Robert Poole
Level 1 (12 points)
Photos for Mac

Q: Will my iPhoto albums stay organised in Photos?

What will Photos do to my iPhoto collection of 30,000 images and some videos?

1. Albums. I have three iPhoto albums (personal, professional, and documents) and I don't want them mixed up.  They can share a screen but they must keep together. Will they?

2. Events. My photos are organised by Events, rather than albums. (Maybe not the best scheme, but I'm stuck with it).  My events are years, and contain photos pulled together from different sources at different times. For example,  the event '2001' contains prints and documents from that year scanned long afterwards, as well as digital photos and videos actually taken in 2001. Can Photos keep all these together when it doesn't use events?

3. Titles. To sort my images with each event I have labelled them consistently. A typical title starts with a date in reverse: 2001.12.25 Christmas -1, for example. I select 'Sort by title' and all my year's images line up in date order, whenever they were actually imported. (Yes, I'm a historian). One album consists of documents, also manually organised to line up by title. What will Photos do to all this when I import from iPhoto?

I'd appreciate hearing of some practical experiences because it's putting me off ordering a new mac. I've looked at a friend's copy of Photos and it didn't seem to have transferred the events in an orderly way, but maybe there's a way to do it?

 

I'm currently using iPhoto 11 9.4.3 on a 2011 Macbook Pro with OS X 10.7.5

MacBook Pro (13-inch Early 2011), Mac OS X (10.7.5)

Posted on Apr 12, 2016 2:54 PM

by LarryHN,Solvedanswer
LarryHN LarryHN
Level 10 (84,646 points)
Photos for Mac
A:

you can not change file names in iPhoto or Photos, only when you export - when you export photos you can set the file name to be the title

 

so yes exporting them will give them the title as the file name and be sure to check to include the various metadata fields - the EXIF and IPTC dates will not change when you export as they are part of the photo - the file metadata will of course change when you export

 

It is up to you but in iPhoto and Photos the file name is totally immaterial and is never used - you only work with and manage the photos - not the files

 

LN

Posted on Apr 14, 2016 7:23 AM

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Robert Poole

Q: Will my iPhoto albums stay organised in Photos?

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  • Helpful answers

  • by LarryHN,Helpful

    LarryHN LarryHN Apr 12, 2016 3:46 PM in response to Robert Poole
    Level 10 (84,646 points)
    Photos for Mac
    Apr 12, 2016 3:46 PM in response to Robert Poole

    Albums transfer as is as do folders - events are converted to albums and stored in a folder named iPHoto events - smart albums move as is to the extent possible (since Photos does not have the exact same feature set as iPhoto some smart albums do not transfer - like ones based on events for example)

     

    this is Apple's description of the transfer - How Photos handles content and metadata from iPhoto and Aperture - Apple Support

     

     

    Titles transfer to the extent you entered them - you do have to enable them in Photos under the view menu ==> metadata

     

    LN

  • by Old Toad,

    Old Toad Old Toad Apr 12, 2016 3:09 PM in response to Robert Poole
    Level 10 (141,105 points)
    Mac OS X
    Apr 12, 2016 3:09 PM in response to Robert Poole

    Read this user tip:  Moments in Photos are the New Events

     

    OTsig.png

  • by Robert Poole,

    Robert Poole Robert Poole Apr 12, 2016 3:51 PM in response to LarryHN
    Level 1 (12 points)
    Photos for Mac
    Apr 12, 2016 3:51 PM in response to LarryHN

    Thanks for the quick and helpful reply Larry, and the useful link.

    Sounds like I need to take care of my titles first, and also enable titles in Photos before I do the transfer - correct?

    So, within these new Event albums, will the photos continue to display in title order?

  • by LarryHN,Helpful

    LarryHN LarryHN Apr 14, 2016 5:21 AM in response to Robert Poole
    Level 10 (84,646 points)
    Photos for Mac
    Apr 14, 2016 5:21 AM in response to Robert Poole

    You are welcome

     

    Albums in Photos can be sorted by date ascending or descending or by title

     

     

    And when you enable titles does not matter - the titles are in the EXIF data - the view simply allows you to view them or not view them

     

    LN

  • by léonie,

    léonie léonie Apr 14, 2016 5:32 AM in response to Robert Poole
    Level 10 (106,958 points)
    iCloud
    Apr 14, 2016 5:32 AM in response to Robert Poole
    3. Titles. To sort my images with each event I have labelled them consistently. A typical title starts with a date in reverse: 2001.12.25 Christmas -1, for example. I select 'Sort by title' and all my year's images line up in date order, whenever they were actually imported. (Yes, I'm a historian). One album consists of documents, also manually organised to line up by title. What will Photos do to all this when I import from iPhoto?

    Are your titles the filenames of the photos, or have you added them to the title field in iPhoto?  iPhoto is using the filenames as titles, if no title has been assigned.  If your titles are the filenames, they will not show in Photos as titles.  YOYu will have to copy them manually from the filename to the title filed or use a script to do that.

     

    There are some scripts in the user tip section to do batch changing, see:   Photos for Mac User Tips

     

    For example:   Batch Changing the Titles to the Filename

  • by Robert Poole,

    Robert Poole Robert Poole Apr 14, 2016 6:02 AM in response to léonie
    Level 1 (12 points)
    Photos for Mac
    Apr 14, 2016 6:02 AM in response to léonie

    Thanks. I have retitled the photos using 'batch change', so I am now using titles, not filenames, to sort my photos. I wish I knew how to change the filenames en bloc to match the titles.

       Perhaps before I change from iPhoto to Photos I should export them all out of iPhoto using the title? Would this create new files whose filename is the title and whose date is the export date? If so, would this be a good idea? It seems to make sense for scanned photos which don't have a real date, but I'm wary of changing digital images that are dated as taken.

  • by LarryHN,Solvedanswer

    LarryHN LarryHN Apr 14, 2016 7:23 AM in response to Robert Poole
    Level 10 (84,646 points)
    Photos for Mac
    Apr 14, 2016 7:23 AM in response to Robert Poole

    you can not change file names in iPhoto or Photos, only when you export - when you export photos you can set the file name to be the title

     

    so yes exporting them will give them the title as the file name and be sure to check to include the various metadata fields - the EXIF and IPTC dates will not change when you export as they are part of the photo - the file metadata will of course change when you export

     

    It is up to you but in iPhoto and Photos the file name is totally immaterial and is never used - you only work with and manage the photos - not the files

     

    LN