Photo Mess Aperature IPhoto etc.

[Designer Dale]

For the record, my 1T backup drive is a server class 7200rpm Western Digital Scorpio Black.

UPS stands for Uninterrupted Power Supply. Its a battery in an inclosure with protective circuitry and sensors. If your power goes out, the UPS will kick in and keep your system running for around 3 hours. In the Old Days this guarded against data loss and allowed either you or the system to shut down in an orderly manner when the power was suddenly cut out. Some modern systems have continuous save features that make this less important.

A UPS also provides what electronics people call clean power. It's stabilized to a very consistent voltage that makes it healthy for the system. Kind of like filtered water for electronics. But don't try that at home...

I have one but I don't use it. It has an alarm that detects variations in house current and is always going off when the heat comes on.

Dale

 

[snberk103]

....

A UPS also provides what electronics people call clean power. It's stabilized to a very consistent voltage that makes it healthy for the system. Kind of like filtered water for electronics. But don't try that at home...

I have one but I don't use it. It has an alarm that detects variations in house current and is always going off when the heat comes on.

Dale

Normally I highly look forward to your comments in this thread. In this case I can't help but wonder if you aren't maybe missing the point, perhaps?

Try the UPS on a different circuit ... it's possible you may find one that is less affected by the heat. Or just figure out how to turn the alarm off. My philosophy of UPSes is that their main job is to filter the power (as you put it so well) - which includes the more than occasional dip caused by your heat.

Just out of curiosity ... what kind of heating? I have a heat pump in the basement, and it also dips the power when it switches on ... quite noticeably. My UPS alarm only goes off when there is a complete failure, however, so I don't get bothered by the alarms. Which reminds me... I need to go and order a replacement battery...

 

[Designer Dale]

------
Just out of curiosity ... what kind of heating? I have a heat pump in the basement, and it also dips the power when it switches on ... quite noticeably. My UPS alarm only goes off when there is a complete failure, however, so I don't get bothered by the alarms. Which reminds me... I need to go and order a replacement battery...

Electric forced air heat in a 1960's vintage wood frame house. We had the breaker box upgraded but it still set the alarm off. The UPS is probably 20 years old and I'm happy with a good stout circuit protector. Don't really have need for the battery which is most of the cost of a UPS. When a storm blows in, I disconnect the electronics anyway. The best protection is disconnection.

EDIT: The alarm didn't bother me, but my wife couldn't tolerate it.

Dale

 

[snberk103]

Electric forced air heat in a 1960's vintage wood frame house. We had the breaker box upgraded but it still set the alarm off. The UPS is probably 20 years old and I'm happy with a good stout circuit protector. Don't really have need for the battery which is most of the cost of a UPS. When a storm blows in, I disconnect the electronics anyway. The best protection is disconnection.

EDIT: The alarm didn't bother me, but my wife couldn't tolerate it.

Dale

That electric motor cutting in is probably dipping the power momentarily. In my research - it was that momentary power dip that did the most damage to electronics and why I bought the UPS. If there is a storm and it's bad enough that the power might go out I'll shut the system down anyway. And disconnect the power and internet cables if there is lightening. My UPS is mostly there for those little dips that we never notice. But, ymmv of course. I post this simply to expand and clarify my thinking.

 

[a4est42]

Placed orders

1 WD red 1TB HDD + HDD enclosure For Photos active drive

2 Different Suppliers for Portable 1TB Passport Portable HDD for Photos: One for storage one for next back up then rotate.

Existing 1TB drive for Computer backup plus I have Carbonite which backups complete computer (and I have been very happy with their Tech support)

1 UPS Power supply/battery backup

1 Card reader

I decided on one less portable since I will have a Dedicated desk top back-up and Carbonite. The small amount of photos on existing Back Up drive will move to new Photo dedicated drive. All documents are also saved elsewhere.

This has lightened my pocket book so by the time I am ready for new computer my mess should be cleaned up and computer hard drive happy.

Wish me luck!

