Photos: can't "Show Referenced File in Finder"

What is it you want to do that means you need direct access to the files via the Finder?

LarryHN - It really wasn't such an optional program, I first had to go through this ordeal to figure out to deactivate it. But at least you guys showed me how to get rid of its tentacles.

It does have to do with the topic of the thread! And I put some well deserved feedback in it as well. How can that be a waste of time?

hokerberg - I totally agree with you on this.

This menu item is always greyed out. What's it there for if it never works?

It will work, if you have selected a photo, where the original image file has not been imported into the Photos Library but is in the original location outside your Photos library. These reference original files can be revealed in the Finder, but not the original of photos, that are managed by Photos inside the Photos library.

When I select a photo and want to make a change to the original,

Manual changes to the original image files are not supported in Photos. This can corrupt the Photos library.

Make all edits using Photos's Edit panel.

It's for referenced photos. If you don't have any you won't be able to use it. If you want to use referenced files you will need to turn off the preference to copy to your library.

Hi, I also have the same problem.

I bought a new MacBook Air and now I have all kinds of trouble unfortunately. I had a time machine backup on an external HD. So I opened the new Macbook, chose to use the backup from the HD, and then most things worked immediately. My two biggest problems are unrelated to each other. First the issue that is discussed in this group:

After I imported all my stuff from the time machine backup, my MacBook says I can't open iPhoto anymore because it's not compatible with Yosemite. I notice that I can access my photos through the Photos app, which I've never seen before. However, they can't be opened in Finder, which is a little annoying, because I have 13.000 photos and 368 videos, and I want to select all videos and copy them to a USB-stick for my parents... I can't even easily locate them now. Unless I scroll through ALL 13.000 files... Would my problem be solved by 'fixing' iPhoto somehow?

My other problem is that I also transferred my mails to Mail of course (with the time machine backup). Seemed to work. I have a sent-mail folder on IMAP, and I have one 'On My Mac', which is locally stored. That last folder had 97.000 e-mails. Full archive since 2003. I opened it in Mail, worked fined, until suddenly the folder was empty. I didn't do anything: I was reading an e-mail and boom... all gone... It's the only folder that's empty now. If I go to time machine to get a back up back, it loads all messages (which I can see in time machine then), but when I click restore, nothing happens. Well... yeah... the screen freezes... only cmd option escape gets me out of the screen... how can I fix this..?

After I imported all my stuff from the time machine backup, my MacBook says I can't open iPhoto anymore because it's not compatible with Yosemite. I notice that I can access my photos through the Photos app, which I've never seen before. However, they can't be opened in Finder, which is a little annoying, because I have 13.000 photos and 368 videos, and I want to select all videos and copy them to a USB-stick for my parents... I can't even easily locate them now. Unless I scroll through ALL 13.000 files... Would my problem be solved by 'fixing' iPhoto somehow?

This is easy, and you do it in exactly the same way as you would in iPhoto.

First find all the videos:

Easy: they're all in the Video Album in the Side bar (you can enable the sidebar in the View menu.

Then Export them

File -> Export -> Export unmodified Original.

I would suggest that you export to a folder on the desktop and then copy that to the flash drive.

Oh wow... that's a really easy answer, and it works... perfect, thanks!!!!

One perhaps stupid question (but very relevant for me and I really don;t know): if I export them to a folder in Finder somewhere, and it's -let's say 20GB-, will the usage of my storage then be 2 x 20GB (in Photos AND in that Finder folder)?

Yes, exporting creates a copy outside the Library.

Just one more thing iPhoto could do that photos can't. "reveal in finder…". Used that all the time.

Don't worry Apple I can be trusted to not overwrite the file.

Also, I can't rename the export? What's with that?

You can rename when exporting and yes, you can rename after exporting.

I'm a bit embarrassed at how mad I am. Is there really no way to properly reveal in finder from the app? I do all my touchups in Photoshop and I just use this app for photo sorting. With this one feature missing, Photos is in the useless category for me. It was literally the ONLY menu item I used in iPhoto. Sheesh.

Decided to finally check that. No, no rename on export. As with all new apple things, it's a non-standard save dialogue. I can rename as title or sequential, but I can't just call it what I want on export.

Makes for a lot of chasing files... Reveal was easier. I knew I was getting the file I wanted.

I guess it's time to see if Lightroom will work for me.