You used the term "album" in your response, which is telling. Photos allows multiple and even overlapping albums (plural). You're looking at your images more monolithically than in logical, virtual groupings. Given what you wrote I suspect that you're using physical folders to do what grouping you do have, which is limiting.
Here is a more detailed answer to your question. By default, the Mac will select the correct gamma for your display, but here's how you can verify that it's correct.
I’m with you, I use folders of images. The top level is the year, and inside of each year, I have each photo shoot by date and location. For some years, I broke it down into months.
Unsharp Mask is in Effect > Effect > Filter, but I prefer Enhance Focus for the photo below.
You need to select File > Export. I'm not saying XnView is suitable for you, but it is the best FastStone substitute on MacOS.
Exactly how I have them organized. It’s simple, it’s clear, and it works.
I mean the Windows app that adds iPhotos as a folder. All it does is make the photos available, it does not allow any processing at all. I did not know that Microsoft Photos could access iCloud but I am going to guess that still involves dealing with Apple’s constant requests for sign in even if you are not accessing iCloud, but I don’t know.
My experience of iCloud for Windows (which accesses iCloud Photos library) is also that it is a royal pain. I was testing it partly to see if Windows-using relatives could access an Apple Photos Shared Album. They could read but not add which they should have been able to do. iCloud Drive worked reasonably well but Mail via Outlook not.
Just chiming in with my 2¢ worth.I had missed this forum, but now that I have found it, you experts may get tired of questions from a dumb really old man with only windows experience. I am a simple kind of guy, so don't care for the most elaborate stuff. I got so fed up with a 7 month old MS Surface laptop that I went out and bought a el cheapo MacBook Air M1 on a Walmart sale. Have found that I absolutely love the speed with which this thing can traverse through the internet, it just runs circles around any windows machine I ever owned. You almost never see it loading a page, they just appear instantly when asked for. So perfectly happy about that. But I cannot figure out a way to deal with my photos on it. On windows, I just make new folders for each month with sub folders for special events within that particular month and download my photos (all jpegs - no RAW) off sd cards to the appropriate folders. Then if I want to view or perform any edits to my photos mostly use FastStone which is quite simple and has plenty of flexibility to keep me happy. I also have used IrfanView, windows photos, and Nikon View NX studio.
On the Mac, I have made some folders, but not figured out how to open these photos in a program like FastStone (which I have yet to find), edit them and save back into the folders. My editing operations are very simple involving only cropping, occasionally tweaking exposure or bringing out shadow detail, sharpening for web viewing or prints and resizing as required for web sharing.
Any really simple suggestions? I'm not a fan of long drawn out technical details, so will ignore those types of suggestionsand listen carefully to basic types of assistance.
Thanks for listening and any simple helps appreciated.
Edit to add. I do still have windows 10 and 11computers and for now continue to use them for my photos, and if that seems to be the better solution for me, I will listen to that suggestion also. Just sorta wish I had a better way to integrate into the Mac.
Good post Andy. I would love to dump Lightroom (Cloudy) and only use Apple Photos, but there are two things stopping me.Just chiming in with my 2¢ worth.I had missed this forum, but now that I have found it, you experts may get tired of questions from a dumb really old man with only windows experience. I am a simple kind of guy, so don't care for the most elaborate stuff. I got so fed up with a 7 month old MS Surface laptop that I went out and bought a el cheapo MacBook Air M1 on a Walmart sale. Have found that I absolutely love the speed with which this thing can traverse through the internet, it just runs circles around any windows machine I ever owned. You almost never see it loading a page, they just appear instantly when asked for. So perfectly happy about that. But I cannot figure out a way to deal with my photos on it. On windows, I just make new folders for each month with sub folders for special events within that particular month and download my photos (all jpegs - no RAW) off sd cards to the appropriate folders. Then if I want to view or perform any edits to my photos mostly use FastStone which is quite simple and has plenty of flexibility to keep me happy. I also have used IrfanView, windows photos, and Nikon View NX studio.
On the Mac, I have made some folders, but not figured out how to open these photos in a program like FastStone (which I have yet to find), edit them and save back into the folders. My editing operations are very simple involving only cropping, occasionally tweaking exposure or bringing out shadow detail, sharpening for web viewing or prints and resizing as required for web sharing.
Any really simple suggestions? I'm not a fan of long drawn out technical details, so will ignore those types of suggestions
Thanks for listening and any simple helps appreciated.
Edit to add. I do still have windows 10 and 11computers and for now continue to use them for my photos, and if that seems to be the better solution for me, I will listen to that suggestion also. Just sorta wish I had a better way to integrate into the Mac.
I've never been a Windows user, but have used most of the option available on the Mac over the last 24 years of using digital photos.
I found that in the modern era, trying to use a traditional folder setup, and saving copies to JPG was just too messy and complicated, and all too often open to user errors.
Then long came the non-destructive workflow system (often called DAMs - Digital Asset Managers) - initially this was Apple Aperture, and Adobe Lightroom. Others soon followed.
However, for the basic user, on a Mac, Apple Photos is a great start. It's far more capable than first realised. It's fully non-destructive (so the original files are never edited, it always works on a copy internally, so you can always revert back to the original). The editing tools are quite good too for a start. It's also already installed, integrates fully with the Apple ecosystem, and has no extra costs involved (other than iCloud storage if needed).
It's also quite expendable too, many higher level apps offer the ability to add extensions to Photos, so you can use Photos to manage the library, and the external apps to edit them. However, I'd start off just seeing what Photos can do first, you may be surprised.
