Tuna Fish

I have a large number of photos in different of formats with a unknown number of duplicates over four external hard drives and with two hard drives on my current computer, I not sure how to 1-elimate duplicates,2 how to set up my current computer hard drives and external drive for safety and storage of pictures. I would be interested any software to find duplicates and should I move all my pictures to hard drive before I start to delete photos.

rmalarz Loc: Tempe, Arizona

https://www.ashisoft.com/blog/top-5-best-duplicate-photo-finder-to-delete-duplicate-photos/
That will help you determine the software you'd want to use.

Otherwise, I'd get an additional drive, copy all the photos to that drive, then start working on that drive only to find and eliminate duplicates.
--Bob

gvarner Loc: Central Oregon Coast

A utility called Ccleaner would do it.

frankraney Loc: Clovis, Ca.

frankraney Loc: Clovis, Ca.

How? It's not a duplicate file finder.

PHRubin Loc: Nashville TN USA

1) First, are they actually duplicates? I post process photos and put them in a new folder with the same file name. I keep the original in an "archives" folder. So I have more than one file with the same name but different content on my hard drive in different folders.

2) If you copy all files into one folder, the operating system should ask what to do with duplicates.

goldenyears Loc: Lake Osewgo

There are plenty of tools to locate duplicates with the same filename across multiple storage devices... I like a free one called everything.exe. But a larger problem for me is how to find duplicates when I've already given various edited versions different file names. Prevention is the only solution I know of. Example, when editing IMG_0123, naming the results IMG_0123_RED_ROSE, IMG_0123_MY_GARDEN, etc. I wish I'd started doing that long ago. Does anyone have a different solution?

rmalarz Loc: Tempe, Arizona

My solution is to transfer photos from a memory card to a hard drive into directories labeled by Year>YearMonth>YearMonthDay. The files are renamed during transfer to CameraCode-YearMonthDayRollNumber-Exposure. This provides a unique identifier for each image file. Information is then either extracted to or input into a database. I've used this system for about 20+ years and it works rather smoothly.

Photographs are then processed and saved in the same directory as the original file was saved. I generally don't keep the jpg file any longer than I need. The .psd or .psb files are kept, however.
--Bob

BigOldArt Loc: Seminole, FL

CCleaner is free. I use it only to find duplicate files of all kinds. I don' use its other funcitions.
I typically work with folders for photos, statistical data files, letters, spreadsheets, etc.
1) download files from a memory card, webpages, etc onto a working folder on my desktop which on my c: drive (SSD)
2) copy that folder into a backup version on the desktop,
3) do stuff with the files in the working folder.
4) copy files from the working folder to archive folders on the second (conventional) drive.
5) use CCleaner to check the working file vs the appropriate folders on the second disk
<tools> <duplicate finder> <name> <size> <contents>
that specifies that files are the same if the name, the size, and the checksum are the same.
That produces a list of pairs.
6) Right-click on the entry of a pair that is in the working folder. Click the option to select all files like this from the working folder. click <delete selected>

7)Periodically back up the archive folders to an external disk.

frankraney Loc: Clovis, Ca.

Ive used CCleaner for years and never saw that function...I use Everything and Easu Duplicate Finder....will have to check ccleaner.

update........i just tried it. thank you for the info. its under tools. I always looked at CCleaner as a registry cleaner, crcap finder etc..

no12mo

You didn't really give us enough info. Desktop / notebook? OS? You're going to open this thread wide open to a bizillion different solutions. More info needed

frankraney Loc: Clovis, Ca.

There are several suggestions for duplicate scanners.....

What I would do, is figure out the amount of drive space ALL your photos take up, then get two drives bigger than this. One for a working drive and one for backup. I would then copy ALL photos to the new drive. And the backup drive. Once all your photos are consolidated, then start the scanning process for duplicates. What ever you use for scanning, I would make sure you can v view thumbnails side by side to make sure they are dup's before deleting one.

Once you have done this, I would start a directory structure, by year. Make a directory for each year you have photos, then move the photos for that year into that directory. The door the same for the months under the year. So, a director of 2021, and under that, 0121 for Jan, or jan-01-21. What ever works for you.

This is going to take some time. Back you're frequently to the back up drive. Once done. And all photos are on the news drive with no errors. You can then start the process of redoing the other drives, and using for backups. You can back up by year or whatever.

I hope you use a dam (digital asset management) program after the culling is done. I use lightroom. Then you can import all the photos from the working drive into lightroom and life gets easy now.

I hope this helps. You will need time and patience. Go slow and methodically. Think it out first and write down your steps, and then go slow.

Good luck.

JeffR Loc: Rehoboth Beach, Delaware

You want software that's actually comparing the images, not just their name or metadata. Try “Awesome Duplicate Photo Finder.” It’s free and you can get it at http://www.duplicate-finder.com/photo.html. It doesn't automatically delete anything -- I would NEVER allow that. It shows both photos side by side with data regarding file size and resolution, so that you can make the decision. The settings allow you to search for 100% identical photos, or for similar photos, and it's analyzing the image itself, not just name or metadata. I’ve used this terrific piece of software for years and love it.

RiJoRi Loc: Sandy Ridge, NC

Similar. First, I use TotalCmd for my file manager. Then, I do this for my "phonera" pix, but also for my DSLR, just for consistency.
My file system has folders for each photo app, and subfolders with the date or subject. I copy the photos into the appropriate folder.
"IMG_" gets replaced with a 3-4 letter abbreviation for the app. HedgeCam becomes "HDG". I then follow it with a 2-digit sequence number, two single quotes for a title, and the date in YY-MM-DD order.
If I modify a file, the seq.no gets a letter attached. ("02" becomes "02a", etc.) If I edit it again, another letter gets attached. ("02a" becomes "02aa"). If I resize a photo for uploading here, (Sm) goes on after the date.
Example:
"BC 01 'By Dollar General' 20=08=21 (Sm).jpeg"
Which means,
"Black Camera, photo #1, 'title' date (Resized)"
This works for me. YMMV.

BigOldArt Loc: Seminole, FL

I would want something more than name and meta data.

CCleaner can be set to detect a match on name, size, and content. I believe that CCleaner flags the same content using standard checksum functions.
A checksum is not typically part of the metadata. Checksums can be calculated on any file, not just photos.
https://www.howtogeek.com/363735/what-is-a-checksum-and-why-should-you-care/


example of metadata
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exif

Edited versions retain much metadata, (camera settings, longitude, latitude)

On windows 10, this process shows how edited versions retain much metadata, (camera settings, longitude, latitude, date taken). But the edited versions do not come up as duplicates. If you are writing or checking out
software, this could help track the same original through edited versions.

open a photo in Photoshop or something.
crop it to 2 distinct aspect ratios, e.g.,
crop it to 8*10 save it with the same name in a different folder
crop it to 3*5 save it with the same name in another different folder another new name,
In windows explorer, right-click on the original file then <properties>, then the 8*10 file, and the 3*5 file.
Eyeball the 3 displays.

I Ccleaner specify the 3 folders with the 3 versions. check the boxes for name. <search> See the matches. <back> check the box for content. <search> What do you see?
check the box for content.