Is there a way to sort photos as they are on phone?

Question

Is there a way to sort photos as they are on phone?

I'm on El Capitan 10.11.3. I am trying to import photos from my iPhone, using the Photos app. Some photos in my Camera Roll have been Airdropped to me, or otherwise acquired. Meaning, they display in my Camera Roll when I received them, not by whatever timestamp is on the. But the Photos app is not displaying the Camera Roll as they are on the phone. I think they are sorting them in some very inexplicable way, I think by the timestamp attached to each photo. I believe (can't be sure though) Photos is sorting everything by date - so, not when I added it to my Camera Roll, but by whatever date is stamped into that image. Resulting experience is beyond frustrating but it's another example of Apple deciding for me how I am supposed to do things. So if I want to import a photo just Airdropped to me, but taken months ago, I have to scroll through ALL the photos to find that one individually. It's beyond stupid. They fail to take into account every possible user experience, and it's excruciating. In one case it is not even showing some photos. Upon ejecting and remounting the phone, then they come back. It's a MESS.

Is there a way to sort photos in the Photos app exactly as they are displayed in my Camera Roll? It would make things a lot easier instead of Apple imposing it's narrow minded trickery upon me.

Thanks.

MacBook Pro, OS X Mountain Lion (10.8.1)

Posted on Jun 9, 2016 1:39 PM

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Answer 1

LarryHN

Level 10

106,142 points

Jun 9, 2016 1:46 PM in response to Christopher Davis2

What is beyond stupid is using software and not bothering to learn how and then blaming the software

All Photos is always sorted by date added to Photos so the newest photos are alwasy at the botto

Photos (Years/Collections/moments) is always sorted by Photo date from the EXIF/IPTC data with the latest date at the end

You can make user albums and they can be sorted by date descending or ascending or by title

I can not follow your description but it matters not since the way Photos works is simple and clear and it has nothing to do in any way with the way any other program works - it works as documented summarized above

LN

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Answer 2

Rysz

Level 8

44,449 points

Jun 9, 2016 1:48 PM in response to Christopher Davis2

There are two basic sort orders in the top-level special albums/Libraries.

"All Photos" special album is sorted by the date the images were added to your library.

"Photos" special album is sorted based on the image creation time stamp and automatically organized based on date and location into Moments, Collections and Years.

Once you create Albums (sort of the equivalent of Events in iPhoto) you have a few more sort options there.

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Answer 3

Old Toad

Level 10

215,754 points

Jun 9, 2016 1:49 PM in response to Christopher Davis2

But the Photos app is not displaying the Camera Roll

There is no Camera Roll in an Photos library on the Mac.

The All Photos view in the Photos library is sorted by Date Added to the Library with the newest photos at the bottom of the window.

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Answer 4

léonie

Level 10

200,645 points

Jun 9, 2016 1:52 PM in response to Christopher Davis2

I'm on El Capitan 10.11.3. I am trying to import photos from my iPhone, using the Photos app.

Are you trying to import from the iPhone using a USB connection?

The the Photos.app will sort the photos by the capture date, when you are viewing the Moments, and it will sort the photos by the date of import to photos, when you are viewing the All Photos album.

If you want to transfer the photos from the iPhone to the Mac's Photo Library in the same way they are organized on your iPhone, sync the two devices using iCloud Photo Library. Then the two libraries will have an identical sort order in the albums and moments.

It would require however to have signed up for enough cloud storage to save your complete photo library in iCloud.

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Answer 5

Jun 9, 2016 2:29 PM in response to LarryHN

I thought Apple products were supposed to be more or less intuitive? I reiterate my point that Photos is NOT displaying my Camera Roll as it is on my iPhone, newest on bottom. Not happening. They are all over the place.

And I should not "blame" Apple? How much time am I suppose to spend teaching myself an app that is supposed to be the simplest thing ever? I could also point out other flaws in Photos, how photos are filed and placed into nonsensical folders, and disallowing me (or at least making it difficult to find) from easily locating photos in Finder. Again, Apple wants us to do it their way.

And you are like other arrogant Apple gurus, not pointing out a solution but only defending Apple. Cheers!

I will review the other responses and suggestions.

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Answer 6

Old Toad

Level 10

215,754 points

Jun 10, 2016 9:14 AM in response to Christopher Davis2

Photos is NOT displaying my Camera Roll as it is on my iPhone,

Which window/mode in the Photos library are you looking in? Try the All Photos window as I mentioned in my previous post.

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Answer 7

Jun 10, 2016 10:21 AM in response to léonie

Well yes I am speaking of importing photos from the iPhone into Photos app. So this is in the Import tab. I am so frustrated with the loss of iPhoto, and having several libraries corrupted, that I actually will not use Photos. My workflow is to import photos, then export them to my desktop, then delete from Photos so it is empty every time. But that's another story. So I can't really speak to how photos are displayed in the Library once imported.

But strictly regarding the viewing and importing from iPhone, and the display of photos in the "Import" tab compared to how they are displayed on my iPhone camera roll - they are entirely different. One example is if I have just saved a photo from a text message in the camera roll, then looking at everything in the Import tab of Photos, that photo will not be at the bottom. It will be somewhere else, I cannot determine the logic here.

And I also don't really feel like syncing up iCloud, which I rarely use. I mean, I don't have all day to teach myself the intracacies of a three-way syncing of iPhone, iCloud, and Photos. Doesn't this all seem like a lot for a very simple task? It's like a Rube Goldberg device. I'm rather astonished. It's just very confusing. It should be simple and intuitive, and it's clearly not. Just saying.

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Answer 8

Old Toad

Level 10

215,754 points

Jun 10, 2016 10:41 AM in response to Christopher Davis2

My workflow is to import photos, then export them to my desktop, then delete from Photos so it is empty every time.

That's a somewhat ridiculous workflow. Why not just download the photos directly from your iPhone to a folder on the Desktop with Image Capture? Cut out the Photos intermediary step completely.

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Answer 9

Jun 10, 2016 10:47 AM in response to Old Toad

I'm not sure it's ridiculous, but I know it's pretty silly. I will try Image Capture, didn't know that might be a solution. Thanks!

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Answer 10

Jun 10, 2016 11:08 AM in response to Old Toad

Image Capture is taking forever to display the Camera Roll (640 images), and some do not display, skipping them for some reason.

The sorting order appears to be the same issue as Photos, that is, not mirroring the camera roll at all. Will continue to fiddle.

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Answer 11

LarryHN

Level 10

106,142 points

Jun 10, 2016 11:08 AM in response to Christopher Davis2

If your iPhone does not display photos the way your Mac does then it is the fault of the iPhone - the tiny guy need to folloe the lead of the big dog

LN

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