1. Mac Photos How To Open Two Libraries Simultaneously Free
2. Mac Photos How To Open Two Libraries Simultaneously Using
3. Mac Photos How To Open Two Libraries Simultaneously Online
4. Mac Photos How To Open Two Libraries Simultaneously Without

Steve Thomas is trying to clean things up across two Macs:

For information about considerations to keep in mind when choosing the System Photo Library, see System Photo Library overview. In the Photos app on your Mac, choose Photos Preferences, then click General. To make the current library the System Photo Library, click Use as System Photo Library. Screenshot: Rob LeFebvre/Cult of Mac. To create a new photo library, click on the Create New. Button, and then name your new library something useful to help you remember. The default is Photos. Therefore, if you would like to open a second or third instance of a specific program, you'll need to do so via the Terminal command line using the following: open -n -a 'APPLICATION NAME' This.

I’m finding that there are photos EVERYWHERE on these two machines—Photos library, iPhoto library, Photo Booth library, multiple file folders on dozens of different levels and in countless locations.

He already owns PhotoSweeper, an app that handles de-duplication, but he’s frustrated at having to select all the folders that contain photos in order to perform a scan and then sort through the results.

1. Switch between photo libraries. If the Photos app on your Mac is open, choose Photos Quit Photos. Hold down the Option key and double-click the Photos icon in the Applications folder (or click the Photos icon in the Dock) to open Photos.
2. Here is a guide on how to use multiple libraries within Photos on your Mac.

How can I possibly find ALL the photos I have regardless of where they’re stored, then move or copy them into one central location for editing, storage, and backup?

It’s certainly two different questions and tasks: finding and consolidating photos, and then making sure you don’t have multiple copies of the same images. You might think you just want to do the former, but it’s very likely you’ll have two or more copies of many images if your images are scattered about drives and multiple computers.

You can use either macOS Spotlight or a third-party tool to find all images by file type and then copy them. I can’t figure out a good way to consolidate access to all images without copying them into a single location. This leaves the originals in their spread-out locations, but that may be simpler to clear out once you know you have them all captured.

The simplest way to do this with Spotlight is via a Finder-based search, for which you can create a Smart Folder to repeat it later without losing the window settings. You have to go through a little rigamarole to get the fields you need:

1. Press Command-Option-spacebar to create a Finder Spotlight search window.
2. In the upper-right corner, click the plus (+) button.
3. Now hold down the Option key, and the plus button in the upper right next to the entry that was created (which starts “Name” and “matches”) changes to an ellipsis (…). Click that.
4. The ellipsis button creates an Any of the Following Are True entry, which is what you need to have multiple criteria for images in a single search. Any is the right selection, so you can leave that alone.
5. Under Any, change the pop-up buttons to Kind, Image, and JPEG.
6. Click the + at the end of that line, and create a field with Kind, Image, and TIFF.
7. Repeat step 6 for GIF and PNG (and BMP, if you think you have any of that format, primarily used in Windows).
8. Click the Save button in the upper right so you can recall these criteria if something goes wrong. Name it something like “Find all images by type”. (When you click Save after naming, the criteria disappear and the Smart Folder icon and name appear the top of the window. You can click the Action (gear) menu and choose Show Search Criteria to display them.)
9. Set up the destination to which you want to copy all images, like a folder or hard drive.
10. In the results window, click and then press Command-A or choose File > Select All.
11. Drag the selection to the new destination.

Step 11 can be problematic. On my Mac, this search produces 171,499 images, and dragging and dropping that many images can cause the system to rainbow-spin for a long time or even lock up.

You can probably shave down which images you want by excluding very small ones. I’ve found that a lot of apps embed or download HTML-based help files, so many tiny images can be associated with them.

I had you leave the Name field in place earlier above where you set up the Any criteria. Go back to the field (see Step 8 to show criteria), and then change Name to File Size, Is Greater Than, and enter a small number, like 3 next to the KB popup. You might even go to 30K or 100K—it’s unlikely, though not impossible, that images that small will be photos you’re looking for, as opposed to graphics associated with documents or help files.

