I'm now obliged to export at Max Quality to get Full Size images

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Level 1

5 points

I'm now obliged to export at Max Quality to get Full Size images

This change has happened since I signed up to iCloud Photos and almost-40,000 images were uploaded to the cloud. I have opted to have the full resolution images kept on my iMac with optimised versions on my MacBook Pro and iPhone.

Today I am away from home with my MacBook Pro and I wanted to export a full-size image from Apple Photos. On checking with Command-i the info panel assured me its resolution was 5038 x 3778.

I selected High Quality and Full Size as I have many times before, but on exporting the image I found it was only 1068 x 768. I tried several more pictures with the same result. After half an hour of experimentation I found I could "Edit With" in Preview and open the full resolution image then save it.

Then I found that if I selected Maximum Quality when exporting from Photos it would also give me the 5038 x 3778 full resolution.

Trouble is, that file size is 11.5Mb. When using High Quality I would have expected full resolution but more compression and a file size of around 4Mb. I export my images quite often to upload to Flickr and have been happy with High Quality for that purpose.

Now it seems I have to accept the larger file sizes and corresponding longer upload times – either that or my exported images are no better than screen-grabs.

Can anyone tell me why is this happening and if there is there a way round it?

Thank you

MacBook Pro 17″, OS X 10.11

Posted on Jan 1, 2021 5:10 AM

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Answer 1

Old Toad

Level 10

210,437 points

Jan 1, 2021 10:17 AM in response to Night Ed

Try again and make sure you have the Size set to Full Size with JPEG Quality set to High. I just ran a test and Size=Full Size and JPEG Quality= High gave me the full pixel resolution image and the same file size as the original.

High-Full

However, this setting:

High-Large

gave me the 1280 × 720 pixel dimensions and ¼ the file size.

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Answer 2

léonie

Level 10

197,123 points

Jan 1, 2021 7:02 AM in response to Night Ed

If you export a cropped image the pixel size will be lower than the pixel size of the original, when exporting with " High Quality and Full Size". The info in Photos 6 in Big Sur may still be showing you the pixel size of the original, not of the cropped version. It does not always update instantly, which could be confusing.

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Answer 3

Old Toad

Level 10

210,437 points

Jan 1, 2021 11:33 AM in response to Night Ed

I know you were. Did you try more than once? If so and got the same results boot into Safe Mode by booting with the Shift key held down and check there to see if the problem persists. Reboot normally and test again.

NOTE: Safe Mode boot can take up to 10 minutes as it's doing the following;

• Verifies your startup disk and attempts to repair directory issues, if needed

• Loads only required kernel extensions (prevents 3rd party kernel/extensions from loading)

• Prevents Startup Items and Login Items from opening automatically

• Disables user-installed fonts

• Deletes font caches, kernel cache, and other system cache files

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Answer 4

Jan 1, 2021 6:47 AM in response to Night Ed

That also doesn't seem like the expected behavour to me.

Which version of photos/macos are you using?

What happens if you export with max quality, and then immideately export again with high quality?

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Answer 5

Night Ed Author

Level 1

5 points

Jan 1, 2021 7:18 AM in response to TonyCollinet

Thanks for the replies. My Mac OS is High Sierra 10.13.6 (it can't be updated further on this machine) and Photos is version 3.0.

Switching back from Maximum Quality to High Quality then exporting again was an excellent suggestion and had the desired result – an image with the resolution of the edited original with a file size reduced to 4.7Mb.

Was this some kind of cache issue causing a glitch, maybe? I will have to keep a careful eye on future exports.

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Answer 6

Jan 1, 2021 7:27 AM in response to Night Ed

Don't worry about it.

I think the issue is that on your macbook you have optimised storage which normally only stores preview sized images on your mac. Clearly the max quality selection triggered a download of the full size image wheras the high quality didn't. Once the full res image has been downloaded the high quality setting can then export it.

I think this must be a bug in high sierra.

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Answer 7

Night Ed Author

Level 1

5 points

Jan 1, 2021 10:43 AM in response to Old Toad

Thank you so much for the trouble you took with this reply. However, as the original question and subsequent discussion shows, I was already using High Quality and Full Size when the problem first showed itself.

Tony Collinet's suggestion of exporting an image at Maximum Quality, then switching back to High Quality for the next one, has now solved the issue for me. I have since exported several more pictures at High Quality and they have retained their expected resolution instead of downgrading to 1024x768.

I now recall that last week I exported an image in Large size and Photos seemed to remained stuck on this setting despite me having switched back to Full Size for my early attempts today. Switching to Maximum Quality and back to High again seems to have "unstuck" the setting.

This is not how the software is supposed to work, of course, but if it always did that there wouldn't be half so many questions in these forums.

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Answer 8

Jan 1, 2021 5:31 AM in response to Night Ed

Doesn't "Export Unmodified Original" work with iCloud (I have always opted out iCloud photos)?

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Answer 9

Night Ed Author

Level 1

5 points

Jan 1, 2021 6:28 AM in response to Matti Haveri

Thanks for the reply. Perhaps it would be interesting to find out, but that would be of no practical use to me. Images I want to export have all been cropped and edited in Photos.

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Answer 10

Night Ed Author

Level 1

5 points

Jan 1, 2021 7:21 AM in response to TonyCollinet

Sorry, I marked the wrong reply as Solved. It should have been yours. Can't see a way out of that.

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I'm now obliged to export at Max Quality to get Full Size images

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