ... move (cut and paste, not copy and paste) the photos back to where they were. This should connect the copy that is now "bad", and fixing the problem in your collections. Second, in Lightroom, delete the copies on the new hard drive, which should now be disconnected. Now, you should have one copy of everything (including in your collections) that is connected and usable in Lightroom. Finally (optionally), if you want your photos to reside on the new hard drive, then inside Lightroom, move them to the new hard drive.

Missing Photos after rename and organize Rolls

Hi. I had a bunch of Rolls in my iPhoto Library\Originals folder for each year. In many cases there was just 1 picture in a Roll and hundreds of rolls. So I renamed a few Rolls to more meaningful names and moved pictures around into these Rolls. Then I deleted the empty Roll. I thought I was doing a great job in reducing hundreds of Rolls down to a handful.
Problem is, now when I open iPhoto, the thumbnail still seems to be there ( meaning I can see the pictures) but when I click on the picture I get the "Missing Photo Indicator", i.e. the gray box, instead of the actual picture. I even Emptied the Trash so I fear I have lost the photos.
I thought I read somewhere about re-indexing iPhoto in cases like this. Is that correct. If so How?
Otherwise, Please help me figure out how to get iPhoto to find my photos in their new / renamed Rolls.

Brad
You made these changes in the Finder, yes?
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
If you have made these changes in the finder, then I'm afraid that you'll either have to return things to the way they were or if you cannot then you'll need to create and populate a new library.
To create and populate a new library:
Note this will give you a working library with the same film rolls and pictures as before, however, you will lose your albums, keywords, books, calendars etc.
Move the iPhoto Library Folder to the desktop
Launch iPhoto. It will ask if you wish to create a new Library. Say Yes.
Go into the iPhoto Library Folder on your desktop and find the Originals folder. From the Originals folder drag the individual rolls to the iPhoto Window and it will recreate them in the new library.
When you're sure all is well you can delete the iPhoto Library Folder on your desktop.
In the future, in addition to your usual back up routine, you might like to make a copy of the library6.iPhoto file whenever you have made changes to the library as protection against database corruption.
Rolls in the iPhoto Window (View -> Film Rolls) correspond exactly with the Roll Folders in the Originals Folder in the iPhoto Library Folder. You can move photos between Rolls, you can rename rolls, edit them, create them, as long as you do it via the iPhoto Window. Check out the Info Pane (wee 'i', lower left) the name and date fields are editable. Edit a Roll Name using the Info Pane, the Roll Folder in iPhoto Library Folder/Originals will also have the new name.
Regards
TD

The case of the missing photos: Urghhh!

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