Nisiprus
Level 1 (8 points)
Photos for Mac

Q: How to export photos to external hard drive keeping Albums?

Question on Photos

Using 2010 Macbook Pro

 

Hi!

I would like to export my entire library of photos (20k images) to an external hard drive.  For various reasons, Photos increasingly does not meet my needs, including having my photos locked up in a proprietary database organization format.  I have spend a lot of time creating iPhoto Albums and now Albums under the new Photos app, so I'd like to preserve those on export.  I also have made edits to many photos, so I understand that exporting max quality JPGs (rather than "unmodified originals") is the way to go.  If I just export everything en masse, it uses subfolders that don't correspond to my albums.

 

Any ideas on how to do this?  i am comfortable with programming and would be open to an Applescript based solution. 

 

For clarity, I do NOT wish to simply move the Photos library to a hard drive and run it from there.  Also I'm sure Photos is a lovely app that works for many people, but please take as given that I'd like to move on.  Thanks.

MacBook Pro

Posted on May 25, 2016 9:30 AM

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Nisiprus

Q: How to export photos to external hard drive keeping Albums?

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  • by Old Toad,

    Old Toad Old Toad May 25, 2016 9:48 AM in response to Nisiprus
    Level 10 (140,918 points)
    Photos for Mac
    May 25, 2016 9:48 AM in response to Nisiprus

    The easiest way to do that is to use this Applescript from the Photos for Mac User Tips webpage:  Export Albums to Folders - Jacques Rioux's Script.  You can select all of the albums in the album selection window that appears by using the Command + A key combination.  Then select your destination and proceed.

     

    You can download a compiled version of the script as an application from this tutorial site: P01 - Applescripts from Photos’ User Tips Compiled as Applications

     

    WARNING:  This will only get you the preview or edited versions of the photos.  Raw Files will not be exported nor will the original image files.  Maybe  you can modify the script to use the original files instead of the preview or edited version.

     

    The only way do what you want and get the original files is to export the photos in an album as originals one and a time to a folder at the destination and name the folder the same as the album.

     

    You can export the originals to folders named after the Moments in the library but not the albums.

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