 

[Designer Dale]

1 WD red 1TB HDD + HDD enclosure For Photos active drive

2 Different Suppliers for Portable 1TB Passport Portable HDD for Photos: One for storage one for next back up then rotate.

Existing 1TB drive for Computer backup plus I have Carbonite which backups complete computer (and I have been very happy with their Tech support)

1 UPS Power supply/battery backup

1 Card reader

I decided on one less portable since I will have a Dedicated desk top back-up and Carbonite. The small amount of photos on existing Back Up drive will move to new Photo dedicated drive. All documents are also saved elsewhere.

This has lightened my pocket book so by the time I am ready for new computer my mess should be cleaned up and computer hard drive happy.

Wish me luck!

Someone should have told you that the road to implicitly had a toll booth..

Dale

 

[swordio777]

1 WD red 1TB HDD + HDD enclosure For Photos active drive

2 Different Suppliers for Portable 1TB Passport Portable HDD for Photos: One for storage one for next back up then rotate.

Existing 1TB drive for Computer backup plus I have Carbonite which backups complete computer (and I have been very happy with their Tech support)

1 UPS Power supply/battery backup

1 Card reader

I decided on one less portable since I will have a Dedicated desk top back-up and Carbonite. The small amount of photos on existing Back Up drive will move to new Photo dedicated drive. All documents are also saved elsewhere.

This has lightened my pocket book so by the time I am ready for new computer my mess should be cleaned up and computer hard drive happy.

Wish me luck!

Excellent work! Good luck - although I'm sure you won't need luck, just patience. Be sure to let us know how you get on. And remember that you can get advice on here if you hit any bumps along the way.

All the best!
Iain

 

[a4est42]

Thank you!

Particularly Ian and Dale,

I will be back. The items were ordered from 2 vendors. UPS to arrive first. Which seems like a good start. In the meantime I am trying to read up on Aperture. Including forums here.

Fundamentally i really messed up by moving files outside of aperture and breaking the links....

I do have a vault backup that was done a few months ago and I need to decide whether to go that route once I have made copies of what I have.

an arduous process but it can't be any worse than the past year struggling to make room and always feeling like I am one step away from complete disaster

Thanks again to all,
Kelly

PS Ian--- my son is periodically in Scotland as he has a research project studying the Feshie river. (geomorphology, fluid dynamics and river restoration)

 

[a4est42]

Update

Checked out a Aperture 3 genius Guide from local library.

• I got the Red WD drive yesterday and installed it in a housing without instructions! LOL
• Copied files to backup portable drives
• Today is move Aperture Libraries to new Photo Drive, test
• Clean-up Internal HD
• Work on reorganizing within Aperture and connecting referenced files

 

[Designer Dale]

Particularly Ian and Dale,

(...)

an arduous process but it can't be any worse than the past year struggling to make room and always feeling like I am one step away from complete disaster

Thanks again to all,
Kelly

PS Ian--- my son is periodically in Scotland as he has a research project studying the Feshie river. (geomorphology, fluid dynamics and river restoration)

Try building a race car in a small garage...

Glad to see you are getting a handle on your stuff. Keep at it and all will be fine. Trust me on this.

Dale

 

[snberk103]

Checked out a Aperture 3 genius Guide from local library.

• I got the Red WD drive yesterday and installed it in a housing without instructions! LOL
• Copied files to backup portable drives
• Today is move Aperture Libraries to new Photo Drive, test
• Clean-up Internal HD
• Work on reorganizing within Aperture and connecting referenced files

Good Luck. My one piece of advice... be paranoid. Start with the assumption that something is going to go wrong, and that at some point your library will be corrupted... so make sure you have a good, clean back up at all times. Don't take shortcuts, and when you're tired take a break. Check your backup to make sure it is really there, and then label it clearly. Sometimes it's tempting to put an unlabeled HDD down for a few minutes - believing you will remember which HDD it is (i.e. what it contains). That is the moment fate is waiting for, and your cat/dog/kid/lover will make a mess/sound/souffle that distracts you - and causes you to forget that this HDD does not yet contain the backup, but is in fact blank. You only put it there with the intention to copy the backup to it. Just take your time, be cautious and paranoid.

