danhornberger

Q: iphoto will not open my old photos

I updated my IPhoto like my Macbook Pro asked me to. I had previously saved my photos to an external hard drive because they were so large that I did not have any room on my computer any longer. With that being said, when I plug in my external hard drive to open my photos it states that they need to be converted, but when I tried to do that, it started deleting them off of my hard drive into my trash can then errored out. I transferred the pictures back onto my hard drive, but of course without going through every photo (which there were a lot) I was not sure which event to put them in, so I just put them in one folder. What do I need to do to be able to view my old photos on the new version of IPhoto? When I plug my hard drive into my boyfriend's computer I am able to view all of the photos, but not in the events, as he has a PC. Please help!!

MacBook Pro, iOS 8.1.2

Posted on Jan 3, 2015 7:39 PM

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Q: iphoto will not open my old photos

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  • by LarryHN,

    LarryHN LarryHN Jan 3, 2015 7:52 PM in response to danhornberger
    Level 10 (84,617 points)
    Photos for Mac
    Jan 3, 2015 7:52 PM in response to danhornberger

    what format is the external hard drive? - What version of iphoto do you have? What version did you have? What version of the OS do you have? What other changes have have you recently made?

     

    This is far less than clear -

    but when I tried to do that, it started deleting them off of my hard drive into my trash can then errored out. I transferred the pictures back onto my hard drive,

    What started deleting? What was "it" deleting? What was the exact error? Exactly how did you transfer the picture back to your hard drive? Which hard drive (the internal one or external one)?

     

    LN

  • by danhornberger,

    danhornberger danhornberger Jan 4, 2015 1:35 PM in response to LarryHN
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Jan 4, 2015 1:35 PM in response to LarryHN

    I have a seagate backup plus portable drive. My current updated version of iPhoto is 9.6. My OS is Yosemite 10.10.1. I have made no other changes recently.

    When I was doing a back up to my new external hard drive (also a seagate just more space) I had my smaller hard drive plugged in to my computer when I was doing a back up. For some reason I felt I had to check the trash can and I found a lot of my photos from my smaller hard drive in there. I transferred them back to my smaller hard drive.

    When I tried to open my iPhoto library saved on my smaller hard drive it told me that the photo library needs to be upgraded to work with this version of iPhoto. Then it tells me that there is an error in accessing my photos and would like to repair the issue. This is where it deleted photos and then states it cannot repair it, so I can no longer view that library which has over 7,000 photos.

  • by LarryHN,

    LarryHN LarryHN Jan 4, 2015 2:25 PM in response to danhornberger
    Level 10 (84,617 points)
    Photos for Mac
    Jan 4, 2015 2:25 PM in response to danhornberger

    Seagate is a brand - not a format

     

    The format is critical - the brand is not - right click on the drive icon in the finder and get info - report the format

     

    LN

  • by danhornberger,

    danhornberger danhornberger Jan 12, 2015 6:10 PM in response to LarryHN
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Jan 12, 2015 6:10 PM in response to LarryHN

    Windows NT Filesystem

  • by Terence Devlin,

    Terence Devlin Terence Devlin Jan 12, 2015 10:45 PM in response to danhornberger
    Level 10 (139,532 points)
    iLife
    Jan 12, 2015 10:45 PM in response to danhornberger

    The iPhoto Library must be on a drive formatted Mac OS Extended (Journaled).

     

    Remember that reformatting a five will erase the contents so be sure to get data you want off there first.

  • by danhornberger,

    danhornberger danhornberger Jan 13, 2015 4:46 AM in response to Terence Devlin
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Jan 13, 2015 4:46 AM in response to Terence Devlin

    That is weird because I know when I first bought it I formatted it for Mac. I was able to access all my photos and photo libraries before I updated IPhoto. Do you think when I did the update it changed my format some how?

  • by léonie,

    léonie léonie Jan 13, 2015 4:51 AM in response to danhornberger
    Level 10 (106,883 points)
    iLife
    Jan 13, 2015 4:51 AM in response to danhornberger
    Do you think when I did the update it changed my format some how?

    That is impossible.

     

    But older iPhoto versions did not check the filesystem for compatibility. The incompatibility may have gone unnoticed for a long time.

    when I first bought it I formatted it for Mac

    Formatted for Mac does not necessarily mean MacOS Extended (Journaled). You may have used a formatting, that a mac can read and write, but that is not safe to store photo libraries.

  • by danhornberger,

    danhornberger danhornberger Jan 13, 2015 5:20 AM in response to léonie
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Jan 13, 2015 5:20 AM in response to léonie

    OOk. So from here, I should transfer my information to my other external hard drive, format this one, then transfer everything back? How do I go about formatting it? Thank you all for your help. I was freaking that I couldn't access my photos.

  • by léonie,

    léonie léonie Jan 13, 2015 7:40 AM in response to danhornberger
    Level 10 (106,883 points)
    iLife
    Jan 13, 2015 7:40 AM in response to danhornberger

    OOk. So from here, I should transfer my information to my other external hard drive, format this one, then transfer everything back?

    Yes.

    How do I go about formatting it? Thank you all for your help. I was freaking that I couldn't access my photos.

    Use Disk Utility to change the file system. The procedure is described in the document below for Aperture Libraries, but for iPhoto Libraries goes the same:  See this link:

     

    Format external drives to Mac OS Extended before using with Aperture - Apple Support

  • by danhornberger,

    danhornberger danhornberger Jan 14, 2015 5:45 PM in response to léonie
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Jan 14, 2015 5:45 PM in response to léonie

    Thank you for your help. When I plugged in both external hard drives, the larger one was formatted for Mac, so I just transferred everything to that one and then went to IPhoto, which converted everything fine and I can now access my photos. I appreciate the help!!