Live Photos Have Become Videos

Question

Level 1

6 points

Live Photos Have Become Videos

Hi,

I have an iPhone 6s (which can take live photos) and an iPad 2 (both running iOS 9.2.1), along with an iMac running OS X 10.11.3 and Photos 1.3.

I've noticed that some of my live photos (all older ones) have become videos. For each, I get a completely still image and then a three second long video, rather than a single live photo.

As I have iCloud Photo Library enabled, this is replicated across all my devices.

I have not touched the files.

Other live photos (newer ones) appear as live photos, in line with expectations.

Is there any way to fix this? In other words, can I change the image + video combo back to a live photo?

Thanks.

Posted on Mar 1, 2016 2:00 PM

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Answer 1

Filip UK Author

Level 1

6 points

Apr 3, 2016 11:09 AM in response to Filip UK

I've still got this problem.

The only progress I've made is finding another thread where users are having the same issue. There does not, as yet, appear to be a solution for this bug.

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Answer 2

LarryHN

Level 10

106,110 points

Apr 3, 2016 1:09 PM in response to Filip UK

I do not have an iPhone 6 so do not have any live Photos but one of the areas of improvement in OS X 10.11.4 and Photos 1.5 was in live photos - do teh update and see if it helps

LN

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Answer 3

Filip UK Author

Level 1

6 points

Apr 3, 2016 1:41 PM in response to LarryHN

Thanks, but I am up to date. I've not had any live photos turn into videos for a long time (none this calendar year), so I guess the bug causing them to be created has been fixed. The issue now is making the photo/three second videos back to live photos.

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Answer 4

LarryHN

Level 10

106,110 points

Apr 3, 2016 2:00 PM in response to Filip UK

If you are up to date why did you state you were not? It makes thing very difficult when you post incorrect information

I have an iPhone 6s (which can take live photos) and an iPad 2 (both running iOS 9.2.1), along with an iMac running OS X 10.11.3 and Photos 1.3.

That is not the current software as I posted

one of the areas of improvement in OS X 10.11.4 and Photos 1.5 was in live photos - do the update and see if it helps

LN

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Answer 5

Filip UK Author

Level 1

6 points

Apr 3, 2016 3:08 PM in response to LarryHN

I did not post any incorrect information.

When this thread was started, on 1st March, I had Photos 1.3 (as stated), which was then the latest version.

Today, over a month later, you advised me to update to Photos 1.5. I replied that I already had.

How is that posting incorrect information?

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Answer 6

Filip UK Author

Level 1

6 points

Aug 9, 2016 6:21 AM in response to Filip UK

I have found a solution to this.

I found this thread. It is about a slightly different problem, but the (eventual) solution works. The basic idea is to reimport the files into Photos, which makes it recognise that the still images and three-second videos are part of the same live photo.

Open Photos on macOS
Cmd-click to select all of the affected files (both the still image and the three-second video for each photo)
Choose File > Export > Export x Items
In the dialogue box that pops up, ensure you are preserving the location
Save the files somewhere temporarily (the desktop is ideal)
Reimport the files by dragging all of them back in to Photos (they will appear under today's date)
You will notice that the still photos and three-second videos have combined to become live photos once again
Highlight each new live photo in turn and select Image > Adjust Date and Time and change the date and time to what it should be (you can look at the date/time on the still photo to see what it should be)*
Delete the unwanted still and three-second video versions of the photos
You should be left with just the live photos, correctly dated; these will sync with your other devices if you have iCloud Photo Library enabled

* I realise manually dating all the affected photos is a pain. You may be able to avoid it by choosing Export Unmodified Originals (which preserves the date), but I couldn't get this to work: I was left with three copies of each file (one correctly-dated still image, one correctly-dated video and, tellingly, one video dated the day everything went wrong) – no matter what I did, these files did not recombine into live photos when reimported into Photos.

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