 

[a4est42]

New question

Good Luck. My one piece of advice... be paranoid. Start with the assumption that something is going to go wrong, and that at some point your library will be corrupted... so make sure you have a good, clean back up at all times. Don't take shortcuts, and when you're tired take a break. Check your backup to make sure it is really there, and then label it clearly. Sometimes it's tempting to put an unlabeled HDD down for a few minutes - believing you will remember which HDD it is (i.e. what it contains). That is the moment fate is waiting for, and your cat/dog/kid/lover will make a mess/sound/souffle that distracts you - and causes you to forget that this HDD does not yet contain the backup, but is in fact blank. You only put it there with the intention to copy the backup to it. Just take your time, be cautious and paranoid.

Thanks here is my first Big question which may seem stupid but I have read everything and am still confused. How do I permanently relocate all the photos (managed and reference) to the new external hard drive labeled PHOTOS. I have created a vault there and elsewhere but I do not want Photos on my INTERNAL HD so can I use the vault I just created (exact duplicate) on the new POTOS HD to restore---but then does that move back to Internal. HELP!!

For anyone lurking. I found this answer. "I seem to recall that, when I went through this same thing, all I needed to do was quit Aperture, copy the xxx.aplibrary file to the new location, and relaunch Aperture by double-clicking the library in the NEW location."

 

[snberk103]

Thanks here is my first Big question which may seem stupid but I have read everything and am still confused. How do I permanently relocate all the photos (managed and reference) ...."

Sorry, that I don't know...

 

[swordio777]

Thanks here is my first Big question which may seem stupid but I have read everything and am still confused. How do I permanently relocate all the photos (managed and reference) to the new external hard drive labeled PHOTOS. I have created a vault there and elsewhere but I do not want Photos on my INTERNAL HD so can I use the vault I just created (exact duplicate) on the new POTOS HD to restore---but then does that move back to Internal. HELP!!

For anyone lurking. I found this answer. "I seem to recall that, when I went through this same thing, all I needed to do was quit Aperture, copy the xxx.aplibrary file to the new location, and relaunch Aperture by double-clicking the library in the NEW location."

Hi Kelly,

The managed bit is easy - you just pick up the library file in the finder and drag it to the new folder. Managed photos actually live inside the library, so you can't break any links to those by moving the library around.

To move the referenced files, open aperture then go to:
"File > Relocate Original..."

It'll open up a Finder-style window where you can select your new destination for the files on your external drive. I think you will need to do this one project at a time.

There are a couple of things to pay particular attention to:
1) There's a "New Folder" button in the bottom lower left - you can use this if you want to build a structure for your photos to live in. (Alternatively you can do this in the finder first & just navigate to the appropriate folder.)

and 2) you can rename your images at the time of moving them. This is particularly important if you renamed the files at the time of import, as you probably want to keep the same filenames.

Once you've selected where you want them to go and what you want to call them, just hit "Relocate Originals" and Aperture will work away doing the rest.

Hope that helps!
Iain

 

[swordio777]

I have created a vault there and elsewhere but I do not want Photos on my INTERNAL HD so can I use the vault I just created (exact duplicate) on the new POTOS HD to restore---but then does that move back to Internal. HELP!!

Sorry Kelly - forgot to mention anything about this. Personally I do not use Vaults. I find them quite clumsy because I do my own backups using SuperDuper anyway.

Did you make backups of all your drives before you started?? If so, keep those safe and you have no risk of losing everything. I wouldn't worry about creating any vaults just yet - just start to move your photos over to your external Photos drive. Once you've finished the job safely, you can make a backup of your Photos drive and you won't need to use vaults.

If you have not yet made backups of all your drives - make sure you do this before you start to move anything at all!

Regards,
Iain

 

[a4est42]

Sorry Kelly - forgot to mention anything about this. Personally I do not use Vaults. I find them quite clumsy because I do my own backups using SuperDuper anyway.

