Photos on external HDD, in folders

[buskroth]

Hi,
I'm the proud owner of a new 27" iMac, and loving it!
I've moved over from a PC, where all of my photos where stored on an external HDD, in named folders.
I want to keep my photos in their folders, on an external Mac formatted HDD, and I want the photos app to recognise the different folders as different albums.
Is this possible and if so, how?
Thanks for any help you can offer...

 

[mpfuchs]

When Importing the pictures to let's say Aperture, you can click the option "store pictures in their current location" vs. "move to Aperture library". That way you keep the pictures on your external HDD and you should get folders that reflect the current folder hierarchy. You might have to play with the import settings to get it exactly the way you want them.
Just use a small portion of your library as a test to make sure you like it before importing the whole thing.

Oh, and congrats on your new iMac!

 

[xmichaelp]

You could also just store your Photos libraries on the external.

 

[Notechy]

I think that, like me, the OP wants the Photos app to recognise and keep the existing folder/album structure and names. Does not seem a lot to ask, but I understand that it will not?

 

[casperes1996]

I think that, like me, the OP wants the Photos app to recognise and keep the existing folder/album structure and names. Does not seem a lot to ask, but I understand that it will not?

Fairly sure you can't have that, no. Not entirely sure, since photos isn't my most used app, but pretty sure.

 

[filmak]

Hi,
I'm the proud owner of a new 27" iMac, and loving it!
I've moved over from a PC, where all of my photos where stored on an external HDD, in named folders.
I want to keep my photos in their folders, on an external Mac formatted HDD, and I want the photos app to recognise the different folders as different albums.
Is this possible and if so, how?
Thanks for any help you can offer...

Unfortunately Aperture is dead now and Photos app not so good / up to the task yet.
If you own or buy Adobe's Lightroom, yes you can...
It's pretty easy.

 

[Fishrrman]

OP:

I, too, prefer to keep my photos in "folder/file" arrangement.

What you need to do, is to set up your photos on your external drive BEFORE you attempt to import them into Photos (or iPhoto, or Aperture -- and YES, Aperture STILL works if you wish to use it. I predict that Aperture will continue to work for several years into the future).

Then -- again, BEFORE you choose to begin importing -- you need to set up the preferences in Photos/iPhoto/Aperture so that your originals will be "left where they are" and the Photos/iPhoto/Aperture library will be created "as a referenced library", leaving the original copies "in place".

If you do it thusly, your Photos/iPhoto/Aperture libraries will contain only "previews" and the necessary data to display the photos "with edits".
You will still have access to the untouched originals in the folder/files where you originally placed them.

Doing it this way also helps to keep the size of your home folder down somewhat.

Personal experience:
For all the bad-mouthing, I find that Apple's new Photos app does a pretty nice job insofar as editing is concerned. However, I'm NOT a professional or even an advanced amateur. But I predict you will be pleased with the photo edits you can achieve by just using Photos.
Also, I've been impressed by the results I get using Google's "Picasa" app.
For quick-n-dirty photo browsing, there's a nifty app out there called "Lyn".

 

[Notechy]

OP:

I, too, prefer to keep my photos in "folder/file" arrangement.

What you need to do, is to set up your photos on your external drive BEFORE you attempt to import them into Photos (or iPhoto, or Aperture -- and YES, Aperture STILL works if you wish to use it. I predict that Aperture will continue to work for several years into the future).

Then -- again, BEFORE you choose to begin importing -- you need to set up the preferences in Photos/iPhoto/Aperture so that your originals will be "left where they are" and the Photos/iPhoto/Aperture library will be created "as a referenced library", leaving the original copies "in place".

If you do it thusly, your Photos/iPhoto/Aperture libraries will contain only "previews" and the necessary data to display the photos "with edits".
You will still have access to the untouched originals in the folder/files where you originally placed them.

Doing it this way also helps to keep the size of your home folder down somewhat.

Personal experience:
For all the bad-mouthing, I find that Apple's new Photos app does a pretty nice job insofar as editing is concerned. However, I'm NOT a professional or even an advanced amateur. But I predict you will be pleased with the photo edits you can achieve by just using Photos.
Also, I've been impressed by the results I get using Google's "Picasa" app.
For quick-n-dirty photo browsing, there's a nifty app out there called "Lyn".

