How can I do a wholesale elimination / deleting of duplicate photos without havin to do them individually...Thanks

First - do not get lots of duplicates - typically duplicates are a symptom not the problem - if you want to provide more information there may be a better solution

Given no information the best solution is Duplicate annihilator - http://brattoo.com/propaganda/

LN

Where do you see these duplicates? In the Finder or in the iPhoto window? By chance did you import a library into the current library?

OT

I downloaded my photos from my PC onto a flash drive to transfer to my mac, I a month later before I gave the PC away I dpwnloaded them again and transferred them to my mac. I thought that like my PC it would not copy duplicates. Then somehow I duplicated them again. So I have three sets of photos but some are all together but some are intermingled.

Is there a simple way of deleting the duplicates in one shot. Right now I delete a few a night. I can't delete them all because I also have new photos that are only in my mac database.

Also some photos seem to no longer handle being enlarged. They lose detail and sharpness.

Thanks for any help.

It sounds very like you have imported a library of photos that includes thumbnails of the actual photos. This will give you apparent duplicates (I say 'apparent' because these thumbnails are actually not dupes - for a start they are lower quality) and images that are poor quality.

I hope you've been checking the file size of the "duplicates" you've been deleting. Do you still have the photos on the flash drive?

No. I downloaded the photos twice thinking that iphoto would skip the dupes they wat windows did.

In events or photos, the thumbnails are side by side. Before I deleted any of them I opened each one and they were the same.

If the dupes were in one section it'd be easy but they are all side by side to the first downloaded photos, So I have to delete or mark one photo then skip and mark the next photo then after doing this drag them to trash. I can still open the remaining photo and it is the same quality as the dupe I deleted.

Some photos are perfect. Others are in bad shape, but on the PC there is no problem enlarging them and they look fine with no destortions.

I can not just delete the library and re download because I have new unique photos that I would lose. I have an external hard drive for b/u.

So in iphoto the photos are side by side and if you open each one they are all of the same quality. If there is another or better way to open them then clicking on the photo I am not aware of it.

When I still had apple support they told me I had to delete them individually.

Then I accidentally duped all the photos because I misunderstood make a copy.

Some photos are perfect. Others are in bad shape, but on the PC there is no problem enlarging them and they look fine with no destortions

What does "bad shape" mean? What are the dimensions of these photos?

In events or photos, the thumbnails are side by side. Before I deleted any of them I opened each one and they were the same.

Did you compare the size?

if you have mackeeper you can use the "duplicate" file option. when you first open it, let it scan. then click change folder, go to your photo's folder and scan that one. when the scan is complete, click the duplicate icon and then click remove. This can be accomplished in less than 3 minutes from start to finish. dont forget to empty your trash can after all your duplicates end up there! if you need a super fast way to empy your trash can, let me know ;-)

(this method does not include thumbnails as duplicates)

Message was edited by: whatchawearing

if you have mackeeper you can use the "duplicate" file option.

Please. Under no circumstances use MacKeeper on any part of your Library. It will trash it and cause significant data loss.

Apart from the dubious quality of MacKeeper itself, plus the makers appalling scammy business practise, this trash application does not understand the iPhoto Library.

Seriously. Avoid it.

Regards

TD

whatchawearing wrote:

if you have mackeeper you can use the "duplicate" file option. when you first open it, let it scan. then click change folder, go to your photo's folder and scan that one. when the scan is complete, click the duplicate icon and then click remove. This can be accomplished in less than 3 minutes from start to finish. dont forget to empty your trash can after all your duplicates end up there! if you need a super fast way to empy your trash can, let me know ;-)

(this method does not include thumbnails as duplicates)

Message was edited by: whatchawearing

THis is REALLY bad advice!!!! Do not follow it!!

first off MacKeeper is considered malwear by many and the best advice is to remove it and never use it

and in any case NEVER make any changes to the content or structure of the iPhoto library using the finder or other programs (like MacKeeper) - the iPhoto library is a SQL database and must be modified only by iPhoto - using other programs on it will corrupt the library and cause loss of data - and possibly photos

In your case if you still have the photos from the PC I would just trash the bad iPhoto library and start over from scratch only importing them once

LN

I have downloaded Mackeeper. I had started to use it and did not like or trust what it was doing. I placed it a folder listing it as MacKeeper be wary so I know not to use it unless I get good verification. Once I read the post and I saw the folder I new I could not trust it. So I agree that it should never be used. Now that I see so many people agree with my instict that it is an untrustworth program I am going to trash it.

Anyway I am speaking of duplicates. The photos are the same the file size is the same size and the demensions in pixels are the same size.

They are dupes.

In liue of a better answer i will just have to do a few every day. Or I could delete all the photos reimport than use my time machine to reimport al my new photos.

The only application for finding and identifying duplicates in an iPhoto Library that's available is Duplicate Annihilator. You can run it in Demo mode (it will only search the first 500 photos) to see how it works and if it will do what you want.

There's a free Applescript, iPhoto AppleScript to Remove Duplicates, that will identify duplicates and add the term "duplicate" to each photo's Description field. You can group them with a smart album based on Description contains duplicate and then manually delete those you don't want. The script will search your entirte library.

OT

Thanks:

I think I'll take the safe approach and use the apple script.

I'm not sure what criteria the script uses to determine if a photo is a duplicate. Duplicate Annihilator has several different criteria which might work even if the file name is different. I've not used either very much but you can set up DA to not delete or move the photos but just add original to those it considers original and duplicate to those it considers the duplicate when if finds two alike photos.

So if the script doesn't do the whold job for you do give DA a demo try. Here's its preference pane:

So you can try different methods.

Thanks

looks likes annihilator is a good way to proceed.

I can see how people have had problems with mackeeper. They are the ones that typically have the attitude that when all else fails go to the trash for the instructions. I have used it for quite some time now and have yet to have any issues with any of my iPhoto libraries.

Dups button for the system will leave only the copy that has been recently updated and select the others for removal. However, only a human can define which of the files is original, so we recommend manual selection of the original.