iPhoto question!

This might be a stupid question, but --

if I have pictures in my Pictures folder in Finder, and then I import them to iPhoto, will they just be shown in iPhoto or are they stored there too? As in like, am I making a COPY of those pictures that'll just take up unnecessary space, or will the pictures I see in iPhoto actually come from their source in the Pictures folder?

I hope that makes sense!

If you look in iPhoto preferences you have the option to copy and save them in iPhoto (thus giving you a copy so you can delete your originals, though i tend not to do this) or not copy them them, in which case iPhoto will refer to the original file - unless you edit it in iPhoto then it will hold the edited version. The option is under the Advanced tab.

BTW - it wasn't a silly question.

Image files in Finder folders and those in iPhoto are two separate locations. So yes, you will have the same file on your Mac twice. iPhoto keeps a library of whatever photos you put in it and has the ability to revert to the original photo regardless of what editing changes you make in iPhoto. It's more like a photo album/display app than a true organizing or editing app. You can do both or choose one method over the other depending on your preference and needs.

Sawday said:

If you look in iPhoto preferences you have the option to copy and save them in iPhoto (thus giving you a copy so you can delete your originals, though i tend not to do this) or not copy them them, in which case iPhoto will refer to the original file - unless you edit it in iPhoto then it will hold the edited version. The option is under the Advanced tab.

BTW - it wasn't a silly question.

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This is brilliant, thank you!

Also, I noticed your location is York - I'm going to uni there in October

MYmacROX said:

Image files in Finder folders and those in iPhoto are two separate locations. So yes, you will have the same file on your Mac twice. iPhoto keeps a library of whatever photos you put in it and has the ability to revert to the original photo regardless of what editing changes you make in iPhoto. It's more like a photo album/display app than a true organizing or editing app. You can do both or choose one method over the other depending on your preference and needs.

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Thankyou! Do you have any recommendations for something more dedicated to organisation? I just totally fell in love with the face recognition!

You don't need to "do" organisation. You have a computer, that has software to do organisation for you. MYmacROX's comments regarding iPhoto are inaccurate -- it's a superb organizer and quite capable editor for most people.

Certainly more advanced tools exist for editing photos beyond what iPhoto offers, but in terms of organising it uses the exact same methodology used by professional programs such as Lightroom and Aperture (ie put the pictures in a vault, organised by EXIF data).

chas_m said:

You don't need to "do" organisation. You have a computer, that has software to do organisation for you. MYmacROX's comments regarding iPhoto are inaccurate -- it's a superb organizer and quite capable editor for most people.

Certainly more advanced tools exist for editing photos beyond what iPhoto offers, but in terms of organising it uses the exact same methodology used by professional programs such as Lightroom and Aperture (ie put the pictures in a vault, organised by EXIF data).

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Thanks

I'm just a bit of an organisational geek and when I used a Windows laptop I had all my pictures organised in folders, by year, then event & date... but reading about what iPhoto can do got me all excited, especially the facial recognition! I just wanted to make sure that I wasn't going to take up unnecessary space by having 2 copies of every picture that I don't really need

It's hard for some people to let go of the idea that THEY need to MANUALLY manage a lot of stuff, but that's a big part of what Apple is all about ... let the COMPUTER do the work, you focus on the FUN.

If the defaults are set in iPhoto to have it keep pictures organised, you can safely delete the ones that were located elsewhere that you imported into iPhoto (there is an option to NOT let iPhoto organise/store pictures if you insist, but then you can never move them, so I don't generally recommend this).

The golden rule of iPhoto is that everything you do to pictures in iPhoto must be done *within the program.* Happily, everything you might want to do with pictures pretty much CAN be done within the program.

chas_m said:

If the defaults are set in iPhoto to have it keep pictures organised, you can safely delete the ones that were located elsewhere that you imported into iPhoto (there is an option to NOT let iPhoto organise/store pictures if you insist, but then you can never move them, so I don't generally recommend this)

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I'm not sure if I'm reading this properly and don't want to mess anything uo - so you're saying keep the setting to copy each picture, then when I copy them into iPhoto I can just delete the originals from my Pictures folder?