Others have mentioned that it syncs across iCloud, but you don't have to use it that way. You can turn off iCloud, and just store everything locally. You can also choose to not store the images in the Photos library, but keep them in an external folder system if you wish (called Referenced mode). However, it's not recommended, as it's not known for being all that reliable, and doesn't offer a reversible option once you import into the Library for the 'managed' option.
You mention needing to keep photos separate. That's also possible. Photos can work with multiple Libraries, you can either hold 'Option/Alt' at launch, and choose a library, or double click a library. there's also a good app by Fat Cat software that offers more advanced library management. Be aware that one one library can be used to sync across iCloud though (if you need that.
All said, you can also easily filter images in your library, should you find it's better to put them all into one. There are smart albums, and keywords, which can make it possible to separate out collection of images.
I personally keep the whole lot in one library, and have a 2TB iCloud account (60,000 images is using 1TB at the moment, and it took that 24 years to fill).
I found it so much more convenient to bung the lot into a full iCloud library. I don't have to go hunting down images in different locations, and they're all available on all devices. that's hand for me, as I use an old MacBook Pro to import and manage the library, but I use an iPad Pro for editing.
I also use Nitro (and previously Raw Power) for most of my Raw photo editing. It's produced by Gentlemen Coders (Nik Batt who was a top developer for Apple's Aperture and imaging division). It works seamlessly with the Photos library, and offers much more in terms of editing and management capability.
Others have mentioned the Take Control books, and I'd certainly recommend getting some of those if you're new to Macs. Even an experienced user finds those useful ;-). they often have sales on, and there is a discount for multi-buy (Its worth taking advantage of that).
Good luck, and all the best.
That's understandable, and I agree, that was a bit of a big miss for them. However, I can also see how it might be tricky to implement too, with it being possible to have mixed shared and private images in one album.
.Indeed so, although to be honest, these days, we don't use that feature much at all. Any photos we want to share, outside of just us two, are mostly done through WhatsApp. In any case, the reduced resolution was never a concern, most shared images were just for family viewing, so were always sufficient, and that's a similar issue with WhatsApp too.
Fair enough. Although I don't think, personally, there's much between them (when comparing the cloud version of Lightroom) in appearance (I use my devices in Dark Mode). Indeed, the organising system is very similar indeed, and they're not miles apart with editing tools. Photos also has a far better extensions system for other apps to add functionaility. From what I remember of it, Lightroom has much more in the way of fluff and gimmicks (IMHO).
Yeah, similarly here. Or indeed, for a tech savvy person that needs to have a fully integrated sharing system between multiple devices and users
.It depends on what you do with them. Even if you never shoot Raw images, you still need to consider edited copies if you do any editing.
All good, sensible advice for the OP.Some suggestions:I had missed this forum, but now that I have found it, you experts may get tired of questions from a dumb really old man with only windows experience. I am a simple kind of guy, so don't care for the most elaborate stuff. I got so fed up with a 7 month old MS Surface laptop that I went out and bought a el cheapo MacBook Air M1 on a Walmart sale. Have found that I absolutely love the speed with which this thing can traverse through the internet, it just runs circles around any windows machine I ever owned. You almost never see it loading a page, they just appear instantly when asked for. So perfectly happy about that. But I cannot figure out a way to deal with my photos on it. On windows, I just make new folders for each month with sub folders for special events within that particular month and download my photos (all jpegs - no RAW) off sd cards to the appropriate folders. Then if I want to view or perform any edits to my photos mostly use FastStone which is quite simple and has plenty of flexibility to keep me happy. I also have used IrfanView, windows photos, and Nikon View NX studio.
On the Mac, I have made some folders, but not figured out how to open these photos in a program like FastStone (which I have yet to find), edit them and save back into the folders. My editing operations are very simple involving only cropping, occasionally tweaking exposure or bringing out shadow detail, sharpening for web viewing or prints and resizing as required for web sharing.
Any really simple suggestions? I'm not a fan of long drawn out technical details, so will ignore those types of suggestions
Thanks for listening and any simple helps appreciated.
Edit to add. I do still have windows 10 and 11computers and for now continue to use them for my photos, and if that seems to be the better solution for me, I will listen to that suggestion also. Just sorta wish I had a better way to integrate into the Mac.
- get a 1TB external SSD (like a Samsung T7) and use it for storing your photos organized your own way. Use Disk Utility to format it for ExFat if you want to use the disk interchangeably with a Windows pc. Use Finder to create your own folders on it , then when you have images to import just drag and drop the image files into the folders.
- PhotoscapeX free version in the App Store is a good basic viewer and editor; Lyn is good cheap viewer editor; DXO FIlmpack 7 is a good basic viewer and editor if you like the look of films, but is more expensive.
- Airdrop is your new best friend for getting photos from your phone into your Mac, and vice-versa for getting images from your Mac into your phone. For transferring images in your Mac to your phone, simply open the desired folder Using Finder, select an image file, then right-click on the file name, select "share", then use Airdrop to send it to your phone/iPad.
Hope that helps
Don't really understand the reason for the Airdrop. Getting images from our phones to our Mac is handled seamlessly by the iCloud, and getting photos to the phones is just as simple as dropping them in photos.All good, sensible advice for the OP.- Airdrop is your new best friend for getting photos from your phone into your Mac, and vice-versa for getting images from your Mac into your phone. For transferring images in your Mac to your phone, simply open the desired folder Using Finder, select an image file, then right-click on the file name, select "share", then use Airdrop to send it to your phone/iPad.
Hope that helps
