transfering photos onto external hard drive

Make sure the drive is formatted Mac OS Extended (Journaled)

1. Quit iPhoto

2. Copy the iPhoto Library from your Pictures Folder to the External Disk.

3. Hold down the option (or alt) key while launching iPhoto. From the resulting menu select 'Choose Library' and navigate to the new location. From that point on this will be the default location of your library.

4. Test the library and when you're sure all is well, trash the one on your internal HD to free up space.

Regards

TD

To copy photos to an external drive select them in iPhoto and export to the external drive

To copy your iPhoto library to an external drive that is formatted Mac OS extended (journaled) drag it intact as a single entity to the external drive. This will not work with other drive formats.

To use the external drive for your active library after copying the iPhoto library over depress the option key and launch iPhoto and use the select library command to make it your default library

LN

Do you want just the photos? Or the library? For just the photos connecting the machines together and using iPhoto Library Managed is the best wat

LN

Look at the videos in the iPhoto help

Connecting the machines can be having them both on the same WiFi network, using a direct connect Eitner cable, using FireWire target mode, etc. any way your computer can see her computer

LN

Dear Larry HN and other Apple support community Friends, I read through the original post from Ginniefrombroadstairs. I read through the answers including yours which the people kindly provided. I still have no understanding as to what to do. Can you help? I need more basic terminology. (Sorry but I really don't understand the responses.

I don't know what iPhoto is. I have an application named "Photos" on my 2015 MacBook Air. That's all I have. Do I need to purchase another application?

The external drive IS formatted for the Mac OS, so I think have the following comment from you covered: "To copy your iPhoto library to an external drive that is formatted Mac OS extended (journaled) drag it intact as a single entity to the external drive. This will not work with other drive formats."

I don't understand your next comment, which is: "To use the external drive for your active library after copying the iPhoto library over depress the option key and launch iPhoto and use the select library command to make it your default library"

My question is: How do I copy photos from the MacBook Air's Photos application to an external hard drive? How do I select the? How to I find the external hard drive (it is connected and has been formatted and shows itself in "Finder".) I simply don't know the mechanism from dropping them down into the external hard drive (or placing them there, if that is a better term). None of the Help Topics seem to cover that process, as at least as far as I can tell.

I have to move some photos out of the MacBook Air's Photos application onto some sort of external device because I am receiving messages that I cannot add any more. I only have 442 snap shots and that seems low but that is another story.

Steve (SaskatchewanGuy) the application is telling me that I cannot add any more.

see my reply to your duplicate post in the Photos forum

LN

Hello LarryHN,

You helped me out with a similar question, but now that I have a drive to move from iPhoto (backed up on Time Capsule) to Photos, your response disappeared from my activity, and I can't find it again.

The problem occurred when I switched from Lion to El Capitan. I went back to Lion, to see if I could get iPhoto to run again, but that didn't solve my problem.

I've got a hard drive ready for action...what do I do?

Thanks,

spencejam1, James

What exactly is the problem?

Hi - thanks for responding. I found my original question and the response from LarryNH - I'll paste both in and let you respond. Thanks, again.

Spencejam1Apr 4, 2016 5:10 AM

When I switched to Yosemite, I had no idea that my iPhoto library would become inaccessible from my TimeCapsule. I have an older Mac desktop running Mountain Lion. Is there no way to get to my photos from my MacBook Pro?

MacBook Pro, OS X Yosemite (10.10)

from LarryNH:

..To migrate a library the library must be on a drive formatted Mac OS extended (journaled) what is directly connected to the Mac with a fast wired connection lie USB, FireWire or ThunderBolt that is not being used as a TimeMachine backup volume and that is always available prior to launching Photos

Then you open it with Photos by dragging it to the Photos icon in the Dock and letting Photos migrate the library - this keeps all metadata, edits, organization and gives you full quality photos to work with

And what is the problem and the question?

LN

When I switched to Yosemite, I had no idea that my iPhoto library would become inaccessible from my TimeCapsule. I have an older Mac desktop running Mountain Lion. Is there no way to get to my photos from my MacBook Pro?

Does this mean that your Library is on the Time Capsule? This is not a back up?