Photo - Cannot Import Item

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Photo - Cannot Import Item

I'm trying to import photos from my iPhone into Apple's Photos App on my Mac. Recently, only the last month or two... some of these photos are not being imported, these are usually photos taken using a different photo app. Please note that I've always been able to import all these photos before.

Error message:

Cannot Import Item

This item cannot be added to your Photo library because it may be unrecognisable file format or the file may not contain valid data.

Lists the File Name - Reason: The file "file name.jpg" couldn't be opened because there is no such file.

Does anyone know how this could be resolved?

Posted on Mar 10, 2018 7:39 AM

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Answer 1

Best reply

léonie

Level 10

194,761 points

Mar 14, 2018 1:27 PM in response to keikeiwang

(Case-sensitive, Journaled).

The case-sensitive drive is probably the problem. There are quite a few reports, that Photos on High Sierra is having problems, if the Photos Library is on a drive with a case-sensitive format.

Tofix this, move the library temporarily to a drive that is not case sensitive and format the drive with Disk Utility to Mac OS Extended (Journaled)

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Answer 2

léonie

Level 10

194,761 points

Mar 10, 2018 8:07 AM in response to keikeiwang

Which system version do you have?

The file "file name.jpg" couldn't be opened because there is no such file.

The error message above is very typical for importing files on macOS 10.13.x High Sierra. High Sierra has problems to import files, if the Photos library is on drive with a file system format, that is case-sensitive. Where is your Photos Library stored? If it is on an external drive, check the file system format in the "File > Get Info" panel for the drive.

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Answer 3

keikeiwang Author

Level 1

9 points

Mar 12, 2018 12:43 PM in response to léonie

I'm on High Sierra 10.13.3, my Photos library is on an external drive and the system format of the drive is Mac OS Extended (Case-sensitive, Journaled). Any ideas how I could resolve this? Would I have to move my Photos library, reformat to something else first then move the library back?

Thanks in advance!

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Answer 4

keikeiwang Author

Level 1

9 points

Mar 14, 2018 1:28 PM in response to léonie

Thank you so much for your help, took a while for me to move things around etc. but once I reformatted the external drive, all my imports are working perfectly now. You're a life saver!

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Answer 5

léonie

Level 10

194,761 points

Mar 15, 2018 8:53 AM in response to keikeiwang

You're welcome 🙂

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