Importing & Saving photos in iPhoto

I'm a new user of Mac. I imported several photos into iPhoto from a memory key. When I removed the key, I received an error message saying that the photo could not be found (the preview of the photo was still visible). I thought that importing the photo automatically saved it on the iMac. Do I have to save them in some folder first and then import into iPhoto?

Any help would be appreciated,
radiomother

If your having trouble I would just copy the pictures off the memory key into any folder (I would just create one on the desktop) then drag the folder into iphoto.

Right Click or Control click on single button mouse to get Contextual Menu for Eject Selection then u can remove it physically;


Click for full size

How is the stick formatted ?

radiomother said:

I'm a new user of Mac. I imported several photos into iPhoto from a memory key. When I removed the key, I received an error message saying that the photo could not be found (the preview of the photo was still visible). I thought that importing the photo automatically saved it on the iMac. Do I have to save them in some folder first and then import into iPhoto?

Any help would be appreciated,
radiomother

Click to expand...

When you removed the memory key you removed the source of the photos for iPhoto. You can drag the photos off the memory key and drop in the Pictures folder in Finder and then import, but then you have to never move or rename the photos or the link will be broken again. I find the best way for me is to go to iPhotos "Preferences" and in the Advanced tab put a check in the "Copy items to the iPhoto Library" box. This way the photos are inside iPhoto and you can delete them off the memory key once they are imported.

Thanks, Pomeroy, I just went into the Advanced tab and clicked on the "Copy photos inside iPhoto Library box." This is what I want.

Two more questions:
I bought Aperture but it seems that the Face/Places features are great ways to find photos fast. Is it wise to keep photos as events in iPhoto rather than projects in Aperture.

A friend said that photos can "disappear" in iPhoto which sounds ominous. Has anyone else experienced this?

Thanks for your help and comments,
radiomother

radiomother said:

Thanks, Pomeroy, I just went into the Advanced tab and clicked on the "Copy photos inside iPhoto Library box." This is what I want.

Two more questions:
I bought Aperture but it seems that the Face/Places features are great ways to find photos fast. Is it wise to keep photos as events in iPhoto rather than projects in Aperture.

A friend said that photos can "disappear" in iPhoto which sounds ominous. Has anyone else experienced this?

Thanks for your help and comments,
radiomother

Click to expand...

I have never had any photo disappear that I didn't want gone from inside iPhoto, but I do use Time Machine for backups.

After I import photos into "Events" and name the Event I have just started. I use "Events" only as a way to get my photos into iPhoto, from there I assign Keywords, Descriptions and Rate them. After you setup some "Smart Albums" and "Keywords" you will find things will start to fall into place and you can find any photo with just a few key strokes in the Search box at the bottom of iPhoto. You can add Keywords from Events in batches and not have to do it one photo at a time.

I keep trying to find a reason to buy Aperture but iPhoto does such a good job of organizing and finding photos, I use Pixelmator from inside iPhoto for my external editor, that I stick with iPhoto.