Looks like no one’s replied in a while. To start the conversation again, simply ask a new question.

iPhoto ignores certain photos in my photo stream

I notice that my iPhone 4S (on IOS 7.1.2) reliably adds all photos I take on it to its Photo Stream folder on the phone, so I assume that all of these are uploaded to the Photo Stream server whenever I am connected to WiFi. However, when I open iPhoto 9.5.1 (on OSX 10.9.4 on a Macbook Pro) it only downloads some of these photos. It seems to skip certain photos in the sequence at random - probably about 10% of them altogether.


I have tried closing iPhoto, taking a few new pictures with the iPhone and then re-opening iPhoto to see if it would somehow "refresh" the list of photos if brand new ones were present. It does not. All it does is add the few new pictures and continue to ignore the ones it has previously skipped.


Does anyone know why this is happening? Is there any way to get iPhoto to properly interrogate the Photo Stream and "notice" the photos it has skipped?


Alternatively, is there any way to check on iCloud which photos are present just in case the iPhone is failing to upload some of them, even though it does list all of them in its Photo Stream folder? (Does anyone suspect that the iPhone is actually the problem?)


Thanks in advance

MacBook Pro (15-inch Mid 2009), OS X Mavericks (10.9.4)

Posted on Sep 16, 2014 12:33 PM

Reply
7 replies

Sep 18, 2014 11:15 AM in response to martinfromcape town

Hello martinfromcape town,


Thanks for using Apple Support Communities.


From your post I understand that you are not seeing older photos from the Photo Stream on your Mac, but new photos are showing up. This indicates that Photo Stream is functioning correctly, and you are likely seeing cached photos on your iPhone, which are no longer stored on the Photo Stream servers. The information below instructs you to verify the current photos in your photo stream.


I see different photos in My Photo Stream on each of my devices.

Your device will keep up to 1000 photos, even if they're older than 30 days. Photos older than 30 days are removed from the iCloud server, so your devices might not have the same photos, depending on when you enabled My Photo Stream. Due to storage limitations, your Apple TV might display only your most recent photos.

If you want to have the most current photos in My Photo Stream on each of your devices and delete the older photos:

  1. If there are any photos in My Photo Stream that you want to keep, save them to your Camera Roll, then back up your Camera Roll and other data using iCloud or iTunes.
  2. Turn My Photo Stream off in Settings > iCloud > Photos (or Photo Stream in iOS 6).
  3. Confirm that you wish to Delete Photos.
  4. Turn My Photo Stream back on. iCloud will automatically push your stored photos to your device.
  5. Repeat these steps for each device.


iCloud: Get help using My Photo Stream


Take care,

Alex H.

Sep 19, 2014 1:14 AM in response to chuck_3rd

Hi Alex,


Thanks for the response, but my problem is not the age of the photos, nor the storage limitations.


The photos that are being ignored are less than a week old. For example, I will take a sequence of 20 photos on my iPhone at a single event. All of these will then appear in the Photo Stream folder on the iPhone, but when I open iPhoto it will only pick up perhaps 13 of them; leaving out 7 within that sequence at random.


This process will not affect the older photos which still remain in the stream since there are still less than 1000 in total.


Then a few days later I take a few more photos (another event) and these may or may not all appear in iPhoto, but the previously ignored ones will never appear.


The only thing I notice is that it if I take only 3 or 4 new photos, they tend to all appear in iPhoto's stream, but when there is a larger group of new photos it is more likely to skip/ignore some of them.


Can anyone tell me how to fix this?


Thanks,

Martin

Sep 19, 2014 4:10 AM in response to léonie

Hi Leonie,


Thanks for the response but this cannot be the issue here.


By a "burst" I assume you mean e.g 20 photos which were all taken in quick succession of a similar subject? Yes, in such a case, certain photos are randomly not streamed successfully to iPhoto. But how would the iPhone know which of the photos are favourites if I have not even looked at them yet?


One of reasons that I want to copy them to the Mac via Photo stream is so that I can look at them in iPhoto on a bigger screen to sort, edit, rate, etc.


I want to make it clear also that ALL the photos in question do show as part of the photo stream on the iPhone. The problem is that they are "randomly" omitted from the photo stream in iPhoto.


Thanks,

Martin

Sep 19, 2014 4:20 AM in response to martinfromcape town

You select the favourite directly in the camera app: From the User Guide:



Take Burst shots: (iPhone 5s or later) Touch and hold the Take Picture button to take rapid-fire photos in bursts (available while in Square or Photo mode). The shutter sound is different, and the counter shows how many shots you’ve taken, until you lift your finger. To see the suggested shots and select the photos you want to keep, tap the thumbnail, then tap Select. The gray dot(s) mark the suggested photos. To copy a photo from the burst as a separate photo in your Bursts album in Photos, tap the circle in the lower-right corner of the photo. To delete the burst of photos, tap it, then tap .


Added:

iOS 8 has a setting

Settings > Photos & Camera > Upload Burst Photos


I don't remember, if this has been available in iOS 7.


Feb 28, 2015 5:42 AM in response to martinfromcape town

Hi;
Did you ever find a resolution to this problem? I have exactly the same. Some recent photo's are simply skipped, exactly as you describe. I too have tested this by shooting a few new pics and they show up, but the previously skipped ones are still missing. Hadn't thought about it being a bug depending upon number of shots taken.

Took 17 different shots of storm damaged trees within about 20 min. Only the first 11 showed up in my iPhoto PhotoStream. Two days later I shot 10 of Almond blossoms plus another 7 random ones within about 30 min. All of these showed up in iPhoto within about 30 min. but not the missing 6 of the trees. They've just been 'skipped'.

I don't know how often this may happen. But once is twice too many when depending upon iCloud to transfer photos to iPhoto for further sorting and refinement. The only thing I did notice when first trying to fix this with the tree pics, is that the iCloud PhotoStream in iPhoto showed 1000 photos – it had reached its supposed limit. I wondered if there might be a bug of sorts that when reaching that limit, it simply stopped taking in new pics instead of deleting old ones first to make space. I don't really know the process sequence behind this. But it did make me wonder.
Anyone with any idea of a fix, very appreciated.

iPhoto ignores certain photos in my photo stream

Welcome to Apple Support Community
A forum where Apple customers help each other with their products. Get started with your Apple ID.