There’s one problem with the above method: it includes all images nested in your Photos, iPhoto, and other libraries. If you’ve already synced or copied those, you can exclude those libraries temporarily while you perform your search:

1. Open the Spotlight system preference pane.
2. Click the Privacy tab.
3. Drag each library in that you want to exclude.
4. Perform the search and copy above.
5. Return to the Privacy tab and delete the libraries from the list.

An alternative to the Finder is third-party disk-searching software. I tested out HoudahSpot, which relies on Spotlight and lets you define and save criteria in a similar way. But it’s easier to set up and edit more complicated searches, and while you can drag and drop results, you can also use a Copy menu item, which avoids the rainbow spinner and Finder lockup. You can also exclude locations from results, which gives it a leg up in avoiding extra or unwanted copies from photo-app libraries.

As far as de-duplication, PhotoSweeper ($10) seems a reasonable choice. The current version works with Photos, Aperture, iPhoto, and Lightroom, as well as any folder it’s pointed at. (We haven’t reviewed a version since 2012 (version 1.7); we’ll review a new version in the near future.)

I’ve also recommended PowerPhotos ($30) if you’re just trying to find and clean out duplicates within Photos or iPhoto, as it comes with a number of other powerful missing features for album and library management. (PowerPhotos works with Photos, but the price includes a license for iPhoto Library Manager to work with the that older Apple app.)

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Whether you’ve just taken a weekend trip up North or the European vacation of your dreams, you’re guaranteed to return home with a massive amount of photos, probably a handful of videos, and, if you were feeling particularly artsy, half a dozen time-lapses.

But now that you’re home, what are you going to do with all those pictures? Where are you going to keep them? How are you going to share them?

Enter the Photos app for Mac.

What is Photos on Mac?

The Photos app is a convenient home for all of your pictures and videos. Anything you shoot, Photos will store it and — better yet — organize it, so you can actually find said pictures when you feel like reliving the memories.

In this post, we’ll go over the basics of using Apple’s Photos app. We’ll talk about where to find photos on your Mac and how you can manage your ever-growing photo library. And of course, we’ll cover all the features Apple has built into this underrated app.

iPhoto vs Photos: What’s the difference?

Those of you familiar with iPhoto for Mac are probably wondering what makes its successor so special. And to oversimplify it, Photos is the next step in photo management — and a giant step at that.

Mac Photos How To Open Two Libraries Simultaneously Free

Prior to Photos, Apple made two apps for managing pictures and videos. iPhoto, for those of us less experienced in photography, and Aperture, for the ones looking to do some heavier editing. Photos perfectly blurs the line between those two apps, combining the best of both while adding new features like iCloud Photo Library and iCloud Photo Sharing.

If you used iPhoto before, Photos will feel instantly recognizable. You’ll have your pictures, albums, and collections in the main window, a navigation sidebar to the left, and different viewing options at the top. However, a significant point of difference between iPhoto and Photos is the app’s performance. When working with larger libraries, iPhoto had the tendency to lag or choke up and had arbitrary limits that would restrict album and collection sizes. Photos gets rid of those limitations entirely and is able to handle much larger libraries than its predecessor. While the look of Photos may be the same, it feels like a faster and more powerful app.

Where are the photos stored on Mac?

The Photos app maintains pictures and videos in its own library, making it easy to view the content, but confusing to access the actual files. To find the photos on your Mac, you’ll need to find that Photos Library first:

1. With the Photos app open, click on Photos in the menu bar
2. Then go to Preferences > General
3. At the top of the window, you’ll see Library Location. Click the Show in Finder button.

