WHERE are my PHOTOS?????

After downloading the new iphoto update, my photos have been eliminated from my computer. Where did they go?

Who can tell with that amount of information to work with? Easy and surefire fix: restore from your back up.

Regards

TD

When I updated iPhoto last year it deleted all my edited versions, affecting over 3000 of my photos 17,000 photos, whether edited in Photoshop or within iPhoto, and replaced them with the "original."

Because I didn't discover it for several weeks my backup was no longer up to date, and it had also deleted my edited versions. Some of those edits took hours!

Have you tried rebuilding the library with the second option checked: Rebuild the iPHoto Library Database from automatic backup?

Rebuilding (thumbnails at first, then moving on from there) was the first thing I tried when I realized what had happened. But they are simply gone. Opening up the iPhoto library package and checking the dates shows they they were deleted during the upgrade to ver. 11 when iPhoto was doing rebuilding as part of it's installation. I notice there are major changes in how iPhoto now stores photos. Apparently several years worth of "modifieds" got trashed. Simply not on the drive anywhere.

OK, looks like missing photos are a problem for upgrade to Snowleopard and iPhoto 11. Surprised me because I successfully loaded the upgrade on a Macbook Pro..... since I had all the photos on the desktop MAC, I was comfortable doing that. That upgrade appears to be OK. But the desktop WAS NOT a success. I can see the photos when I look in the desktop screensaver list, all organized by their files, and I can see them under the Image files organized by their extension. They are still there in the computer but not accessible in the iPhoto library. I have tried each of the suggested tips availabe on the MAC.

I am no computer geek and only somewhat savvy but my analysis is that the upgrade did not move the data from the old iPhoto and bring it into the new iPhoto. 11 Why not on this machine? It was successful on the Macbook Pro??????? I don't get it.

The pics are there, tucked away in some corner of computer memory world................... I can try to load the pics from the laptop onto the desktop and that will minimize my loss....BUT it is still not OK. I do have a new external harddrive and printer and that was part of the reason I was upgrading. OOOOO not happy with this.

Can you take a moment to explain what the actual problem is?

It may be that what you are seeing in the Screen Saver list are only the Thumbnail versions of the photos.

If the originals came over at all then they are in the iPhoto package > Masters (aka "originals") folder. You can easily check this.

Go to your home folder on your Mac > pictures > iPhoto library. It is what Apple calls a "package" so you will need to right click on iPhoto Library and choose Show Package Contents from the pop up menu.

In the finder window that will appear, open the Masters folder. Photos are organized by year > month >date in successive sub folders. Choose a year you know you took photos in. Drill down into a month and day you want to check. Keep drilling down until there are no more folders in folders and you should see an actual photo file such as a .jpg or whatever format you shoot in. If they are the true original photos, they should be in the 1 or more Mb size range. For example, most of my photos are 1 to 4 megabytes. Drill down in to other folders if you need to. If they are all empty, then indeed none of your originals came over, only thumbnails that point to them.

You would have to re-import them as you have described. The problem is that if you have stray thumbnails AND manually import (drag them in) then you will probably end up with two thumbnails for each photo, one good, and one orphaned.

I am running OSX 10.8.2 on an Imac (3.4 Ghz Intel Core i7) when I did a software update and chose "iPhoto 11" version 9.4.2 (710.42) all of a sudden my entire iphoto library and all photos are gone.

I am a very savvy Mac user of 22 year and a programmer.

There is no longer an iphoto library here:

user > Pictures > iPhoto Library

All my original photos are missing as well. They are completed gone from my harddrive.

There is nothing to backup and nothing to restore.

This is a complete nightmare. I had 10,000+ photos that are completely wiped off my harddrive.

There is definitely something going on here with this new update. The software itself had to have completely erased all of my photos off my hard drive.

Believe me I have NOT moved the folder or accidently moved it to the trash.

THIS IS DEFINITELY AN ISSUE WITH THE SOFTWARE OR COMBINATION OF THE SOFTWARE AND OPERATING SYSTEM!!!!

My library and all pictures were on my drive then after update to iPhoto ALL GONE.

This really is happening. CAn someone at APPLE please enlighten us to what the heck is goign on here???????

The only update you did was for iPhoto, correct. Download and use Find Any File to search for "Library6.iPhoto", a file that is unique to iPhoto Libraries. FAF can search areas that Spotlight can't, like system folders, invisible folders and packages. If there is a library somewhere on your hard drive with that file in it FAF will find it.

If not your best bet is to restore the library from your latest backup.

OT

I am devestated as I have lost nearly my entire photo library. I recently bought another Mac Powerbook and transfered all my photos from my old mac over to my new one. I also bought a new hard drive but stupidly I didn't back anything as I had thought that having a new mac I will get around to it. What a big mistake. I then updated Iphoto to the latest and thought nothing of it. A few weeks later I opened Iphoto only to find that I had no photos at all. I lost my entire photo collection from the past 7 years and have tried in vain to recover deleted files but have only been able to recover 1/8 of my original photos, and most are just thumnail size.

I understand that you should always back up all your files and I have now experienced the first hand how terrible it feels to lose so many memories. However, I am still seething that a company such as Apple would release an Iphoto upgrade that completely wipes your photographs.

F#&KING DISGRACEFUL ON APPLES PART I SAY!

Any way you can demonstrate that this was done by the update?

1- if you do not ALWAYS have a backup you are 100% guarenteed to lose your photos sooner or later

2 - since you transfered from an old mac worst case is transfering that library over again giving you everything you had when you pruchased your new computer

3 -- You language does nothing to enhance your question or to improve the chances of an answer and is really inappropriate and has been reported

4 - your problem was not caused by an upgrade - your problem is a data problem in your library - Millions and million and millions of peolple have upgraded with no problems - some have had problems and if they handle it correctly nearly all of them have recovered everything

5 - not only do you always have to have a backup if your files and photos have any value to you, but you especially need a backup when you upgrade or update software

6 - Apple and the volenteer users here certainly have no responsibility for your failure to use normal procedures

LN

Same happened to a friend of mine. Updated, bam, 10.000 photo's vanished. No backup (duh). How can Apple make a mistake like that? Oh, by the way, yesterday happened to my iPhoto too. I am an Apple certified consultant so I guess I know what I am doing, but my photo's also vanished.

I am an Apple certified consultant

You updated with no back up?