Hyperlinking into iPhoto

I'm interested in making links from an Excel spreadsheet to photos in my iPhoto Libraray.

I know of on way to do this.

Regards

TD

I believe TD meant "no" way - and he is off onHoliday for a while

LN

I'm interested in making links from an Excel spreadsheet to photos in my iPhoto Library.

You can link to a photo outside of iPhoto but Excel does not support the Media Browser feature which would allow it to select a photo from inside the library.

HOWEVER, You might be able to make an alias of the Originals folder inside the iPhoto Library package and use it to navigate to your picture and link to it. Use the Insert->Picture->From File menu option and select the checkbox to link to the photo.

It will be difficult to find the photo but a search should be able to do it. Then you can either opt to embed the photo in the spreadsheet or not at the time of insertion. I would use this method very carefully so you don't damage the library. *Do not move or rename any item inside the library package from the Finder!*

This would be only for use on your computer. Not on the web if that's what you meant by hyperlinking.

OT

I've done some testing and found that you can do it in a fashion. However the hyperlink will only open the photo in it's default editor/application and only when you click on it while you're on the Mac with the library. The link will appear as: +*file/localhost/Users/MacUserNamne/Pictures/Test Library/Originals/2009/Jul 9, 2009/Scanned JPG0.jpg*+ on the Excel spreadsheet, not the picture itself.

It takes a bit of work to get the URL but it can be done and I don't think that's what you want to do is it? If you want to view the picture in the spreadsheet you'll need to drag it into the spreadsheet from the open iPhoto window and resize it as needed. That will make the spreadsheet file large so you probably would be better off exporting the photos out of iPhoto at a reduced quality level so the file size will be smaller.

Belated, and I'm not sure of your ultimate goal here--but I assume you want to attach more information to your photos than iPhoto will allow.

It might be worth looking at Bento for an alternate approach--it has a database that will automatically pull in all your photos and if I remember correctly, you can set all sorts of custom fields in the database, then create smart collections to run reports on your data, export to spreadsheet format, etc.

Here's an article discussing it--there's a 30 day free trial:
http://www.appleinsider.com/articles/09/09/29/filemakerreleases_bento_3_personal_database_for_applemac.html

(I use Bento, but not the iPhoto integration)

Where are you going to use this spreadsheet. If other places then just your computer then you'll need to put them on a server somewhere and link to them there. Hyperlinks generally require the files linked to to be online.

That being said, if you only plan on using the document on your computer and if there's not too many photos, export them to a folder in the Pictures folder and link to them there. That will get around the iPhoto block.

Yes, I understood your question. My point was just that Bento comes with a built-in way to create an additional catalog of your photo collection, that might save you work and offer easier (QuickLook) access to the photos. Although, now it sounds like you are only cataloging certain photos, so that might not be appropriate after all.

By ultimate goal, actually, I meant whatever you need to use this hyperlinked spreadsheet for. Creating the hyperlinks is just a step on the way to meeting that function. My thought, and this is why I said it would be an alternative approach, was that Bento might serve that function (whatever it is) better.

One of the things Bento is designed to do is catalog things with associated photos and data. Excel is not exactly designed to do that, it's just possible to use it that way. In general, using a program designed for your needs means it's easier to make the computer do the grunt work for you.

An alternative which lets you add the photo to the spreadsheet and keep the file size down is to resize your folder of photos with an application like Resize!. With it you can select the maximum pixel dimension you want and set the image quality level to as to reduce the file size down to a level that will not bloat your spreadsheet. You can get the file size down to 40B or maybe less for each image depending on the image size you want to add to the spreadsheet.

Click to view full size

Then when you print up a hard copy you'll have the photos with you.

Very likely it is. 🙂 I was imagining you manually hyperlinking an entire iPhoto Library when I suggested it, not a selection of 10-100 pix.

But I kinda like databases, so am prone to overkill with them.