You can make a difference in the Apple Support Community!

When you sign up with your Apple Account, you can provide valuable feedback to other community members by upvoting helpful replies and User Tips.

Looks like no one’s replied in a while. To start the conversation again, simply ask a new question.

exporting from Photos

I would like to export several thousand photos including all metadata to others. I have tried the Photos/Export/ process on a subset by exporting to a desktop folder. I am not exporting the unmodified original as I have edited most of the photos in some way.

When I compare the exported files to the originals, they do not match. In some cases, descriptions are missing or dates have changed. In several the file size has ballooned by 200+%.

What have I missed or is this to be expected?

Thanks

Posted on Sep 17, 2019 7:52 AM

Reply
Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Posted on Sep 18, 2019 10:43 AM

You could include a PDF file of the photos being "printed" to PDF as a contact sheet with the metadata included under the picture:


You can adjust the number of columns per page and different ways to show the metadata:


Include the pdf file along with the image files so there is a "catalog" of the images and metadata. Not perfect but works..

7 replies
Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Sep 18, 2019 10:43 AM in response to fred57

You could include a PDF file of the photos being "printed" to PDF as a contact sheet with the metadata included under the picture:


You can adjust the number of columns per page and different ways to show the metadata:


Include the pdf file along with the image files so there is a "catalog" of the images and metadata. Not perfect but works..

Sep 17, 2019 12:25 PM in response to Old Toad

Thank you so much for your response. I did have the boxes checked for Title, Keyword, etc and Location when I exported the files.

I moved the exported files to a memory stick from my Desktop and into my wife's MacBook Photos program. I had hoped that the metadata would survive the import without changes. It did not. For example;

Original Photo Info screen shot


The imported photo Info screen shot



The file size is smaller on the import (perhaps okay) but the description is missing as is the keyword.

For other files the file size is larger and the date is changed. I have not discovered a pattern to the changes.


Thanks



Sep 18, 2019 6:35 AM in response to Old Toad

Thank you. I have the Quality set to Maximum but sometimes the file size is larger in Preview, sometimes smaller and sometimes the same as the original. Weird.

The seemingly random changes (in descriptions, location, title) between the original and the export files is frustrating as I hoped to be able to provide my siblings with copies of the old photos with the details of the person/event intact without having to review each photo.


Thanks again for trying to help

Sep 18, 2019 11:19 AM in response to fred57

I have the Quality set to Maximum but sometimes the file size is larger in Preview, sometimes smaller and sometimes the same as the original. Weird.


Not really weird once you remember that jpeg is not a photo format, but a compression format. A Jpeg is a container for an image, when you view the image, the container is opened, the image decompressed for viewing.


When you export at maximum quality, the resulting jpeg is the image (not the original container) compressed at a different rate. You get files bigger than the original because Photos applies less compression than your camera does. This partly due to the setting chosen, but also because Photos uses a different algorithm for compression than your camera does. So these variations in files size are normal.

exporting from Photos

Welcome to Apple Support Community
A forum where Apple customers help each other with their products. Get started with your Apple Account.