Photos Across 3 devices without iCloud (or partially using iCloud)

I was really hoping to find a way to use my ipad in my workflow, as i actually enjoy sitting on buses or random places and editing or sorting photos on there.

I liked to do that too. I purchased my iPad 3 exactly to be able to do that. but that was on iOS 7, when the marvelous iPhoto for iOS has still been supported. In iPhoto it has been possible to assign titles and captions, and keywords. I could add notes to the photos directly after taking the photos. And iPhoto allowed to apply dodge & barn adjustments and sharpening simply by brushing them in locally with the fingertips. The iOS 8 upgrade killed iPhoto, and no we cannot even display titles and captions in Photos, and the brushed adjustments are not supported. On my iPad I do not even dare to delete a photo to remove duplicates or similar photos, because Photos does not show the pixel size or the format. So I cannot be sure, if I am about to delete a RAW original or a smaller version, saved from a shared album.

Since I upgraded to iOS 8 I have not used the camera connection kit for the iPad once. With iPhoto on the iPad I downloaded the photos from my DLSR to the iPad using the camera connection Kit and did some basic edits there.

I'm starting to think I need to keep using another app (Lightroom, On1, ??) to manage my original photos library, and after editing in whatever software i choose to use (Luminar, Pixelmator, Affinity) I just export to JPEG and import those to Photos.

I am using Photos to manage the originals. Many of the editors are available as photo editing extension directly from Photos. and Photos can keep the originals and the externally edited photos paired.

recently I am doing most edits, that cannot be done in Photos natively right from tPhotos edit panel by calling an editing extension. They are easy to access this way, and I cn use "Revert to Original" right in Photos, if I want to go back.

I don't need all my SLR photos on iPhone, but don't know of any way to only sync up to the cloud on a device, instead of up and down.

As currently deployed, iCloud Photo Library is always 2 way syncing.

All subscribed devices get all of your files.

If you want to use the iPhone as a camera, but not photos from your other devices on the iPhone, do not use iCloud at all for the iPhone Photos library. Simply import new photos from the iPhone to your MBP using the USB cable.

This way the photos will download to the Mac, but no photos will upload.

Take photos with SLR, sync to Photos via MBP, then to iPad via iTunes.

If you want to edit the photos on the iPad and get the edits back to your MBP, use iCloud Photo Library to sync the Mac and the iPad. If you sync the photos with iTunes, you can view them on the iPad. But they will not be added two the Camera Roll. Editing the photos will be very clumsy, You would have to copy each photo to the camera roll, before you can edit it, and then you cannot sync the edits back to the Mac. With iCloud Photo Library the edits will sync between the Mac and the iPad, also the Favorite heart, or if you delete bad shots.

My solution, when traveling is, to import all iPhone Photos to the Mac using the USB connection, and then I am doing all edits and ratings, adding titles, keywords, captions directly in Photos on the MacBook Pro. Occasionally I am syncing a few albums with iTunes to my iPad, but just to show off my best photos to my travel companions, not for editing.

On the Mac, Photos is by now better than iPhoto in many areas. For example, the ease we can switch between external editors or or integrate with iCloud. Some editing tools are more advanced than in iPhoto Mac.

But on the iPad, I am still waiting for Photos to bring back the powerful tools we had with iPhoto on the iPad. There is no support for editing metadata at all, there are no smart albums, and we can no longer create books or web journals.