That is what I'm saying, yes.

Also, I should have mentioned before that in fact, iPhoto (internally) organises the photos similar to the way you described -- by chronological date and then (if needed) by event, based on the EXIF information in the photos themselves.

Yup, I believe that's right - which is why I never use iPhoto I started off using it and then discovered that it takes over completely and getting images out of iPhoto to process in something like Elements or Aperture is tedious. So I've binned iPhoto, use my own directory of images and use Elements for processing. Letting the computer do things is all very fine, but computers have a habit of failing and then where are you? I was using Bridge with Elements, but even that failed and proved difficult to repair, without reinstalling so I'm back to finding things through my own directory structure. As for face recognition - I found it to be virtually useless, since the number of false 'hits' it finds means that it is probably easier to go through your files manually. In fact, the easiest thing to do is to tag them appropriately - that'll find them more accurately and faster.

didymus said:

Yup, I believe that's right - which is why I never use iPhoto I started off using it and then discovered that it takes over completely and getting images out of iPhoto to process in something like Elements or Aperture is tedious.

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Double-clicking on them is "tedious?" You must find your Mac quite a chore!

excessinfinity said:

This is brilliant, thank you!

Also, I noticed your location is York - I'm going to uni there in October

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Enjoy! It's a great place.

I have to say iPhoto is one of the Mac's great Unique Selling Points and is a strong reason I'll stay a Mac user at home!

I have iPhoto setup to copy all the photos in to it's own Library (I have several Library's setup for different projects etc) and the way it organises all your photos is fantastic!

You can split your photos in to different events which are sorted in date order and then you can create albums using all or some of your photos from one or more events!

Faces is great - it works really well and Places is a great feature as well - if you have an iPhone or other GPS enable camera it shows you where you took the photo, if you don't have a GPS enable camera you can manually set a location using the map!

HelpdeskRules said:

I have to say iPhoto is one of the Mac's great Unique Selling Points and is a strong reason I'll stay a Mac user at home!

I have iPhoto setup to copy all the photos in to it's own Library (I have several Library's setup for different projects etc) and the way it organises all your photos is fantastic!

You can split your photos in to different events which are sorted in date order and then you can create albums using all or some of your photos from one or more events!

Faces is great - it works really well and Places is a great feature as well - if you have an iPhone or other GPS enable camera it shows you where you took the photo, if you don't have a GPS enable camera you can manually set a location using the map!

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A bit off topic, but as a (long distance) landscape photographer I'm not sure of the value of GPS enabled camera. I want to know where the scene being photographed is - not where the photographer was when the photo was taken. Maybe it's just me...

Sawday said:

A bit off topic, but as a (long distance) landscape photographer I'm not sure of the value of GPS enabled camera. I want to know where the scene being photographed is - not where the photographer was when the photo was taken. Maybe it's just me...

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Go on a long shooting trip, shoot several thousand images over a short period (say in places like the Grand Canyon, Death Valley etc) and this could be extremely useful. Should you not carry a notebook that is

Dysfunction said:

Go on a long shooting trip, shoot several thousand images over a short period (say in places like the Grand Canyon, Death Valley etc) and this could be extremely useful. Should you not carry a notebook that is

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+1
It's hard for me to think of an instance of "long distance" landscape shooting that it wouldn't be helpful to at least know what county you were in.
I guess if you only take pictures of the Moon, or famous landmarks like the Sphinx, or don't travel it may be a waste, but I try to make a point of taking an iPhone photo wherever I am so I have the coordinates for Places.

Sawday said:

A bit off topic, but as a (long distance) landscape photographer I'm not sure of the value of GPS enabled camera. I want to know where the scene being photographed is - not where the photographer was when the photo was taken. Maybe it's just me...

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You can modify the location values using a map as was said above, but it's helpful to have at least a starting point for the location.