iTJMacattack

Q: How to delete pictures permanently from Photos app in my entire mac?

Within the Photos app for OS X you cannot delete a picture permanently from your Mac.

 

(I have imported my existing iPhoto library when I migrated to Photos on 10.10.3)

 

When I delete a picture from Photos. Photos then puts the picture in a trash bin that is hidden in the File button on the task bar - "Show Recently Deleted". When you select this it then shows all of your deleted pictures you selected in Photos. If you then select to "Delete All" it asks you again are your sure and you click ok. Photos then cannot see these photos. BUT IT DID NOT DELETE THEM FROM YOUR MAC!

 

I then opened iPhoto, found the photos that I deleted inside the Photos app and viola they are still there, (these are not thumbnails!) these are the exact picture. HOW DO YOU VERIFY? In iPhoto if you select the picture then go to File - "Reveal in Finder" it will show that the picture you THOUGHT you deleted in Photos, is still there in the Master folder in your library!!

FYI there is no way in Photos to find the file location, very sneaky because the app is not deleting these files. This very frustrating coming from Apple who is pushing thinner profiles so SSD's with very limited storage, to give you the assumption that you are actually deleting these photos and videos when in fact you are not.

 

Question again is...

How to delete pictures permanently from Photos app in my entire Mac?

Does anyone have a solution other than don't use Photos.

 

This question was asked and solved already but I have verified that "Delete All" in the hidden trash can in Photos does in fact not delete from your disk space! Have a video on my YouTube Channel iTJMacattack that shows this issue - for proof.

 

Please real help and a solution!!

 

Thanks,

MacBook Pro, OS X Yosemite (10.10.3)

Posted on Apr 12, 2015 9:28 AM

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Q: How to delete pictures permanently from Photos app in my entire mac?

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  • by romit.73,

    romit.73 romit.73 Sep 10, 2015 1:30 PM in response to DPL19702
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Sep 10, 2015 1:30 PM in response to DPL19702

    Did the same thing, but still photos aren't deleted from masters folder. My iCloud Photo library is also switched on.

  • by stimbler,

    stimbler stimbler Oct 1, 2015 1:09 PM in response to Linmukai
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Oct 1, 2015 1:09 PM in response to Linmukai

    Thank you! Going to recently deleted in Photo app and then deleting all from there worked. Freed up hard drive space within a minute of deleting all.

  • by timg1392,

    timg1392 timg1392 Oct 6, 2015 8:37 AM in response to sbunns
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Oct 6, 2015 8:37 AM in response to sbunns

    Nice stuns, that was a simple and effective solution.  I did as you said and cleared out 7GB quickly and easily

  • by timg1392,

    timg1392 timg1392 Oct 6, 2015 8:40 AM in response to timg1392
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Oct 6, 2015 8:40 AM in response to timg1392

    sbunns not stuns...gotta love auto correct

  • by malako069,

    malako069 malako069 Oct 7, 2015 4:12 AM in response to iTJMacattack
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Oct 7, 2015 4:12 AM in response to iTJMacattack

    Have the same issue.

     

    Is there any option to REAL erasing photos from Photos (and then from my Mac)?

     

    Cheers

  • by Boltonjohn1947,

    Boltonjohn1947 Boltonjohn1947 Oct 27, 2015 4:06 AM in response to sbunns
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Oct 27, 2015 4:06 AM in response to sbunns

    Thanks. This helps enormously.  I used iphotos for pre-processing large numbers of RAW files before exporting as jpegs.  Most days, a couple of hundred or more 23mb RAW images are imported into photos out of which I select ten or so for onward processing. Having up to 4gb of unused deleted pictures a day for thirty days was completely messing up my system. Not to mention that the back-up disk I use for Time Machine is getting full after ten days of back-ups. It seems that over the last few years Apple the requirements of Apple's original customer base of print processors are being dumped in favour of making their machines Twitter friendly.

  • by henry vm,

    henry vm henry vm Oct 27, 2015 12:56 PM in response to iTJMacattack
    Level 1 (10 points)
    Oct 27, 2015 12:56 PM in response to iTJMacattack

    Some can delete the pictures completely, other can not. Maybe the answer is: hard links.

    When you import an iPhoto library into Photos the system creates kind of aliases to the original pictures, instead of disk-space eating duplicates. But not normal aliases as we know, it's done by 'hard links', something from the Unix underpinning of OS X. And when two applications, in this case iPhoto and Photos coexist using folders with hard links for the same pictures, that pictures can not be deleted by only one of them.

    Let me try to explain without too much technical details. A hard link is like a second door for one and the same room, where an alias is an arrow that points to the door. All doors are equal in hierarchy, the original door included. A door can be deleted, but the room must be kept for the other doors. Only if one door is left, deleting that door can safely be accompanied by deleting the room.

    So the solution should be: delete the picture in both applications to free up the diskspace. Could not test it, so as I said above: maybe.

