Unable to remove photos from iPhone to Mac

Photos that were placed onto the phone by using iTunes to sync them from a computer can be deleted from the phone by syncing again with iTunes as stated in the quote below from iTunes: Syncing photos - Apple Support

To delete synced photos and videos from your device

1. In iTunes, click the Device button in the upper right corner. (If viewing the iTunes Store, click the Library button in the upper-right corner first.)
2. Click the Photos tab in the resulting window.
3. Choose "Selected albums" and deselect the albums or collections you want to delete.
   Note: To delete all synced photos, deselect "Sync Photos from" and, when asked, click "Remove photos."
4. Click Apply.

If the only copy of the photos is the one that is on the phone, you will need a 3rd party application such as http://www.wideanglesoftware.com/touchcopy/index.php (unless you want to email them to yourself).

iTunes Photo Sync was intended as a way to copy photos from your computer and to then keep the selected folders in sync (i.e., to subsequently add or delete photos from the phone when they were changed on the computer). It was intended that you would keep the originals on the computer.

The options I gave are the ones I know about. There may be other 3rd party software that is cheaper or even free, but I don't know of any that I can recommend.

I don't think you are going to get a different option -- other than possibly a recommendation for some other 3rd party software. This is an issue that comes up on this forum very frequently and I haven't seen any other recommendations. Unfortunately I don't even remember seeing any other 3rd party software recommendations but I wouldn't rule out that possibility.

The following is from Apple's support site: iTunes: Syncing photos - Apple Support

You can't reimport pictures synced from your computer to your device back to your computer. You can only import pictures in the Camera Roll or Saved Photos from your device to your computer. If you need to retrieve synced photos from your device:

1. Email them from the device to yourself.
2. Copy them from the emails to your computer.

Also, note that the photos that were placed onto your phone by using iTunes to sync them from your computer are not included in an iPhone backup (to iCloud or iTunes). Just want to make sure you don't risk losing them while thinking they are backed up.

And to add to what FoxFifth is saying, these photos that you synced from the computer to the phone are also in a reduced resolution. The original on the computer would be at full resolution, the ones synced to the phone are at a reduced resolution to save space. There is no other way to copy those photos from the phone back to the computer except the solution that FoxFifth provided. While you may feel that $30 is a lot for Touchcopy, it also does a number of other tasks. It will allow you to copy your messages and you voicemail to the computer for safe keeping. Your problem started when you removed the photos from the computer that you did the sync from. I can give you a solution to get the photos off of the phone, but I'm just talking erase them, not save them.

If they won't delete using the instructions below, try syncing one or more new photos to the phone using iTunes, and then try the instructions below again:

1. In iTunes, click the Device button in the upper right corner. (If viewing the iTunes Store, click the Library button in the upper-right corner first.)
2. Click the Photos tab in the resulting window.
3. Choose "Selected albums" and deselect the albums or collections you want to delete.
   Note: To delete all synced photos, deselect "Sync Photos from" and, when asked, click "Remove photos."
4. Click Apply.

If you do locate the photos on the other computer, then create a blank folder on your current computer with iTunes. After connecting the iPhone, select the Photos tab, then select the empty folder to sync, then click on Sync. Once you do that, it will remove all of the old pictures and sync the blank folder. Should be no photos synced. Then go back to iTunes, remove the checkmark by the folder you chose to sync, then sync again. That will remove that folder. No folders synced at all.

i've been having this problem for weeks and i'm very glad to see this response. you are awesome. thank you

I wish I'd knew this was going to happen before I deleted and imported my pic.. So what happens when I out some ware and I run out of space... I'm F%$#ed because I can't remove any imported pic without itunes. This is unacceptable! So now I have to lose all my pics on my phone in far of this happening... Why in the **** would apple do something like this... This is ******** and I'm kind of ****** right now....