HT204414: Designate a System Photo Library in Photos
Learn about Designate a System Photo Library in PhotosQ: How do I combine multiple photo libraries into one complete library? And can this new all0-encompassing library be on an ext ... How do I combine multiple photo libraries into one complete library? And can this new all0-encompassing library be on an external hard drive? more
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Helpful answers
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May 16, 2016 9:21 PM in response to jmsteiningby Niel,1. Click here for information.
2. Yes, if that drive contains a partition or disk image formatted as Mac OS Extended.
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May 16, 2016 9:22 PM in response to jmsteiningby LarryHN,1 - upload each library to iCloud Photo Library - or use PowerPhotos
2 - yes - it must be formatted Mac OS extended journaled), connected with a fast wired connection, not used for a TimeMachine backup and aways available prior to Photos being launched
LN
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May 17, 2016 4:59 AM in response to jmsteiningby léonie,To elaborate on Larry's and Niels advice:
It will depend on whether your Photos have edit and metadata applied that you need to save when you merge the libraries which option to choose. There is no perfect way to merge Photos libraries without losing some metadata, edits, or products.
You will want a lossless merging, if your photos have been edited or you applied titles, captions, etc. Lossless means, all metadata will be applied, all albums and folders preserved, and both the original and the edited versions will migrate paired as original and version, so you can undo the edits without losing quality. Aperture could merge iPhoto Libraries this way, but neither iPhoto nor Photos can.
There is no lossless merging of Photos Libraries other than iCloud Photo Library, and even the merging in iCloud will not include the faces albums and the print products.
- Uploading both libraries one after the other to iCloud will merge the libraries in iCloud. It will be like using iCloud Photo Library from multiple Macs, see: Use Photos and iCloud Photo Library on multiple Mac computers - Apple Support
Your albums and folders will migrate, keywords, titles, and other metadata. All edited images will be paired with their originals, so you can undo the edits and revert to the original. The searchable faces names will upload, but not the faces thumbnails and albums. Photos will scan for duplicates while merging. It is the best way to migrate libraries you invested much work into, but uploading large libraries to iCloud requires a paid subscription for more storage than the free 5GB - for at least a month, and it is slow. My library with 40000 photos took a full week to upload. - Merging with PowerPhotos is faster (https://www.fatcatsoftware.com/powerphotos/). It will migrate the metadata and the albums, but you have to decide, if you want to use the originals or the edited versions. So you will either lose the editing work or the high quality originals or create redundancy by merging twice in two passes, once to transfer the originals, and then the edited versions. You will have to add a pass to remove duplicates afterward. See chapter six in the manual: https://www.fatcatsoftware.com/powerphotos/Help/merging%20libraries.html
A third option would be to keep both libraries separate and use PowerPhotos to browse the libraries and to transfer selected albums as you go.
- Uploading both libraries one after the other to iCloud will merge the libraries in iCloud. It will be like using iCloud Photo Library from multiple Macs, see: Use Photos and iCloud Photo Library on multiple Mac computers - Apple Support