Merging Photo Libraries in iCloud - one large and one small - request review of plan

I also saw mention that iCloud Photo Library video cannot exceed 15 minutes in length but I couldn't find a source for that (photo sharing video is limited to 15 minute).

I have not seen any mention of a length limit for iCloud Photos Library videos, only for Shared Albums. But I can confirm that some of my videos are longer than 15 minutes and have been synced with iCloud Photos from to my Mac to my iPhone and iPad, no problem. For example - one video is 48 minutes, onother one 1 hour 42 minutes long:

The AVI videos have been blocking the syncing, I also had to remove all AVCHD videos taken with my video recorder from the library.

But I have converted all videos to use either H.264 or HVEC as a codec, either with Motion or the free Handbrake.

I tested all videos simply by exporting the unmodified originals to a folder, then reimporting them in small batches to a different, empty library created for testing. Any video, that could no longer be imported without an error message had to be removed from my library and converted to a different format. Some more ideas how to check the media in your library in this user tip: How to Weed out Legacy Media in Photos for Mac - Apple Community

If the sync sticks does Apple give an error message on the problem (maybe in Console?).

I have not seen anything in the Console, when the syncing is hanging. In the status bar below the Photos window the count of items for uploading may not change for days, however, and then sometimes we can see "on this mac only" or "unable to upload". The last two are indicating a problem, also, if you are seeing "items" instead of videos or photos. If you are seeing "items", photos cannot recognise it as a video or photo. It might be an audio file or a PDF or any other format, that is no longer supported by Photos.

When you switch between two different libraries as your system Photos Library and iCloud Photos Library, the library you enabled currently as the iCloud Photos Library will be uploaded into iCloud and merged into your existing iCloud Photos Library.

In your case you are already having a small Photos Library in iCloud, your 3GB PhotosLibrary. When you now make the 400GB iCloud ApertureLibraryConverted the System Photo Library and turn on iCloud Photos, the complete library will be uploaded into iCloud Photos. Photos will check for duplicates and conflicting metadata against the photos already in iCloud, then the merged library will sync back to your currently used "ApertureLibraryConverted".

You can expect the whole process to take several weeks to complete, given the size of your Aperture Library Converted.

Watch the status bar below the All Photos view for problems, see: Check the status of your library in Photos for macOS - Apple Support. As your Aperture Library might contain older videos in a legacy format, the syncing could hang. If there should be items "Unable to upload" or "On this Mac only", they need removing from the library and fixing.

hotwheels, it will depend on the system version on your Mac.

• Any migration from Aperture to Photos would have best been done on macOS 10.14 or earlier, when we could still run Photos and Aperture side-by-side. On Mojave we can compare the new, migrated Aperture library in Photos directly to the old Library in Aperture and fix incorrect dates, missing metadata, incomplete smart albums, etc.
• On the system versions macOS 10.15 to macOS 12 we could at least migrate Aperture Libraries by opening them in Photos, but could no longer run a full version of Aperture to view the library in Aperture.
• Since macOS 13 Ventura we can no longer open and view the Aperture Libraries even in Photos to see the structure of the library with the albums, folders, projects. We can just import the photos and videos from it to Photos. Here has come FatCat Software to the rescue with the most recent version of PowerPhotos. It can now migrate Aperture and iPhoto Libraries to Photos Libraries, preserving the structure, even on macOS 13, Ventura.

I kept my older macs on macOS 10.14 Mojave. This way it is much easier to handle videos in a legacy format or to retrieve media from the old Aperture Libraries. It is also the last systemversion that has been storing the original image files with their original filename.

Hello jfaughnan,

Thanks for using Apple Support Communities, it's great to have you here.

For assistance with this Aperture issue, we want to recommend that you reach out to Apple directly for support by heading here: Get Support. If support is available in your region, this will let you work directly with an Advisor who specializes in exactly this type of issue with Aperture so they will be your best bet from here.

We hope that this information is helpful.

​Have a great day!

i appreciate your thinking of the larger community as you do this. i also hope i am not intruding. however i am in the same boat and i'm less technically inclined.

can you say which OS you are on?

can you clarify (please) if you have a plan for doing this via iCloud and if so what it entails?

can you clarify (please) if you have a plan for how to do this using Fat Cat Software?

-> meaning do you have proposed methods currently for one of the two or both? or are you asking here how to accomplish this?

hi leonie,

i have been following this poster as i am in the same situation with the caveat that i have equally large libraries in aperture and with photos.

the photos library contains important Albums i am trying to get to for business reasons.

but there is a large amount of data i would like to sort before migrating. so the idea was to split the aperture library for now and migrate the albums and projects only to photos app.

-> A. if i am following you are saying that my thinking that i am "migrating" an aperture library to the photos app is not really correct? and instead the process is to open the library not currently being synced (in my case the aperture library) so it uploads to the cloud? and to then re-open my "original" library that is currently synced? and in this way they will get merged?(!)

-> B. is there an advantage or disadvantage to my thinking about a temporary step of EXPORTING aperture photos in my ALBUMS to the desktop and then IMPORTING them into Photos app one by one while recreating the named Albums as i do this? then presumably i could just delete them out of the aperture library and deal with the i sorted images in aperture later? and in this way get access to my old albums?(!)

-

apologies but i do think in following the OP on this issue that my questions are related. but of course will defer to the OP if i should post elsewhere.

i have your info printed out from earlier. but i also saw it here. sorry i am trying to put it together and not finding it easy...