iPhone photos not importing to iPhoto

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iPhone photos not importing to iPhoto

I have an iPhone 4s - running version 8.4.1 and I use a MacBook Pro (OS X Yosemite 10.10.1)

I am trying to sync some photos from my iPhone into my iPhoto library on the Mac. Any help with this would be appreciated as I've been fighting with it and reading threads for the past several days. When I connect the phone to my Mac, iPhoto has always automatically found my new photos and allowed me the option to import all or some of them, and then the option to delete off my device afterwards.

After connecting several days ago, iPhoto found SOME of my new photos to import, but not all of them. There are several weeks worth of photos still on my phone that I cannot figure out how to import to iPhoto. After importing the few new pictures iPhoto did find, it basically tells me that all pictures have been imported. (As a side note that may or my not be relevant, even though I selected "delete" for my the few new imports, all of those photos still remain on my iPhone - also annoying as my objective here is to free up space on the phone).

I am using iPhoto version 9.6.

I can view the pictures I want to import by clicking on my camera app on the iPhone, which then directs me (I believe,) to my photo stream. Here I see at least 5 dozen photos that I'd very much like to import onto my Mac's iPhoto. How can I access these pictures if iPhoto is not automatically detecting them?

Thank you in advance for any help!

iPhone 4, iOS 8.4.1, null

Posted on Aug 24, 2015 10:45 PM

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Answer 1

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gail from maine

Level 9

52,575 points

Aug 24, 2015 11:04 PM in response to kdean129

Hi there,

When you import photos to iPhoto from your device, they are being imported from your Camera Roll, not your Photo Stream. Your Photo Stream will keep up to 30 days or 1000 (whichever comes first) of your recent photos. But they are in the Photo Stream so that those photos can be shared between iOS devices and computers that are signed onto the same iCloud account and which have Photo Stream turned on.

However, the Photo Stream on a particular device will continue to keep all of the Photo Stream photos for that device. You can get them cleaned up by going to Settings>iCloud and turning off Photo Stream, then turning it back on again. iCloud will then push the last 1000 or 30 days of photos back to your device, but the older ones will be gone.

If your Camera Roll is pretty much empty, then that means that you have been importing those Camera Roll photos and deleting them as you go.

Cheers,

GB

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Answer 2

kdean129 Author

Level 1

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Aug 24, 2015 11:11 PM in response to gail from maine

Thank you for the reply. Im trying to follow you and realize how inept I am with my own devices.

95% of the photos in my photo stream have not been imported onto my Mac. If I'm following your post correctly, it sounds like turning photo stream off (temporarily) will remove the photos from there and place them back onto the camera roll on my iPhone. This would ultimately allow me to then connect the phone to my Mac and import into iPhoto?

If I misunderstood that please let me know. My concern about attempting this is the warning message I receive as I turn off photo stream: "Turning off photo stream will delete all photo stream photos from your phone." This sounds to me like I'd lose the pictures completely?

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Answer 3

Aug 24, 2015 11:23 PM in response to kdean129

Turning off your Photo Stream will not put your Photos back into your Camera Roll.

However, the Photo Stream is a "copy" of the Photos in the Camera Rolls of all of your Devices which are signed into the same iCloud account and which have Photo Stream turned on.

What I meant was that photos only get imported to your computer from your Camera Roll, so if you are not seeing any photos in your Camera Roll, then they should be showing in your iPhoto library. Can you open your iPhoto library on your Mac and take a look in the "Photos" album showing at the top of the sidebar in the Library section and right under Events. Scroll down to the very bottom of this album and see if it appears to have your photos in it.

If it does, then that means that you have been successfully importing then deleting them. If they are there, then you are safe to "reset" your Photo Stream.

Cheers,

GB

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Answer 4

kdean129 Author

Level 1

0 points

Aug 24, 2015 11:30 PM in response to gail from maine

Thank you again for the rapid responses. I had an update on my Mac that I hadn't noticed before. I'm now running 10.10.5 and iPhoto seems to have been replaced with "Photos." This solved my problem - I now see ALL my photos in here. Maybe you can help me with one more thing - If I delete photos from my photo stream on my iPhone, will that also delete them from the "Photos" app on the Mac?

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Answer 5

Aug 24, 2015 11:43 PM in response to kdean129

No, it won't. Photo Stream is a temporary holding place for photos. What you see on your phone may or may not be what is actually in the Photo Stream in iCloud. But resetting it will have no effect on your imported photos or your photo library. By resetting it, you are clearing out old copies that live on your version of Photo Stream only. When you reset (or refresh it), iCloud will push back the actual photos that are currently residing in the Photo Stream.

Cheers 🙂

GB

P.S. - Glad you found your Photos in the Photos app now that you are running Yosemite! 🙂

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