Hello and thanks in advance for any help.
I am faced with two different situations where I wish to upgrade/migrate an existing iPhoto library to Photos.app, and I'd like some advice on best practices before I proceed.
SCENARIO ONE
This one is the more straightforward of the two.
On the first computer, there is already a pre-existing Photos.app library, that contains just one photo (plus that photo's editing history). Meanwhile, iPhoto is what I've been using as my main photo management app for years, and so the iPhoto library has hundreds of photos and albums, and I want to migrate them all over to Photos.app. Yes I should have done this ages ago, but here we are.
SCENARIO TWO
Similar to the above situation, but a bit more complicated.
On the second computer (belonging to my wife), I actually converted/imported the iPhoto library to Photos.app a few years back. Unfortunately though, I did so without tidying up or deleting the original iPhoto library afterwards, or uninstalling iPhoto. Or informing her of what I had done. Oops, my bad. So for a while after that, she continued to import/add photos to the original iPhoto library, as she was used to doing. And then later still, she discovered Photos.app and began to add new photos to the Photos.app library instead of iPhoto.
So on this computer we've got two "forked" libraries, with some photos in common, and some variations. The first few hundred photos are the same in both libraries, then a bunch that are unique to iPhoto, and then a bunch that are unique to Photos.app, up until the present day.
I am faced with two different situations where I wish to upgrade/migrate an existing iPhoto library to Photos.app, and I'd like some advice on best practices before I proceed.
SCENARIO ONE
This one is the more straightforward of the two.
On the first computer, there is already a pre-existing Photos.app library, that contains just one photo (plus that photo's editing history). Meanwhile, iPhoto is what I've been using as my main photo management app for years, and so the iPhoto library has hundreds of photos and albums, and I want to migrate them all over to Photos.app. Yes I should have done this ages ago, but here we are.
- I understand that if there is no existing Photos.app library file, when I launch Photos.app, it will prompt me to migrate the existing iPhoto library. Is that right?
- So can I:
- move or rename or zip the existing Photos.app library file (which contains just one photo),
- then launch Photos.app, and click the option to import/convert the existing iPhoto library,
- and then later somehow merge that other Photos.app library file (with the one lonely photo) into my brand new, main Photos.app library? And while preserving the editing history of that solitary photo?
- Will the editing histories of each photo in the old iPhoto library be preserved in Photos.app? Both apps have this feature, and it is very useful. Ideally I would like the original, untouched or uncropped versions of each edited photo from iPhoto to still be accessible, and I'd retain the ability to roll back edits.
- Will the albums I have carefully curated and named in iPhoto be preserved when I bring everything over to Photos.app? I seem to recall that iPhoto albums get changed into something else in Photos.app.
- Will photo titles and descriptions from iPhoto be preserved? Also, the flags, and other metadata such as dates, location, and Faces?
SCENARIO TWO
Similar to the above situation, but a bit more complicated.
On the second computer (belonging to my wife), I actually converted/imported the iPhoto library to Photos.app a few years back. Unfortunately though, I did so without tidying up or deleting the original iPhoto library afterwards, or uninstalling iPhoto. Or informing her of what I had done. Oops, my bad. So for a while after that, she continued to import/add photos to the original iPhoto library, as she was used to doing. And then later still, she discovered Photos.app and began to add new photos to the Photos.app library instead of iPhoto.
So on this computer we've got two "forked" libraries, with some photos in common, and some variations. The first few hundred photos are the same in both libraries, then a bunch that are unique to iPhoto, and then a bunch that are unique to Photos.app, up until the present day.
- My strategy in this case is to have both apps open side-by-side, compare the libraries from oldest to newest, and drag over any photos that are unique to iPhoto so that they are also in Photos.app. And do this until the Photos.app library contains everything. At which point, after I double check everything, I can ditch the iPhoto app and delete its library file. Is this a good way to go?
- If it matters, this computer is still running High Sierra, and the startup drive is formatted with HFS+. I mention this because I know that with HFS+, the iPhoto and Photos.app libraries can use the HFS+ hard links feature to save hard drive space, when they have photos in common. If, at the end of the process described above, when I delete the iPhoto library file, is there any risk of causing issues or damage to the Photos.app library?
- As in the above scenario, I am also wondering what, if anything, might get lost in translation from iPhoto in this case, such as edit history or metadata.
