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User profile for user: RLSbear
RLSbear Author
User level: Level 1
8 points

Scanned Pictures

Over the last couple of years I have been scanning all of my mom’s old pictures into a folder on my hard drive. (NOT into iPhoto or Photos). If that DRAG and DROP these scanned pictures into PHOTOS (which I currently use)...does that mean I will now have TWO copies of each picture? One in it’s original location where I scanned them. AND another COPY in the PHOTOS library?


IF so, Can I then DELETE the pictures in folder in which they were originally scanned into?


Thanking you in advance for your response.

iMac 21.5″, macOS 10.14

Posted on Jun 6, 2020 6:20 PM

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User profile for user: Keith Barkley
Keith Barkley
User level: Level 7
21,006 points

Posted on Jun 6, 2020 8:04 PM

As long as you are running a managed library (which is the default) , iPhoto copies the images into its library, and you can safely delete the originals. Check the preferences to make sure you are running a managed and not a referenced library.


This being said, it would be a very good practice to back these up on an external drive somewhere.


Backups are your friend. The more precious the data, the more important the backup.

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User profile for user: Keith Barkley
Keith Barkley
User level: Level 7
21,006 points

Jun 6, 2020 8:04 PM in response to RLSbear

As long as you are running a managed library (which is the default) , iPhoto copies the images into its library, and you can safely delete the originals. Check the preferences to make sure you are running a managed and not a referenced library.


This being said, it would be a very good practice to back these up on an external drive somewhere.


Backups are your friend. The more precious the data, the more important the backup.

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Scanned Pictures

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