Old Live Photos Now Dead

[JTravers]

Anyone else's old live photos stop working? It's so strange. Maybe it's due to an iOS update or maybe something else. I have no idea. But all the live photos I took in the past on my 6s+ no longer work. They definitely did work just a couple weeks ago. They are all just static images on my iPhone, on Photos on my MBP, etc. I shared some of them to iCloud Shared Photo Albums when I first took them, so I can recover those (albeit at a lower resolution). And if I take new live photos, they do seem to work (at least for now).

This is all very strange. Has anyone else had this happen to them? Any suggestions on how to get the old live photos back?

Thanks for the help.

 

[Wayward]

I have some Live Photos that I took on September 25, iPhone 6s series release day, and they work fine.

I have a 6s+ running 9.1 and am using iCloud Photo Library.

 

[JTravers]

Thanks, I'm sure they're working for most people. Otherwise, there'd be an uproar all over the net. I'm interested in hearing from others that noticed the same issue as me.

 

[gsmornot]

Thanks, I'm sure they're working for most people. Otherwise, there'd be an uproar all over the net. I'm interested in hearing from others that noticed the same issue as me.

Did you edit them? The only edit I think you can do without turning it into a static photo is the magic wand that auto corrects color. Most other edits will remove the Live Photo feature. Maybe tap edit on one and see if you can hit the revert button. Can't think of anything else at the moment.

 

[JTravers]

Did you edit them? The only edit I think you can do without turning it into a static photo is the magic wand that auto corrects color. Most other edits will remove the Live Photo feature. Maybe tap edit on one and see if you can hit the revert button. Can't think of anything else at the moment.

Good idea. Just checked a few, and none were edited. When I "Get Info" on Photos on my MBP, they don't have a "Live" badge on them. New live photos I take do have the "Live" badge. It's like something caused the associated video file to get deleted for all the live photos.

I wonder if upgrading from Mavericks to El Cap caused this. I had Photostream turned on in iPhoto in Mavericks. I just upgraded to El Cap last week. Maybe the Photostream photos from iPhoto all imported into Photos.app and overwrote the live photos?

 

[AbsynthMinded]

Did you store them somewhere and then put them back on your phone, restore them to your phone, or have they been sitting in your phone the whole time?

 

[JTravers]

Did you store them somewhere and then put them back on your phone, restore them to your phone, or have they been sitting in your phone the whole time?

They've been sitting on my phone or in iCloud Photo Library the whole time (I have "Optimize Storage" turned on). The only thing I can think of is what I mentioned in my previous post about upgrading from Mavericks to El Cap and maybe the imported Photostream photos from iPhoto overwrote the Live Photos. Seems like a bit of an oversight on Apple's part if that were the case.

 

[AbsynthMinded]

Yeah I think the only devices that handle them properly are currently the 6S and 6S+, not even sure about Mac OS X El Cap preserving them reliably. I have a few that no longer are live, but I was aware of those because during some instance the file was somewhere other than on my phone.

 

[JTravers]

Would seem like a big oversight if importing a static jpg into iCloud Photo Library could delete the "Live" portion of the photo. Shouldn't conflict resolution default to keeping the Live Photo and throwing away the static one? Maybe I should test this with some new, throwaway photos.

 

[JTravers]

I just tested this. Photos.app asks if you want to import the duplicate. If you import, both photos become Live Photos even though the imported one was static. Not exactly what I expected, lol.

Now I wonder if the whole convoluted syncing process messes this up, since Photos.app will first be populated with iPhoto imports before it even gets a chance to sync with iCloud Photo Library???

 

[AbsynthMinded]

Hmm, now I want to test it when I get home. I believe iCloud works with it properly but iPhoto does not, that being the case I think both of your assumptions may be correct.