I've now (somewhat) successfully imported my OLD Aperture library into a NEW Aperture library on my 240 GB SSD on my laptop. (Joseph's magic trick.)
My referenced iPhoto library exists on an internal 2nd hard drive.
Finder says iPhoto Library is 141 GB on disk. I only have 92 GB free on my SSD. Masters folder inside iPhoto package is 96 GB on disk.
Is there a way for me to use Consolidate Masters, or something like that, to effectively recapture the 49 GB of bloat in the iPhoto library package, and keep the 92 GB of iPhoto master images on that same drive and referenced in new Aperture library?
Or do I need to move Aperture library to internal 2nd hard drive and use Consolidate Masters?
Ultimate goal is to have Aperture library file on SSD for speed, and I suppose just reference images off of 2nd internal HD. I don't see a need to maintain a separate iPhoto library any longer. Any reason to keep it?
Make sense? What would you do if you were me? How would you do it? Thanks for the help!
John,
Glad to see the move finally worked.
If I’m understanding correctly, you want a single Library on your SSD with all photos, referencing originals (masters) kept on the second HD, correct?
You may need to move things to a drive with some more free space to do this, but basically you have two steps.
1) Consolidate Originals (from the iPhoto library) into your main Library. Remove the old iPhoto library for safekeeping and ensure that everything consolidated properly and everything is connected. Don’t delete that old iPhoto library until you are 100% sure.
2) Relocate Originals from the managed Library to the second drive.
make sense?
-Joseph
@PhotoJoseph
— Have you signed up for the mailing list?
OK Joseph, part of the way there!.
Put new Aperture library back on internal 1TB hard drive (along side referenced iPhoto library). Selected all photos and choose Consolidate Originals.
Aperture warned me it could only consolidate originals there were found.
Now, in Aperture, I have two smart albums to cross check:
1. Managed Images = 20,990 images
2. Referenced Images = 1,984 images
What gives with those? How do I round them up and get them in to the Aperture managed library so I can move on to step #2 Relocated Originals?
Thanks!
John,
I’m assuming that just selecting those 1,984 images and choosing consolidate doesn’t work.
Are they offline (red slash through the curved arrow)? Missing (yellow warning triangle)? You need to sleuth these out, find out where the masters are, and connect them to proceed.
-Joseph
@PhotoJoseph
— Have you signed up for the mailing list?
I just tried what you suggested. Selected and Consolidate Original. Now down to 625!
None of those appear to have any badges indicating offline or missing.
I created SMART albums for Missing and Offline.
My counts now:
Missing = 0
Offline = 20
Now what!? Try it again?! Man, Aperture is weird sometimes!
Thanks again for all the help!
Down to 368 in referenced.
Taking a guess it might have to do with Stacks being closed?
Will try one more time with all Stacks open?
Opening Stacks gets me to 1,051 referenced images. Will see what happens this time with Consolidate Originals! ;-)
LOL thanks for the play-by-play ;-)
Don’t forget if image counts are mysterious, try a library repair or rebuild along the way.
Sounds like you’re getting close.
-Joseph
@PhotoJoseph
— Have you signed up for the mailing list?
OK. Feeling OK about where I am now.
On my 1TB secondary internal drive, I now have a fully managed Aperture library weighing in at 139 GB on disk. (As well as a leftover shell of iPhoto library measuring 43 GB on disk; any reason to keep this?)
So now for step #2!
How do I effectively get my Aperture library back over to my SSD for speed, but leave the images referenced on the 1TB drive?
Is this even worth it for speed? Seems like it would be?
p.s. I did the repair and rebuild just to be safe, and all seems good with consolidated, managed Aperture library. Only 20 “missing” “referenced” images, and all are 2 stars or below…so I’m ignoring.
John,
Glad it’s all coming together.
For the 20 missing files, delete those if you don’t care about them. Don’t leave those “hanging chads” in there, or it’ll just confuse you later. Make your Library 100% clean.
I do believe you’ll see a speed benefit to moving the Library to the SSD drive. Since your LIbrary currently is on the same HD where you want the Originals to live, all you need to do is Relocate Originals to a folder on the same drive (and choose your folder structure carefully; my preference as you probably know is the yyyy / mm / dd structure). That will go quickly since it’s just moving files on the same drive, and not copying them. Then move the now-referenced Library to the SSD. You may have to reconnect the Originals on first launch, but probably not. Once you’ve confirmed that it made the move cleanly, you’re free to delete the one on the HD.
I’d move the old iPhoto library to another HD for now, and label it appropriately (“migrated to aperture, holding as backup, trash after xx date”) just to be sure everything made a clean transition. Moving it off the internal HD though is important, as that’ll ensure there are no links to it you weren’t aware of.
-Joseph
@PhotoJoseph
— Have you signed up for the mailing list?
Thanks for all of your help Joseph!
In process. Relocate Originals complete, and folder directory in Finder looks nice with your recommendation of yyyy / mm / dd format.
Don’t quite understand why, but Aperture is now regenerating thumbnails for all 20k+ images. Guess I’ll just let it do it’s thing, then quit, and move Aperture library over to SSD and reconnect.