Master the Great Apple Photos Bake Off

At some point during my summers home from college I discovered Graham Kerr, The Galloping Gourmet. He made cooking look accessible and entertaining in a way that no other cooking show ever did. It was kind of a Julia Child meets The Great British Bake Off thing. Long on personality. Full of energy. An enthusiastic celebration of the culinary arts with a down-under raffish charm.

Like all cooking shows, the dishes Kerr made often required more time than the 20 odd minutes he had to fill. Either food prep happened in advance or he employed the standard cooking show slight-of-hand to squeeze a long process into just minutes. The prepped dish goes in the top oven and is removed from the bottom oven all done. Like magic.

Apple Photos does that too by processing photos behind the scenes for a variety of tasks. The long, tedious stuff goes on “off camera” and it can sometimes take an extraordinary amount of time to complete. It’s not uncommon to see some task stalled for days. Weeks, even. It’s the digital equivalent of “a watched pot never boils.”

Seriously.

But knowing how the process works will help you cut to the chase and create a complete, rich photo library in less time with more delight. A few simple steps and a little patience can make all the difference. Your people will be identified, Memories will be created, and you’ll have the same pictures on all your devices.

If you’ve ever been frustrated because tasks didn’t happen fast enough, this post is for you.

Here’s how it works.

CONNECTIONS

Because Apple Photos is a system - all your Apple devices connected by iCloud - you have the benefit of doing a task once for all devices. Deleting a photo on your iPhone deletes that photo everywhere, for instance. You don’t have to find and delete that same photo in three (iPhone, iCloud, Mac) or more places like we had to before Apple Photos.

But that assumes that every device is properly connected to iCloud so that the sync happens in a timely way. Your Mac and iPhone/iPad need to have iCloud Photo Library enabled in their Photos settings and they need a good internet connection. That’s generally not a problem with your Mac, but iPhones spend much of the time on cellular, which is fine for most tasks, but may not be fast enough to sync a couple dozen photos you just took at your child’s birthday party. This is one reason that Apple encourages you to put your iPhone on a charger overnight, with the screen locked and connected to Wi-Fi. Then, if your iPhone didn’t get a chance to properly sync during the day, it will do so overnight.

Back to your Mac, it’s a good idea to leave it on overnight as well. Even in sleep mode, those background tasks are happening in addition to syncing with iCloud and your other online devices. One process in particular - photo analysis - is designed to take a break when other apps and activity are going on. It needs some quiet time when other processes aren’t engaged to do its stuff. The Photos app doesn't have to be open, either. And if you’re concerned about the power usage, don’t. The newer Macs are incredibly energy efficient in sleep mode and do maintenance tasks at night. I rarely shut down my Macs anymore, I just restart them once a week to clear out system clutter.

PEOPLE

One of the best things you can do to improve your Library is assign people ID’s. When you first set up a new Mac or iPhone, or upgrade the operating system, the device will review all the faces. This may take some time. But once it’s done, reviewing and adding ID’s to new photos and videos (yes, Apple Photos can find faces in videos) keeps the photo analysis going. It’s also a fun process. Check in with People ID’s every 3-4 weeks to keep the system active. It won’t find all the photo ID’s on the first pass.

This is also your chance to remove people you don’t want to track or just plain strangers in the background.

DUPLICATES

A recent feature in Apple Photos is Duplicate Detection and it works really well. But like the People tab it works best in batches. Once you’ve merged a group of duplicates, check back in a week and you’ll likely find more of them. Or sequences of similar photos that need your guidance as to which to keep.

MEMORIES

One of the fun features of Apple Photos is the Memories video. Part of the photo analysis task is to identify relationships, popular themes, and curate moments in your library. When these are offered up, you can delete, favorite, or edit them. That helps Photos understand the Memories you most enjoy.

SHARED WITH YOU

Messages attachments now show up in a Shared With You album and you can choose to save them to your Photos Library. Photos can see which ones you choose to keep and who sent them. Just another way that the app learns how to customize your Photos experience.

SOFTWARE UPDATES/UPGRADES

It goes without saying that macOS and iOS updates and upgrades are an important part of the process. You don’t have to apply an update the second it’s released, but within 2-3 weeks is a pretty good target for the Mac and 1-2 weeks for mobile. Occasionally that will reboot the photo analysis tasks, but that’s because it’s likely been improved in some way.

All of which is to say that being active in Photos Library not only helps you learn your way around and enjoy your photos and videos, but it makes the Apple Photos ecosystem just work better.

So you can have your Apple tart and eat it too.

See you next time!

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