Naming faces in Photos on Mac

[DaveWT]

I am more of a snapshot taker rather than a real photographer and I have collected about 34,000 photos in Photos (5.0) on my iMac (Catalina 10.15.6)
I am undertaking a massive cleanup of my Photos library, hoping to greatly pare that count down to only good, unique and meaningful photos as well as better labelling.

One aspect of this, is that I want to be sure all photos with people in them are well identified as to who the people are. In the (good?) old days of iPhoto, once you had named a person there was a feature where iPhoto would show other photos where it thought it found the same person and you could quickly agree or disagree, so that all the photos of that person were quickly collected.

In Photos there doesn't seem to be the exact same functionality and I have been having a hard time understanding how to manage the "People" collections. So I went to Photos Help and looked up how to add a name. I found this:

"Name a person’s photos: Click Add Name in the toolbar, type a name, then press Return (or choose a name that appears as you type). If a photo is misidentified, Control-click it and choose “[name] is not in this photo” or “This is not [name].” "

But where is the toolbar in Photos with an "Add Name"? so I searched for "toolbar" in Photos Help and found nothing. So I did a general web search for "toolbar in Photos on Mac" and found an Apple support document at https://support.apple.com/en-ca/guide/mac-help/mchlb294260e/mac It stated in part:

"Hide or show the toolbar: Choose View > Hide Toolbar or View > Show Toolbar.: But in Photos there is no View > Show Toolbar. I did see a View > Always show toolbar and sidebar in full screen" which is checked but going into full screen doesn't seem to add a toolbar.

I am sure there is an easy way to add names to people in Photos but I just can't seem to discover it myself.

 

[DaveWT]

Fortunately I found a good article at iMore.com

People and Places in Photos for Mac: The ultimate guide

The Photos app for Mac lets you easily and conveniently organize and search for your images and videos, and the People album and Places let you find the folks you live in the places you love!

www.imore.com

 

[chas_m]

It's been so long since I've turned this feature on I had to puzzle it out again, but in the View menu in Photos you can turn on "Show Face Names."

Once that's done, you can then open any photo and start typing in a name where it says "unknown." This will prompt matches with people you've already named previously, or create a new "face" for the People section, and from there of course it suggests other photos that person might be in. You can opt to turn off "Show Face Names" if you only want to see this when you're actively adding names.

 

[DaveWT]

It looks like I have a bigger issue now after messing about with "People" Now when I go there I see this at the bottom:

" Updating People...
To finish updating your people, quit Photos and make sure your Mac is connected to power."

After quitting Photos and leaving my iMac on of course, this message never goes away.

 

[chas_m]

This is likely something to do with an iCloud backup, if you are using iCloud Photo Library. Try letting it sleep overnight.

 

[DaveWT]

Nope, I don't use iCloud Photo Library. I'm to cheap to pay for extra storage!

 

[chas_m]

Try opening Photos with the command and option keys held down, and choosing the repair option. Make sure you have done a backup of your Photos library (or just a general backup) before doing this.

 

[DaveWT]

Good suggestion, Chas, I will give that a try tomorrow after doing a CCC backup. But I have read several threads on the internet where people report the same issue. I will report back if the repair makes a difference, but otherwise it seems just to be an annoyance that isn't otherwise affecting my use of Photos.

 

[DaveWT]

Try opening Photos with the command and option keys held down, and choosing the repair option. Make sure you have done a backup of your Photos library (or just a general backup) before doing this.

Well, today I did the repair, and it looked good at first. After a lengthy restoration I was back into Photos and when I looked at the "People" section it said it still had to "scan" all my photos when the app was shut down. So I quit Photos and later checked.

It is now back to saying "Updating People..." etc. so I don't think anything has been resolved.