Is this possible? I don’t want to migrate my whole Aperture Library at once as it’s over 100,000 images and I’m working on cleaning it up before moving it, but I’d like to move the Projects that are ready to go. I can’t see a way to do this though and am hoping I’m missing something. I asked this question in the comments of a new Photos post by Joseph, then decided it was best to ask here in the forum instead. Sorry for the repeat post. TIA!
I think you can only do it by export/import…which can only be done either for the originals or the edited version. I can’t see a way to convert just a project such that the original+edits are moved from Aperture to Photos.
Aperture allows a project to exported as a new Library, but Photos doesn’t (AFAIK) allow such an Aperture lib to be imported, or merged into an existing Photos lib.
I have a very large referenced Aperture lib covering years 2000-2014 and would like to do what you are asking. My Aperture lib is on the internal drive and the referenced photos are on an external. One idea I am considering, which at least avoids uploading the whole lot to iCloud in one go, is to start by converting the whole Aperture Lib to a referenced Photos Lib, and make it the system iCloud Photo Library.
Initially no photos will be uploaded because referenced photos are not uploaded to iCloud. My plan then is to consolidate photos/projects/albums selectively and progressively so that they do get uploaded to iCloud, hence become available on all devices.
I don’t want all 600Gb of my referenced photos to be consolidated and uploaded partly because I don’t want to pay for the 1Tb storage option, partly because I don’t need them all to be available on all devices. The third factor is that I don’t have space for 600Gb of photos on the internal of my rMBP.
The space issue could be addressed by using the “Optimise for Mac” setting so that the full size originals were in the iCPL (hence ££) but not on the internal of rMBP. (I would keep backups of the full size on an external of course).
Hi Mike!
Thanks for your reply. I followed it for the most part. :) I actually have a managed library, not referenced. What I’m doing right now is exporting my 2015 monthly projects as a new Aperture Library so that I can then Import it into Photos. Once it’s imported I’ll delete the new Aperture Library, create a new one for 2014 and see if I can then import that into the Photos Library. I want just one Photos Library so hopefully it won’t make me create a new Photos Library for the 2014 import. I guess I won’t know if this will work unless I try.
~Debbie
Debbie, as I said I am pretty sure you can’t import one Photos library into another, or merge Photos libraries, or import Aperture libraries into an existing Photos libraries. yet.
I found an app called PowerPhotos (which is a successor to the respected iPhoto Library Manager) which, when it was announced in April said it would merge Photos Libraries. But now it has been released it admits it can’t:
http://www.fatcatsoftware.com/comments/merging_photos_libraries
The link in my last post, and this link:
http://tidbits.com/article/15584
both talk about merging Photos Libraries in iCloud.
I haven’t got my head round this but it might offer some possibilities.
Joseph described a way to merge libraries a while ago using icloud photos.
I think you open the 2nd library and then promote it to system library. This will merge 2nd library with the existing icloud library.
Did not test it myself.
Thank you Mike and Peter! I did realize shortly after my above reply that my plan wouldn’t work. Why does it have to be so complicated?? I may have to bite the bullet and just export my whole library. I’ve been using Photos for awhile now syncing between my iMac and rMBP, though I stopped syncing with my iDevices when I saw how much space was disappearing on them. I was just hoping to trim down my Aperture Library a little at a time before exporting, but I really want access to all of my photos on my MBP (currently Aperture is only on my iMac). I can’t imagine how long it’ll take over 100,000 images to export to a new Photos Library, and then sync in the cloud with my first Photos Library. Ugh! No fun. ;)
~Debbie
Debbie, on the iDevices you need to have “Optimise iPhone storage” or “Optimise iPad Storage” checked or Photos will indeed devour space. I don’t believe there is any reason not to have this checked.
Checking it after already uploading the full size files to your device can take a very long time to adjust but I think it gets there in the end. It is much better to check it in advance.
My Photos library is 32 Gb on my Mac (full size originals), 7.0 Gb on my iPhone 6+(128Gb model) and only 1.1 Gb on my iPad Mini (16Gb model). The photos look fine on the iPad.
Hi Mike!
I did have Optimize checked on all devices, but I suddenly found the storage on all of them had dropped from about 25 GBs available to 7, and that’s with just 5000 or less images in Photos on my Mac. So, I got nervous and turned off all but my iPad Air 2. I have 64 GBs on each device, but I didn’t want it all going to photos and I wasn’t sure if it would adjust or not. I’ll keep an eye on what happens on the iPad Air. Thanks!
~Debbie
I think the algorithm used by Photos to manage the space is quite clever, so it will use the space it wants provided it is available, and reduce the number of full size photos as the space available changes. It is not just pro rata i.e. 5000 images uses 7 Gb so 10000 uses 14Gb. On my 16Gb iPad mini my 3500 photos are using 1.1Gb and the same photos are using 7Gb on my 128Gb iPhone 6+.
Very interesting, Mike! Thanks for the explanation. I’m hoping I’ll be happy with how it works on my iPad Air. If so, I’ll enable iCloud again on my mini iPad and iPhone.
~Debbie
Debbie: might want to use this link to view Derrick Story’s treatment of this issue. Everything all at once or not? http://files2.lynda.com/secure/courses/184578/iphone_MP4/184578_01_03_XR…
Let me try to paste the link again. http://files2.lynda.com/secure/courses/184578/iphone_MP4/184578_00_03_XR… This should work with copy paste.
Sorry again: try this:
http://thedigitalstory.com/2015/05/converting-an-aperture-or-iphoto-libr…
Thanks Vidpixarts. I don’t see an answer to my original question in this video, so I’m still in the situation of not being able to add to Photos from Aperture a little at a time. Or at the very least the ability to merge two Photos libraries without having to change the System Library from one to the other, which I don’t want to do.
What I hate about having more than one Photos Library is the Keyword Manager doesn’t sync between libraries. I have keywords all set up the way I want them in my System Library, but when I created a second Photos Library the keywords are a huge mess. Back to square one. Frustrating.
~Debbie
Keyword sync issue is a significant pain.