how to I export pictures from iphoto to a sd card

Just Drag and Drop the Photos from iPhoto to the SD card icon on your desktop or a Finder window.

Alternatively you can use the Export Option from the file menu in iPhoto to export the iPhoto library to the SD card.

Exporting from iPhoto to the SD card is preferable. Dragging to the card will only write the lower quality preview files and not the high resolution originals.

Export to a folder on the Desktop and then drag the folder to the card. If the file system on the SD Card is not MacOS Extended (Joournaled), you'll avoid a problem with the limit of files, that can be stored on the top level of the card by collecting all files in a folder.

léonie wrote:

Exporting from iPhoto to the SD card is preferable. Dragging to the card will only write the lower quality preview files and not the high resolution originals.

Export to a folder on the Desktop and then drag the folder to the card. If the file system on the SD Card is not MacOS Extended (Joournaled), you'll avoid a problem with the limit of files, that can be stored on the top level of the card by collecting all files in a folder.

Actually I found the opposite was true.

As you can see in the following picture, the dragged photo, which is the one named IMG_2268.JPG retained more metadata and had a larger file size than the one I exported which was reduced in file size, and lost a bit of the meta data in the export. Including the creation date, and the latitude and longitude.

I think Dragging is the better option.

How did you export? Which settings did you use?

All default, touched nothing in the Export dialog. Which I now realize means the picture exported in Medium quality, and the location data was not included. Setting it to Maximum, and preserving location data does produce the full sized quality picture.

I think Dragging just exports with different settings though.

So.. never mind. 😉

When I use the following export settings I get a jpeg file that very close to the size of the master file but includes all of the metadata and only has one level of JPEG compression applied to it:

Dragging the thumbnail to the Desktop usually gives you the preview version which will not have the same quality level or the metadata included as léonie has already pointed out.

Yeah, realized that above, thanks

This User Tip

https://discussions.apple.com/docs/DOC-4921

has details of the options in the Export dialogue.

What happened next made my eyes crossed. I have 2 "problems" and I hope you can enlighten me.

1. Put in a new 64 GB SanDisk card into my Sony Cyber-Shot for my trip to WY. When I tried to download pics to my iPad (Gen 2) it came back with "Contents not Available. Cannot read the connected storage media." So I gave the card to my buddy who has the same iPad and the pics came right up. He gave me a new card, stuck it in my camera, took a couple of pics, stuck it in my iPad and the pics came up. So I thought huh, I put the card in my GoPro and it came back with 'No Pictures." Mind you there are some 800+ pics and 3 videos on the card. I stuck my 8GB SanDisk card in, took 100's 0f pics, stuck the card into my iPad and the pics came right up. I don't know what to make of this.

2. Exporting pics from iPhoto to memory card. I was able to export all the pics from the 64GB card to iPhoto. So then I thought I'll put all of my pics onto one card. In all about 10.65GB of pics & vids. I bought a new card, dropped all the pics, clicked on card, Open, all the pics&vids came up. Cool. I gave the card to my buddy..no pics. Nothing. Bought a new card. Clicked on File-Export, did its thing, took about 15min. I opened card all the pics were there. Plugged it into my iPad...no pics. Put the card into my camera..no pics. With the same card i took a pic, plugged it into my iPad, pic comes up! Just that one pic. I have no clue whats going on.

I've taken some 50K pic and 100's of videos. The stuff aint rocket science. In my head I'm thinking I want this stuff to work, why aint it working? All my devices are up-to-date so I don't think its a software issue.

What happened next made my eyes crossed. I have 2 "problems" and I hope you can enlighten me.

1. Put in a new 64 GB SanDisk card into my Sony Cyber-Shot for my trip to WY. When I tried to download pics to my iPad (Gen 2) it came back with "Contents not Available. Cannot read the connected storage media." So I gave the card to my buddy who has the same iPad and the pics came right up. He gave me a new card, stuck it in my camera, took a couple of pics, stuck it in my iPad and the pics came up. So I thought huh, I put the card in my GoPro and it came back with 'No Pictures." Mind you there are some 800+ pics and 3 videos on the card. I stuck my 8GB SanDisk card in, took 100's 0f pics, stuck the card into my iPad and the pics came right up. I don't know what to make of this.

2. Exporting pics from iPhoto to memory card. I was able to export all the pics from the 64GB card to iPhoto. So then I thought I'll put all of my pics onto one card. In all about 10.65GB of pics & vids. I bought a new card, dropped all the pics, clicked on card, Open, all the pics&vids came up. Cool. I gave the card to my buddy..no pics. Nothing. Bought a new card. Clicked on File-Export, did its thing, took about 15min. I opened card all the pics were there. Plugged it into my iPad...no pics. Put the card into my camera..no pics. With the same card i took a pic, plugged it into my iPad, pic comes up! Just that one pic. I have no clue whats going on.

I've taken some 50K pic and 100's of videos. The stuff aint rocket science. In my head I'm thinking I want this stuff to work, why aint it working? All my devices are up-to-date so I don't think its a software issue.

Assuming you are using the Apple Camera connection kit to do this, the iPad expects the pictures to be in a folder named DCIM off the root of the card with an 8 character name, and an 3 character extension. i.e image001.jpg

So for your second question: The iPad cannot see any pictures outside of a DCIM folder. When you took a picture, the camera automatically creates this folder if it does not exist, and puts the picture in there. So the pic that's taken shows up on the iPad.

The Go Pro camera may have a similar restriction, though that would be a question for Go Pro.

For your first question, it may have been an issue with the card, or some glitch that did not show up with your friends iPad.

Hey thanks buddy, yeah using the Apple camera kit. What I don't get is I can see whats on the card.

Your Mac can see what's on the card entirely, no limitations there.. The iPad will only ever see what's inside the DCIM folder and has a file name with the above specifications.

I finally called Apple and they said its the 64GB SD card which operates under exFAT. That said I can understand a portion of why my iPad isn't reading the card- I refuse to update my iPad because I don't like, no I HATE the new Photo. My buddy's iPad is up-to-date so it was able to read exFAT. What I can't figure out is why when I exported the pics I took with the 64GB card to another 64GB card and handed that card to my buddy for him to download pics his iPad said there were no pics on the card. I showed this to the Apple Tech when we were screen sharing. Is it because I have my iPhone pics and pics from 8GB SD card mixed in and it that were the case wouldn't those pics show up and not the pics from 64GB card?