existing photos on external hard-drive becoming iPhoto library?

Question

existing photos on external hard-drive becoming iPhoto library?

I have an external hard drive with thousands of pics, takes up way to much space to store on my macbook air (2011). I am trying to understand how to keep these photos stored on the external, yet make this my iphoto library source. The key here is that I do not have any photos currently in iphoto (or stored on my macbook air), so this is not an issue of clearing up space on my internal hard drive. thanks for your help.

iPhoto '11, OS X Mountain Lion (10.8.3)

Posted on May 8, 2013 12:50 PM

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Answer 1

mende1

Level 10

93,538 points

May 8, 2013 12:53 PM in response to BryanHaggerty

Welcome to Apple Support Communities

As you have the iPhoto library empty, open iPhoto holding the Option (Alt) key, and you will be able to choose which library you want to use to start iPhoto, so choose the option to create a new library in the external disk. Then, open the iPhoto library you have on your external drive.

After doing it, drag the photos you have to your iPhoto window, so they will be added to the iPhoto library

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Answer 2

rquirosb

Level 1

0 points

May 9, 2013 8:17 PM in response to mende1

Hi. If I create the new library and drag the old photos, will it keep the folder structure or iphoto will copy the photos individually? thanks

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