deleting photos from iPhone but keeping in iPhoto

I need to make space on my phone, but I want to keep the pictures on my mac.

Are you asking about the photos you are seeing in the Photo Stream on your mac?

The photos will be visible in the Photo stram for roughly a month, and then they will be automatically removed from the Photo stream. To keep them permanently on your mac, set up iPhoto to import automatically from the Photo Stream or drag the photos from the Photo Stream to an event. Once they have been imported into an event (either the automatically created monthly events or one you created yourself), they are safe and willnot bedeleted, when the photo is deleted from the Photo Stream.

This article explains ho to delete from the Photo stream:

http://support.apple.com/kb/HT5125

I am confused on how iphoto and photo stream handle photos especially when I want to delete photos from my iphone.

Deleting photos from the Photo Stream will delete them from the Photo Stream view on all devices, but leave the imported photos on the devices.

The Photo Stream is stored in iCloud, but you are seeing a local copy in the Photo Stream View, and that needs extra space.

iPhoto for iOS : Delete photos from iPhoto

Regards

Léonie

This is what Léonie is referring to about iPhoto and automatic importing of Photo Stream photos:

OT

So if I automaticaly import to iphoto on my mac will all my pictures from my phone be saved there? and therefore I can delete them from my phone?

Automatically import will import all photos currently in the Photo Stream. You may have older photos in your camera roll, that that are no longer in the Photo Stream.

The savest way - to be sure that all photos have been saved to your computer - would be to connect your iPhone to to your mac and to import the complete contents of the Camera Roll. Then enable automatic import from Photo Stream and all future new photos will be downloaded automatically.

Deleting photos from your phone will depend on the way you imported the photos, see:

Delete photos from iPhoto

Photo uses the photos and video clips that are stored in the Photos app on your device. If you delete a photo from the Photos app on your device, the photo is deleted in iPhoto (unless the photo has been edited, captioned, tagged as a favorite, or used in a journal).

You can also hide a photo, so it remains in the Photos app but doesn’t appear in iPhoto.

Delete photos

Depending on how your photos and video clips were added to iPhoto, do one of the following:

• Photos and video clips taken with your device: Open the Photos app on your device, tap Camera Roll, tap to select the photos, and tap .
• Photos and video clips you synced to your computer using iTunes: Connect your device to your computer and, in iTunes, deselect the photos and video clips you want to remove from your device. Click Apply, and click Sync.
• Photos in the Beamed, Photo Box, iTunes, or [App] album: Tap a photo, tap (tap Edit if you don’t see the tool), tap Delete Photo, and tap Delete.

And to delete from the Photo Stream:

iCloud: How to delete photos from Photo Stream