Did you make backups of all your drives before you started?? If so, keep those safe and you have no risk of losing everything. I wouldn't worry about creating any vaults just yet - just start to move your photos over to your external Photos drive. Once you've finished the job safely, you can make a backup of your Photos drive and you won't need to use vaults.

If you have not yet made backups of all your drives - make sure you do this before you start to move anything at all!

Regards,
Iain

Thanks Swordio at least 3 backups probably more on 3 different ext. HDD
Thanks for the tips. I am knee deep in the thick of it.

Still not sure I know what I am doing but trying---and as you say all will not be lost. I'll check in a bit later.

 

[a4est42]

Making Progress

I have cleaned up broad subjects of Animals and Wildlife! Yipppee.

 

[swordio777]

Glad to hear things are going well so far

 

[mtngoatjoe]

Organizing Photos

Other have described much of this, but I thought I'd post my process as well. I use iPhoto, but I may move to Aperture someday. Either way, the process is pretty much the same....

----------------------------------
I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again. Use iPhoto to ORGANIZE your photos. And the key to organizing your photos is Faces, Places, Keywords, and Ratings.

For example, if your wife's birthday is coming up and you want to show every 4 and/or 5 star photo she is in, then iPhoto will save your life. Here’s another example: your anniversary is coming up, and you want to create a slideshow with every 5 star photo that contains the two of you. Or, you’re hosting a dinner party and you want something to occupy that big-screen TV in your living room. Use iPhoto find every good photo that contains at least one of your guests.

Faces, Places, Keywords, and Ratings! It takes a bit of work, but if you want to do anything with your photos other than file them away, then the work is well worth the reward.

Here is how I go about using these tools:

1. Import photos.
2. Delete junk.
3. Set Keywords. I try to keep my keyword list to a minimum. For example, I have a
   keyword for “Vacation”, but I don’t use keywords for the location of the vacation (that’s taken care of with the Places feature). Another example: I have a keyword for “Birthday”, but I don’t have keywords for the person or the year (those are taken care of with the Faces feature, and the fact that all the photos are dated already).
4. Rate the best as 4 or 5 stars, and if I need to keep a bad photo for some reason, I rate it as 1 star.
5. Name the Faces. I only do this with the people I care about and delete the box around people that I don’t care about (this prevents them from showing up as suggestions when you’re viewing a person’s photos).
6. Set the location. This is very important for travel photos, but is also handy for others as well. If you want a really good reason to set the travel photos, pick a trip, do the work of setting the location of each photo, and then start the Travel slide show. The Travel slide show is really cool!

Now, with all this info set (called metadata in computer parlance), I can use Smart Albums to great effect.

• I have a smart album the contains all photos of my daughter that I’ve rated as 5 starts. This album is automatically synched to my iPhone, my wife’s iPhone, my iPad, and our AppleTV. Every time I import a photo into iPhoto and mark my daughter’s face and rate the photo as five stars, the photo is automatically sent to all our devices when we synch. Super easy!
• I have smart albums with Christmas photos for each branch of our family. So, when someone comes over for the holidays, I can easily show that part of the family’s Christmas photos on the TV. We don’t just sit around and watch the slide show all night, but the photos are there if people want to look and they add a nice touch to an otherwise empty sheet of dark glass.

That's just a few things to keep in mind. I've found that combining Smart Albums with Faces, Places, Keywords, and Ratings, I rarely need to create traditional folders or albums. And finding photos to suite the moment is not nearly as difficult as a folder structure would be.

 

[flynz4]

Other have described much of this, but I thought I'd post my process as well. I use iPhoto, but I may move to Aperture someday. Either way, the process is pretty much the same....

----------------------------------
I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again. Use iPhoto to ORGANIZE your photos. And the key to organizing your photos is Faces, Places, Keywords, and Ratings.

For example, if your wife's birthday is coming up and you want to show every 4 and/or 5 star photo she is in, then iPhoto will save your life. Here’s another example: your anniversary is coming up, and you want to create a slideshow with every 5 star photo that contains the two of you. Or, you’re hosting a dinner party and you want something to occupy that big-screen TV in your living room. Use iPhoto find every good photo that contains at least one of your guests.

