iphoto: problem organizing photos

soo i have the previous iphoto, i think iphoto 06/07. i just imported some pics from my cam and i was given the option to name the roll rather than it automatically becoming roll 555 or something. i'm trying to get my other pics organized that way, so it's easier for me to find--outside of iphoto--rather than looking for what roll it's under. but i'm not importing them through my camera, so i don't have the option of naming the roll. i tried doing the obvious and renaming it manually outside of iphoto in the appropriate roll folder, but it still doesn't work for me.

also, is iphoto 08 a better bet when it comes to organizing your photos? cause i have to go through tons of folders in order for me to find a picture outside of iphoto.

First of all, if you want to use iPhoto, do NOTHING to/with your photos "outside of iPhoto" unless you have them in a folder that is separate from the iPhoto library. The ones in the iPhoto library in finder are arranged by iPhoto so that the app can access them,and if you change anything there, the app will not work.

From within the app, you can easily change the name of the roll in the left panel. Just highlight the roll number or whatever is there, and change it. To easily find photos, use keywords, folders and albums. Make a folder for "vacations" for example. Then an album for each of "Summer 2007", "Winter 2008", etc. Move those albums to the folder and there you go. For keywords, apply one to each photo as you import -- "Bill", "Joe" "dog", etc. then a "Smart album for "Bill" or whatever, and all photos from there on that you keyword with "Bill" will automatically go into that folder. So easy to find!

The latest iPhoto -- 7 (part of iLife '08) has many improvements and is much easier to work with. Same cautions exist, though -- stay out of the finder!

thank you so much for the quick reply, sky. i posted an attachment of my iphoto library for reference, which i should've done before. i apologize.

the reason why i want to locate pictures in finder is for when i'm uploading pictures onto sites, etc. i'll have to go through something like pictures>iphoto library>data>2008>roll 1335 and i just want to be able to know what's inside each roll and manually control what goes into each roll. i once found a folder dated 1966, but i don't have anything from 1966. i don't know how iphoto came up with that lol.

i think iphoto organizes by date, but since i'm an adobe suite user, sometimes i'll have photoshop things that aren't really organized by date. i check the roll folders and there'll be like only a single picture inside a roll. also, my left panel doesn't even have the list of rolls for me to change. the only roll that's listed on the left panel is last roll.

i think iphoto is a great app, which is why i love using it as opposed to having my pics in a folder separate from iphoto. i obviously do utilize the albums feature, but that only helps when i'm working within the iphoto app itself and not outside of iphoto. i think i'm just going to delete everything and start over lol, but thanks so much for helping!

To upload pictures to other sites, either drag the photo from within the iPhoto app to the desktop, or use the export function to export to the desktop (using export will give you the option to choose what size you want to use) and then upload from the desktop to the site. Some sites will let you just drag from the iPhoto app directly, but since I don't upload to sites, I can't tell you which ones do. Another advantage of doing it this way is that you will always have the most recent version of your photo -- the last edited version.

i really appreciate ur help, skybolt. anyway, i just noticed this cool little feature in finder for when i'm uploading onto imageshack, etc. instead of going to places>pictures and locating the roll folders, there's also the option of media>photos and all the albums are there! honestly, i've never even noticed that, but it makes things a lot easier to find. once again, thanks a bunch for the help.