  • by J G Low,

    J G Low J G Low Oct 27, 2015 3:26 PM in response to Boltonjohn1947
    Level 1 (21 points)
    Photos for Mac
    Oct 27, 2015 3:26 PM in response to Boltonjohn1947

    When you delete a photo in the mac Photos App it is basically transferred to a “smart” Album i.e. Recently Deleted.  In theory they remain there for 30 days and then are automatically actually deleted.  If in the meantime you open the Recently Deleted Album and select photos there, a tick will appear in the corner and if you then select delete they are immediately deleted.

     

    In many ways I think Photos tries to be too clever.  The iPhoto deleted button gave you the option to move a photo to iPhoto’s trash or to the real trash which when emptied in the normal way removed the photo.

     

    One of the big problems with Photos I have found as a new user is the lack of a decent manual and help files.  For instance if you type “delete” into the Photos help it gives no information at all on deleting a photo.

  • by Bebo Gordo,

    Bebo Gordo Bebo Gordo Oct 30, 2015 1:24 PM in response to iTJMacattack
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Oct 30, 2015 1:24 PM in response to iTJMacattack

    Sadly there is no quick way to delete pictures from "Photos Library" or "iPhoto Library".  Although you can do it the same way for both.  You have to right click or control click on the "Photos Library" or "iPhoto Library" which should be in your "Pictures" folder.  Once you right click or control click on it select "Show Package Contents" you are going to have to go through the pictures you want deleted from the following folders: Masters, Previews,Thumbnails.  You may also want to take a look at "model resources" folder which is in the "resources" folder.

     

    Once you have done this you will want to delete the pictures from "Photos" or "iPhotos" application if you have not already done it.

     

    And if you have ever used mail to reduce an image size or even email an image you are going to want to get into the "Library" to free up all the space that is being used up by duplicate file that get created there.  The first time I did it I ended up freeing 35GB of disk space.

     

    From your desktop click on "Go" in the top menu bar. Hold down the "option" key so that "Library" can appear.  Select "Library".

     

    Now before you go into "Library" do not delete anything that you are not sure of.  Your first time in here you are going to want to check the size of each main folder to see how large they are.  Anything over 1GB should be looked into to make sure you don't have anything you don't need taking up space.  "Messages" and "Mail" will most likely be the largest because they keep everything you have ever received or sent through mail or messages and I do mean everything.  Even things you deleted the first day you used mail and messages.

     

    Have fun.

  • by johndoejnr,

    johndoejnr johndoejnr Nov 22, 2015 12:52 AM in response to iTJMacattack
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Nov 22, 2015 12:52 AM in response to iTJMacattack

    I'm trying to add to this conversation, but there's nowhere on the page I can ask my own question, and I'm having to reply to someone's comments instead.

     

    I have no File>Show Recently Deleted. It's just not there!!! Is every iMac different to each other, cause this happens all the time. I'll read about something in Apple Support Communities, they'll even show me a picture of the drop-down menu with the link, but on my computer it's just not there.

     

    I'm surprised that of all the dozens and dozens of threads about deleting pic from Photos, there's not one response from Apple itself. It's like we're all left to our own devices in trying to solve an issue.

  • by kevinfromkcom,

    kevinfromkcom kevinfromkcom Nov 23, 2015 1:02 PM in response to sbunns
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Nov 23, 2015 1:02 PM in response to sbunns

    Just installed Yosemite.  Went to "File" on toolbar to find "recently deleted photos" however the option (recently deleted photos) is not there.  I keep on reading that it is there but it is not. Hoping there is a simple answer to this. Thx.

    kevinfromkcom

  • by LarryHN,

    LarryHN LarryHN Nov 23, 2015 1:19 PM in response to kevinfromkcom
    Level 10 (85,032 points)
    Photos for Mac
    Nov 23, 2015 1:19 PM in response to kevinfromkcom

    In Yosemite OS X 10.10.x and PHotos 1.0 that is where it is (file menu ==> show recently deleted)

     

    In ElCaptain OS X 10.11.x and Photos 1.2 it is under albums in the  sidebar (view menu ==> show sidebar)

     

    LN

  • by kevinfromkcom,

    kevinfromkcom kevinfromkcom Nov 24, 2015 7:25 AM in response to LarryHN
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Nov 24, 2015 7:25 AM in response to LarryHN

    Larry,  thanks so much. I meant to say that I installed El Capitan (not Yosemite). There it was in Albums and under "view". Greatly appreciated!

     

    k

  • by LarryHN,

    LarryHN LarryHN Nov 24, 2015 8:50 AM in response to kevinfromkcom
    Level 10 (85,032 points)
    Photos for Mac
    Nov 24, 2015 8:50 AM in response to kevinfromkcom

    you are welcome

     

    I suspected that which is why I posted directions for both just in case

     

    LN

  • by delapaco,

    delapaco delapaco Nov 29, 2015 10:22 AM in response to iTJMacattack
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Nov 29, 2015 10:22 AM in response to iTJMacattack

    These are my two cents. It seems that:

     

    1) If photos are migrated from iPhoto to Photos, they have to be deleted in both programs to disappear from your drive.

     

    2) If photos are imported directly to Photos, then deleting them from Photos would be enough.

     

    This would explain the different experiences reported above. Note that you do NOT have to dive into your hidden folders. Don't do it.

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