But will Photos present me with my pictures in their folders, which is how I find them, know what they are, and show them?

 

[Replevin]

Do yourself a favor and get Lightroom. We switched to Mac about eight months ago. My wife was not very impressed with what iPhoto did to her photo library. She was starting to get the hang of it when Photos came out. She was looking up divorce attorneys when I made the switch without consulting her. We went back to iPhoto for a little while, like a day, when I decided something needed to change. Lightroom is what I envisioned a native Mac photo library would actually be like. With LR you can pretty much organize your pictures any way you want.

 

[buskroth]

Thanks for all the advice. I will have a go at using Aperture, thanks Mpfuchs. I will also start using Adobe Lightroom, thanks Replevin (I did use Adobe elements on my PC, but have just gone with a Creative Cloud subscription so I do have Lightroom at my disposal).
I will post an update of my progress in the next couple of days for any future user that stumbles across this thread who has the same limited knowledge as me.

 

[filmak]

Thanks for all the advice. I will have a go at using Aperture, thanks Mpfuchs. I will also start using Adobe Lightroom, thanks Replevin (I did use Adobe elements on my PC, but have just gone with a Creative Cloud subscription so I do have Lightroom at my disposal).
I will post an update of my progress in the next couple of days for any future user that stumbles across this thread who has the same limited knowledge as me.

Aperture is no longer available, Apple stopped supporting it / updating, it was replaced with photos app.
Anyway if you have a copy and you want to use it, imho, just be careful because anytime now or in the future it can be broken by a new os x update and no longer function as it should or at all.
So invest your time and efforts to the app that you will be using now on ...

 

[Chippy99]

Aperture is no longer available, Apple stopped supporting it / updating, it was replaced with photos app.
Anyway if you have a copy and you want to use it, imho, just be careful because anytime now or in the future it can be broken by a new os x update and no longer function as it should or at all.
So invest your time and efforts to the app that you will be using now on ...

Of course Aperture is still available. It might not be Apple's future direction (which is a great shame) but it is still available.

 

[filmak]

Of course Aperture is still available. It might not be Apple's future direction (which is a great shame) but it is still available.

https://www.macrumors.com/2015/02/11/apple-aperture-removed-from-app-store/
https://www.macrumors.com/2015/04/10/iphoto-aperture-removed-mac-app-store/
http://www.macworld.co.uk/news/mac-software/no-new-aperture-iphoto-apple-pro-apps-future-3474820/
Apple removed Aperture from App store since the 10th of April.
Only if you can find a forgotten retail box somewhere, but what for? will this continue to work after the new iterations of OS X? or even after the next minor update?
Aperture 3 was released on February 9th of 2010, version 3.5 June 5th 2013.
It's a dead end, imho I think that it's not logical to spend your money, time and efforts with an obsolete piece of software, even if it was the best for me and many other people.

Of course the choice is yours...

 

[Chippy99]

https://www.macrumors.com/2015/02/11/apple-aperture-removed-from-app-store/
https://www.macrumors.com/2015/04/10/iphoto-aperture-removed-mac-app-store/
http://www.macworld.co.uk/news/mac-software/no-new-aperture-iphoto-apple-pro-apps-future-3474820/
Apple removed Aperture from App store since the 10th of April.
Only if you can find a forgotten retail box somewhere, but what for? will this continue to work after the new iterations of OS X? or even after the next minor update?
Aperture 3 was released on February 9th of 2010, version 3.5 June 5th 2013.
It's a dead end, imho I think that it's not logical to spend your money, time and efforts with an obsolete piece of software, even if it was the best for me and many other people.

Of course the choice is yours...

Fair enough - I hadn't realised it was now so difficult to get hold of. Aperture is still the Apple software to use imho however... until Apple Photos reaches a level of maturity such that you can actually work with it, tripe that it is.

 

[casperes1996]

Fair enough - I hadn't realised it was now so difficult to get hold of. Aperture is still the Apple software to use imho however... until Apple Photos reaches a level of maturity such that you can actually work with it, tripe that it is.

I think Apple officially said something about continuing to offer support for x amount of time.
And let's pretend you bought it right before it got taken down. You'd expect it to work with at least a few OS updates. I'm saying OS X 10.13 will either not run it at all, or run it with issues, like how iMovie 11 runs in Yosemite.