Can I download a batch of photos [roughly one month's worth] from Photos in the cloud to work with offline?

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Can I download a batch of photos [roughly one month's worth] from Photos in the cloud to work with offline?

I have just returned from a trip. I have been using my iPhone to take pics and a Canon camera, then each night transferring the Canon images to the Photos program on my iPad [which then syncs/uploads to iCloud I gather]. Now that I am home I'd like to download all the photos of that trip [roughly all July photos] and put them on a harddrive and work with them locally and not in cloud or by having each one worked on needing to download to work with first. Can I do that and is it best/simpler to go to iCloud itself and download the iimages there [from iPhone & Canon via iPad] to a separate harddrive.

I figure then I can delete everything in that month in the cloud and re-upload the worked on pics == ie I have 1500 now in cloud, will work on and edit and delete and end up with 500 and then delete the 'original' 1500 and upload to cloud, perhaps by connecting harddrive and importing to Photos the final batch??

If this works I have other discrete albums that I can handle similarly but thought I'd test my theory on this batch first.

Thanks.

Mac Studio (2022)

Posted on Jul 24, 2024 2:40 AM

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Answer 1

Top-ranking reply

léonie

Level 10

200,759 points

Jul 24, 2024 3:30 AM in response to Victoria Herring

Hello, Victoria,

I hope you had a great trip!

Is your Mac syncing with iCloud Photos?

Then you can simply open your iCloud Photos Library in Photos on your Mac and use the command "File > Export > Export unmodified Originals" to save your images to a separate folder.

I would use the checkmark "Export IPTC as XMP" to save the IPTC metadata in a sidecar file, so you will not lose the locations and other metadata. And use the subfolder format "Moment name" to collect the photos taken at the same day at the same location together.

léonie

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Answer 2

Jul 24, 2024 9:16 AM in response to Victoria Herring

Optimize may keep smaller version of your pictures to save space, but when you need the full resolution for zooming in, editing, printing, or exporting, Photos grabs the full version from your iCloud Photos Library. If there's plenty of storage space on the Mac, the higher resolution versions may even be kept until Photos sees that you need more space. If that happens, it will start dumping the Originals until you need them again.

Of course you can edit the pictures within Photos using its own editor.

Also, you can edit using other editors by choosing the menu item "Image>Edit with"

Here I'm choosing Edit with Lightroom Classic.

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Answer 3

Jul 24, 2024 4:03 AM in response to léonie

Hello - again. Glad to have your answer! It was a great trip [Adriatic area] but now that pics are in the cloud working on them can be a pain. I'd forgotten about the Export function = that will make it very easy. Thanks again.!!!

The photos were taken by iPhone & Canon, put on iPad and uploaded [I believe] from iPad to iCloud photos == I opened Photos on my Studio and see them all there - I'll double check to be sure all syncing is done but think it is and now I can export. My Studio is set up to optimize but I assume the command to export unmod originals cures the problem by going to the ones in the Cloud to download....V.

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Answer 4

Jul 24, 2024 10:25 AM in response to Richard.Taylor

Thank you - that is helpful - one reason I want to put the bulk of them on a separate harddrive to work with is that if I do start to work with an image and it is something that needs to download first that's a pain = I don't mind keeping them up there for now but when I edit one by one don't like the delay hassle = your comment is helpful tho

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Can I download a batch of photos [roughly one month's worth] from Photos in the cloud to work with offline?

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