Where are all my photos?

Question

Where are all my photos?

When I tried importing my photos library into Lightroom it appeared that I only had 28 pictures to import instead of thousands. I did what I was supposed to i think. clicked import, selected Copy, was going to move them to an external drive and then used the Finder to open my photos library, found Open Package Contents and then dragged the Masters file into the big box, only to find just a few photos were available. So where are they? Are they in the cloud or something? Scared and confused.

VIN, MacBook Pro (13-inch Mid 2010), iOS 10.0.3

Posted on Feb 3, 2017 7:39 AM

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Answer 1

léonie

Level 10

200,681 points

Feb 3, 2017 10:59 AM in response to Outoftheloupe

Where might I find the Optimize storage button you mentioned? It definitely appears that I have my photo library stored in the cloud.

When you open Photos again, go to the main menu bar, open the Photos menu: Photos > Preferences

Elect the "iCloud" tab of the Preferences panel:

Then click "Download Originals to this Mac", so "Optimize Mac Storage" is turned off.

You need to have enough free storage on the drive with your Photos Library to be able to download the photos again to the library.

Did you move the Masters folder back into the library package?

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Answer 2

léonie

Level 10

200,681 points

Feb 3, 2017 7:55 AM in response to Outoftheloupe

So where are they? Are they in the cloud or something? Scared and confused.

This will depend on the Photos > Preferences > General you used.

Photos has two different ways to add photos to the library - by default it will copy the photos into the Photos Library (managed library) and the original photos will be stored in the Masters folder, but if you change the default, it can reference the photos in the original location (referenced library) without copying the photos into the library, see this Help page:

https://help.apple.com/photos/mac/1.2/?lang=en#/pht12e7a8015

If you enabled Photos > iCloud > iCloud Photo Library, photos will have uploaded to photos to iCloud Photo Library. And if you also enabled "Optimize Storage", Photos may have removed originals from the Masters folder to save storage. Inthat case you need first to download the originals from iCloud back to the Photos Library.

In any case, put the Masters folder you removed back into the Photos Library, so Photos can still use the library and you can use it to find the originals. But first we need to know, his you are using iCloud Photo Library, and if you imported the photos to Photos with the "copy items into the Library " option or idk you are using a referenced library.

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Answer 3

Feb 3, 2017 8:09 AM in response to léonie

Thank you so much for your prompt reply. If you could kindly help me out a bit more, I'm quite lost in all this. Where might I find the Optimize storage button you mentioned? It definitely appears that I have my photo library stored in the cloud. And how would I go about bringing that back for the purposes of putting them on an external drive to operate out of Lightroom?

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Answer 4

Feb 3, 2017 11:01 AM in response to léonie

The problem is I know I don't have enough space. Somebody said that I could do it in small batches using iCloud.com - tried once but it was awkward as it dropped them into downloads separately but I'll try again

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Answer 5

léonie

Level 10

200,681 points

Feb 3, 2017 11:11 AM in response to Outoftheloupe

The problem is I know I don't have enough space. Somebody said that I could do it in small batches using iCloud.com - tried once but it was awkward as it dropped them into downloads separately but I'll try again

Do you have an external drive with plenty of free storage, where you could download the library to?

Any external drive you use would need to be formatted MacOS Extended (Journaled), or you cannot enable iCloud Photo Library for a library on that drive. YOu do not need to download the library to your System drive.

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Answer 6

Feb 6, 2017 8:12 AM in response to léonie

Ok so you know what, problem solved, thank you very much. What I have figured out is that if I go to iCloud.com I can download them in small batches. Then when I import I use the Move option so the pics won't stay on my HD taking up space. It would probably be smart if I started figuring out how to use keywords ash such now so I can do it as I import. Thanks leonie for your amazing and generous help!

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