Location, location, location.
DO YOUR PHOTOS HAVE A PLACE TO GO WITH THAT DATE?
I used to recall my trips, vacations and visits by date. The once-in-a-lifetime reunion with all my cousins and extended family at the old beach cabin. A sailing regatta on Block Island. That epic gala party at the Guggenheim Museum. Road trips. A detour to see an old college friend. Showing the sites to my Mom. Great memories all.
The exact dates have gotten fuzzy, though, with time. There are so many, after all, and time is such an artificial marker. It has no meaning without what came before and what followed. It's a lot to think through when you just want to find a photo.
But I do remember the places. And I think that for quickly finding photos, a location trumps a time stamp almost every day.
GPS location tagging on iPhone photos is a world class gift and I can tell you that it's saved me more than once from minutes of swiping through years of pictures to find the one I want. When I show the Map Collection in Apple Photos to my clients, and teach them how to use it, I swear that I see tears of joy.
In the OS 26 updates the old Places tab became the Map Collection, but works pretty much the same.
What has changed, ironically, is where to find it.
Places used to have top level visibility in the Apple Photos menus, but in the new Photos layout, Map has moved into the Utilities Collection. To find it you need to choose the Collections page then go into the Utilities Collection where it’s tucked in among the 13 other Collections.
I know, Collections within Collections within Collections seems a bit complicated, but it works.
So the smart move, for Map and any other useful Collections, is to add it to the Pinned Collection and put that at the top of your Collections page.
For an intro to Pinned Collections you can reference this post from iOS 18 last year when the Library and Collections were all on one page, but building a custom Pinned Collection was the same.
What makes Map so handy for quickly finding pictures is that your iPhone - where almost all of your photos are likely to originate - can add a GPS location tag automatically. You just have to be sure it’s enabled in Settings > Privacy & Security > Location Services > Camera. I set it to just use location when the app is being used. And if you are worried about sharing locations of a photo, you can always delete it from a photo and have options to not share the location when sharing a photo.
Aside from using Map to find a photo, locations are important for many of the other Collections like Memories and Trips. You can also use location as part of a Search task, so location tagging is a pretty big deal in the overall Apple Photos experience.
The thing is that when you have old scans or digital camera photos, those coordinates don't exist. Also, imported photos that are shared with you may not have location tags. You have to add them to those files yourself.
Fortunately, it's pretty easy.
First, you need to go to Apple Maps on your Mac and find the location of the photo. It doesn't have to be exact.
Next, you left-click and hold to mark the location and bring up the location info which includes - big surprise - the GPS coordinates of the location.
Then click on the ellipsis (three dots) of the info panel and you will get a choice to Copy Coordinates.
Pull up the photo(s) where you want to add the location, and open the Info palette.
Then paste the coordinates into the location field at the bottom of the palette.
Or, let’s say you’ve received pictures from an event or trip from a companion. You can also copy the location from your photos and paste it to the un-tagged photos that were shared with you.
You can even type a location name into the empty location field and Photo will offer a general location from the Map. It may not be exactly the photo capture location, but should be close enough to show up where you want when viewing the Map Collection.
Now when you go to the Places tab in Photos, you can zoom in on the map to see what photos you have, based on your location tags. It's easy to find all the photos you have from that place as well as see a history of photos from those locations over time. Perfect for a summer home retrospective.
Then you can worry about the dates.
This is a repost from May 12, 2023 updated for OS 26. Map images may look slightly different.
If your photos are living on Apple devices - iPhone, iPad, Mac, iCloud - and you are confused, overwhelmed, or just eager to understand all the in’s and out’s of this amazing photography system, let me help you. You can see me at Bluewater Imaging. I provide easy to understand support and training to people worldwide.
Email paul@bluewaterimaging.com or book a free 15 minute phone consult HERE