Faces, Places, Keywords, and Ratings! It takes a bit of work, but if you want to do anything with your photos other than file them away, then the work is well worth the reward.

Here is how I go about using these tools:

1. Import photos.
2. Delete junk.
3. Set Keywords. I try to keep my keyword list to a minimum. For example, I have a
   keyword for “Vacation”, but I don’t use keywords for the location of the vacation (that’s taken care of with the Places feature). Another example: I have a keyword for “Birthday”, but I don’t have keywords for the person or the year (those are taken care of with the Faces feature, and the fact that all the photos are dated already).
4. Rate the best as 4 or 5 stars, and if I need to keep a bad photo for some reason, I rate it as 1 star.
5. Name the Faces. I only do this with the people I care about and delete the box around people that I don’t care about (this prevents them from showing up as suggestions when you’re viewing a person’s photos).
6. Set the location. This is very important for travel photos, but is also handy for others as well. If you want a really good reason to set the travel photos, pick a trip, do the work of setting the location of each photo, and then start the Travel slide show. The Travel slide show is really cool!

Now, with all this info set (called metadata in computer parlance), I can use Smart Albums to great effect.

• I have a smart album the contains all photos of my daughter that I’ve rated as 5 starts. This album is automatically synched to my iPhone, my wife’s iPhone, my iPad, and our AppleTV. Every time I import a photo into iPhoto and mark my daughter’s face and rate the photo as five stars, the photo is automatically sent to all our devices when we synch. Super easy!
• I have smart albums with Christmas photos for each branch of our family. So, when someone comes over for the holidays, I can easily show that part of the family’s Christmas photos on the TV. We don’t just sit around and watch the slide show all night, but the photos are there if people want to look and they add a nice touch to an otherwise empty sheet of dark glass.

That's just a few things to keep in mind. I've found that combining Smart Albums with Faces, Places, Keywords, and Ratings, I rarely need to create traditional folders or albums. And finding photos to suite the moment is not nearly as difficult as a folder structure would be.

Nice post... and you will love Aperture once you move to it.

I basically do the same as you... except with a few changes.

Faces: I find that faces is not worth the effort... especially when you have a large library. It is a great "consumer" tool... but too "toy like" and just doesn't scale well into large libraries. Instead, I use keywords. Aperture's tools for keywording is very fast. One nice thing is that if you choose to move from faces to keywords... it is trivially easy because you just create a smart album for each person... and keyword them in one simple step.

Star ratings. I never rate anything higher than 4 stars on the first pass. 4 stars are my best... and then I choose from them which I want to do post processing (such as Nik tools). Those become 5 stars after post.

Since I have Aperture... I also have the extra flexibility of stacks.

Overall... I think your description is quite good and almost a direct match for how I organize.

/Jim

 

[glenthompson]

One other advantage to places is when you make a photo book of a trip. I made one of my travels around the US last year and was able to include a map of all the places we had been.

 

[mtngoatjoe]

Nice post... and you will love Aperture once you move to it.

I basically do the same as you... except with a few changes.

Faces: I find that faces is not worth the effort...

I won't disagree with you. Faces does need some added functionality. I'd like to be able to say "This is Bill, but it's a bad picture of him so don't use it when suggesting future matches." Faces should really be called "People" since a "This is a photo of Bill with a Halloween mask." My daughter is 5, and after 5 years of Faces, iPhoto NEVER suggests her when it analyzes her face.

Star ratings. I never rate anything higher than 4 stars on the first pass. 4 stars are my best... and then I choose from them which I want to do post processing (such as Nik tools). Those become 5 stars after post.

That's a good idea. Another thing I do with ratings is that I sometimes (but not often) rate a photo as 1 star so that I can keep the photo, but filter it out of whatever project I'm working on.

Overall... I think your description is quite good and almost a direct match for how I organize.

Thanks, I got tired of forum posts that said, "I switched to Mac from Windows, but I want to use folders to organize my photos, and I don't like iPhoto", so I saved my response and posted it above (minus the references to folder structures).