The first thing you’ll notice after you find the Photos Library file is you can’t do much with it. You can double-click it, but that opens Photos again. If you want to find the original files of your pictures and videos, you’ll need to:

1. Right-click on Photos Library to open the alternate menu
2. Select Show Package Contents from that menu
3. Open the Masters folder
4. All of your pictures and videos live in this folder, organized by year, month, and date

How to use Apple’s Photos app

Mac Photos How To Open Two Libraries Simultaneously Using

When you open Photos for the first time, the app offers you a glimpse of what your library will look like with all your pictures and videos imported. You get a quick intro to some of the features and tools, and learn how you can make these memories tangible through printed objects like calendars, photo books, and more.

Once you’ve finished the tour of the app and gone through the initial setup, you’re all set to start importing your pictures and videos!

How to import photos to Mac

There are several ways you can import your media content to Photos, depending on where you’ve been storing it.

From your iPhone or a digital camera

1. Connect your iPhone or camera to your Mac with a USB cable. You might need to unlock your iPhone with your passcode, and then tap Trust when prompted to Trust This Computer.
2. On your Mac, if the Photos app doesn’t open automatically, go ahead and open it.
3. The Photos app will show you an Import screen that has all the photos and videos on your iPhone or camera. If you don’t see the Import screen, click on your iPhone or camera in the Photos sidebar under Devices.
4. From here you can either choose to Import All New Items or select a batch and click Import Selected.

From a folder or an external hard drive in Finder

You have a couple of options here. If your pictures and videos live on an external hard drive, you’ll want to make sure it’s connected first. Then, you’ll want to do one of the following:

• Drag the files from your drive into the Photos window
• Drag the files from your drive onto the Photos icon in the Dock
• In Photos, go to File > Import from the menu bar. Choose the photos or videos you want to import and click Review for Import.

An important thing to know about Photos is that the app copies the pictures and videos into the Photos Library we talked about earlier, leaving the original file either on your device or in its folder.

Tabs in Photos: Library, Albums, Projects

Have you ever been unable to find a specific picture because you couldn’t remember when you took it? You can remember everything else about the photo, things like where it was taken and who was in it, but not the one thing you need to navigate your files.

The Photos app helps you with this predicament by organizing your pictures not only by date, but also by event, location, and even by people’s faces. In the sidebar, you’ll find a number of tabs designed to make sorting through your pictures easier.

Memories. Photos creates “memories” based on who is in a series of images as well as when and where those pictures were taken.

Favorites. These are the pictures you’ve gone through and clicked the heart icon on, marking them as your favorites.

People. This is where you’ll be able to see all the pictures of you have of specific people.

Places. This is where you can see all the pictures you’ve taken in specific locations.

Shared. This section is where you’ll find all the albums you’ve shared with other people and the albums that have been shared with you. (Check out our guide to iCloud Photo Sharing for more info on Shared Albums.)

Albums. If you want to group certain pictures for easy navigation, you’ll want to create a new album. This section is where you can access those albums.

How to tag people in photos

If you want to tag someone in a specific picture:

1. Open the photo in the Photos app
2. Click the info button in the top right corner.
3. At the bottom of the info window, you’ll see circles with faces at the bottom. Tap on one of those.
4. The face will now be circled on the photo. Underneath the circle will be a text box labeled “unnamed.” Click on the text box and type the person’s name.

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If the person you’re tagging has already been tagged in your Library, their name should appear under the circle on the photo.

How to share pictures from the Photos app

The Photos app on Mac has made it easier than before to share your pictures. Just select the photos you want to share and click on the Share button in the top right-hand corner. You’ll see a list of options:

• Shared Albums
• AirDrop
• Messages
• Notes
• and more, depending on what apps and accounts you set up on your Mac

Tap on your preferred option and proceed to send the pic or create a Shared Album.

Mac Photos How To Open Two Libraries Simultaneously Without

Now that you’ve gotten a feel for how to use Photos on Mac, it’s time to give it a spin. Once you’ve got your library set up and organized, you’ll see how easy it is to relive and share your memories with Photos.

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