Iphoto can't find my photos!

Vicoria

Welcome to the Apple user discussion forums

Do I ned to buy the new Ilife in order to get my Iphoto to work properly?

No - this had nothing to do with the version of iPhoto that you have - if fact you should NOT upgrade until you solve your library problem - upgrading a corrupted library makes it harder to solve

click on the thumb nail a BIG exclamation point comes up instead of the photo-

This is an indication that iPhoto has lost contact with the photo - it is often caused by user activity within the iPhoto library, moving, changing or deleting photos using the finder or an external program instead of using iPhoto to control the iPhoto library

but the ones that I have already gone through an edited, then seem to disappear so that the next time i go and click on the thumb nail

Exactly how are you "going through and editing" your photos?

How do I get Iphoto to recognize/ find my pictures.

Answer the above questions to help make sure this is the right path

Do you have a good current backup of yoru iPhoto Library?

If not then Probably the first step will be to rebuild yuor library -quit iPhoto, back up your iPhoto library and launch iPhoto while depressing the optin (alt) and command (apple) keys and use the resulting dialogue to rebuild your library

If that does not work then you can download iPhoto Library Manager - http://www.fatcatsoftware.com/iplm/ - and use it's rebuild function to attempt a rebuild - it will make a new library and leave your old one untouched so there is no risk

If none of these work then you will have to create a new library - quit iPhoto and drag your iPhoto library to the desktop then launch iPhoto and it will create a fresh, new library - go to the originals folder in the iPhoto library on your desktop and drag each folder onto iPhoto to recreate yur library without edits, albums or projects

Good luck


LN

I have similar problem, however, my exclamation mark started after I installed i-work '08, now my i-photo '08 will not work. The photos are there, but when I click on them, they come up with the big exclamation mark on gray background. Two weeks ago I used same photos to build an i-movie/DVD prior to installing i-work. I ran the disk first aid and many permissions appeared to be corrected, whatever that was, but I still get messages when trying to open "some items can't be used because you don't have access privileges or because they contain no content or are corrupted", "couldn't paste file", "couldn't paste file because it is unread". Will depressing the option, command key while launching i-photo be the correct step to take? Also the event stacks are all black, that is also something new since i-work. Will try anything to rebuild the library if it is appropriate. I am a computer illiterate and learning curve is becoming shorter, so please keep your suggestions simple.
Thanks for any and all assistance.

Try rebuilding the database. Hold down the apple and option (or alt) keys while launching iPhoto. Use the resulting dialogue to rebuild. Choose the top three options.

If that fails:

Download iPhoto Library Manager and use its rebuild function. This will create a new library based on data in the albumdata.xml file. Not everything will be brought over - no slideshows, books or calendars, for instance - but it should get all your albums and keywords 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 a similar problem that started when I went on vacation. I didn't want all my photos on my macbook hd, so I put them on an external drive. Then while I was on vacation I downloaded new photos. So now all the pre-vacation photos are there as thumbnails but not actual photos--those get me the big exclamation point when I try to access them. How can I bring these two libraries back into one on the external drive? I will also want to seperate libraries by year, I guess, so there is not too much on the book, AND just keep some favorites from all years on the book.
Thanks.

knrking

Welcome to the Apple Discussions.

I didn't want all my photos on my macbook hd, so I put them on an external drive.

Exactly how did you go about that?

Regards

TD

Knrking

Welcome to the Apple user discussion forums

I didn't want all my photos on my macbook hd, so I put them on an external drive.

How did you do this? If you went into your iPhoto library and moved photos using the finder then that is the cause of your problem - it is strongly advised that you never enter the iphoto library and never move or change anything within it via the finder - if this is what you did can you restore the iPhoto library to exactly how it was before you "moved" the photos?

I will also want to seperate libraries by year, I guess, so there is not too much on the book, AND just keep some favorites from all years on the book.

Once you have a working library iPhoto Library Manager - http://www.fatcatsoftware.com/iplm/ - is the easiest and best way to manage multiple libraries and move photos between them

LN

Message was edited by: LarryHN

I held down the option/alt key and had minimal success. However, prior to doing that I
looked in the trash and found my entire i-photo library in the trash!! I think it happened when I
ran the disk permissions check as suggested on another forum. I have put a few of the "trashed"
photos back into i-photo and it seems to be working, at least I am not getting the exclamation mark
when I click on a photo. Is there an easy way to get all of the "trashed photos" back into i-photo other than by placing them one by one. The empty "events" squares are still in i-photo, but the ones without replaced photos are black. The larger "events" have empty squares, but when I move a photo from that event from the trash into the "event" it begins to fill up the stack. How would I removed an "event" if I chose not to put the photos back in? Will the i-photo Library Manager help the problem?

Thank you Terence Devlin, Just to bring you up to date on your advice. Downloading the i-photo manager did restore 124 of my photos, but could not find 234 of them. The ones rebuilt are working fine, and drag and drop where ever without the exclamation mark. Now I will open the trash and see how many of the photos I really want to leave in the library. I still don't know how all of this happened, but I learned about the Manager and hope I won't need to use it again. The exclamation marks all started with the installation of i-work, and in trying to find a fix with the permissions disk, it seemed to make it worse. Thank you for your help in the matter. I am up and running again. There are other posts on this thread, but I will mark this as solved for me and hope the others have found answers as well.