[enucho]

Greetings,

Apart from the fact that iPhoto drives me nuts, there is one (among many) question that I cannot seem to get an answer for:

* when I move (import or drag) my pictures into iPhoto, what happens? Do I end up with a duplicate set of pictures on my hard drive (so, if my pictures "weigh" 5 gigs and I put them in iPhoto, will I end up with 10 gigs?

** can I delete the original pictures and stay with what is in iPhoto? or will that also delete what is in iPhoto?

I hope I made myself clear and would really appreciate an answer from someone.

Many thanks,

Emile

[bastion]

enucho, on 22 May 2012 - 05:35 PM, said:

Greetings,

Apart from the fact that iPhoto drives me nuts, there is one (among many) question that I cannot seem to get an answer for:

* when I move (import or drag) my pictures into iPhoto, what happens? Do I end up with a duplicate set of pictures on my hard drive (so, if my pictures "weigh" 5 gigs and I put them in iPhoto, will I end up with 10 gigs?

** can I delete the original pictures and stay with what is in iPhoto? or will that also delete what is in iPhoto?

I hope I made myself clear and would really appreciate an answer from someone.

By default, iPhoto copies files that you add to the library into the library folder itself. So you would end up with duplicated data. iPhoto has a pref to change that behavior, though. When set that way, it only stores a reference to the file in the library, and doesn't duplicate your data. You'd have to look in the preferences set for the app in your account to see which way it goes.

[enucho]

OK. Many thanks. I will check pref and see. Based on your question, am I to understand that if I remove the photos (not from iPhoto, but from where they were imported from), move them to an external hard drive and delete them from my Mac, they would also disappear from iPhoto?

Emile

bastion, on 22 May 2012 - 07:18 PM, said:

enucho, on 22 May 2012 - 05:35 PM, said:

Greetings,

Apart from the fact that iPhoto drives me nuts, there is one (among many) question that I cannot seem to get an answer for:

* when I move (import or drag) my pictures into iPhoto, what happens? Do I end up with a duplicate set of pictures on my hard drive (so, if my pictures "weigh" 5 gigs and I put them in iPhoto, will I end up with 10 gigs?

** can I delete the original pictures and stay with what is in iPhoto? or will that also delete what is in iPhoto?

I hope I made myself clear and would really appreciate an answer from someone.

By default, iPhoto copies files that you add to the library into the library folder itself. So you would end up with duplicated data. iPhoto has a pref to change that behavior, though. When set that way, it only stores a reference to the file in the library, and doesn't duplicate your data. You'd have to look in the preferences set for the app in your account to see which way it goes.

[bastion]

enucho, on 23 May 2012 - 07:07 AM, said:

OK. Many thanks. I will check pref and see. Based on your question, am I to understand that if I remove the photos (not from iPhoto, but from where they were imported from), move them to an external hard drive and delete them from my Mac, they would also disappear from iPhoto?

I'm not sure I understand the question, but if I do the answer is: perhaps.

If iPhoto's pref is set to copy images into the library, then they'll get copied into the iPhoto Library folder or package (depending on which version of iPhoto you have) and the originals are no longer of any interest to the software.

If iPhoto's pref is set to not copy images into the library, what it does is create a Finder alias file in the iPhoto Library that references the image. If you then remove the image from the original disk, the alias won't resolve to anything. iPhoto *may* still show a thumbnail. I really can't remember because:
1. I stopped using iPhoto for the most part some time ago in favor of Aperture.
2. I don't have it store references. In the abstract I'd like to, but since each reference is a discrete Finder alias file (instead of just an alias record in a database or something) it consumes a silly amount of excess space.

[enucho]

Hello Bastion,


The version of iPhoto I have is the latest one that came with Lion and all its updates. I checked the pref section and the box for copy was ticked. So, I backed up the photos into an external HD and then deleted the photos from my Mac. When I opened iPhoto, they were there. So, I guess it worked and many thanks for your help.

Emile

bastion, on 23 May 2012 - 08:13 AM, said:

enucho, on 23 May 2012 - 07:07 AM, said:

OK. Many thanks. I will check pref and see. Based on your question, am I to understand that if I remove the photos (not from iPhoto, but from where they were imported from), move them to an external hard drive and delete them from my Mac, they would also disappear from iPhoto?

I'm not sure I understand the question, but if I do the answer is: perhaps.

If iPhoto's pref is set to copy images into the library, then they'll get copied into the iPhoto Library folder or package (depending on which version of iPhoto you have) and the originals are no longer of any interest to the software.

If iPhoto's pref is set to not copy images into the library, what it does is create a Finder alias file in the iPhoto Library that references the image. If you then remove the image from the original disk, the alias won't resolve to anything. iPhoto *may* still show a thumbnail. I really can't remember because:
1. I stopped using iPhoto for the most part some time ago in favor of Aperture.
2. I don't have it store references. In the abstract I'd like to, but since each reference is a discrete Finder alias file (instead of just an alias record in a database or something) it consumes a silly amount of excess space.